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Month: April 2019

KALEIDOSCOPIC MUSICAL EXPERIENCE

KALEIDOSCOPIC MUSICAL EXPERIENCE

OAKLAND—It was a bizarre concert, the most haphazard of events thrown like a tossed salad, yet one of the most stimulating of the season. Single-sheet printed programs were late arriving (ink already dry!), handed out to patrons moments before the downbeat. And no one thought to print the names of the three instrumentalists anywhere. You hardly expected a barn-burner, in a modest 150-seat church well removed from the main venues, with the long-haired presenter/arranger/pianist Derek Sup buzzing about in his…

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REMEMBERING ZEMLINSKY

REMEMBERING ZEMLINSKY

If you always yearned to know composers from A to Z, tune in on Alexander Zemlinsky, who spans the extremes. The long-forgotten Austrian composer Zemlinsky was finally given his due with the S.F. Symphony’s first performance of his tone poem “The Mermaid,” 116 years after its premiere. The Viennese composer had the double misfortune of losing out to Gustav Mahler: musically, standing in his instrumental shadow, and romantically, yielding up the elusive Alma, who married Gustav and left A.Z. in…

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EXUBERANCE OVER A PRODIGAL SON

EXUBERANCE OVER A PRODIGAL SON

LOS ANGELES—Yet another grand Salonen love-in, with his third orchestra on the West Coast this year. Is there no end? This time, it was Esa-Pekka leading his former crack ensemble, the L.A. Philharmonic, in his long meandering farewell tour before taking the reins at the S.F. Symphony next year. You hope that your maestro-to-be will be an outstanding musician. What you never expect is the bonus of exuberant affection around several concert halls with totally different audiences and musicians. Little…

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The Nonstop Opera Composer

The Nonstop Opera Composer

REDWOOD CITY, CA—Opera composers are caught in a to-be-or-not-to-be quandary when adapting great novels for the stage. Should the text, consonants and all, be squeezed into librettos of talky vocal lines? Or else just retain the gist and plot (like Giuseppe Verdi) while adding rhymes and all those delectable, soaring vowels that singers love so dearly? Composer Kirke Mechem, 93, audaciously chose the first option in taking on Jane Austen’s classic timeless novel “Pride and Prejudice,” producing his latest opera…

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THE METHUSELAH OF MAESTROS

THE METHUSELAH OF MAESTROS

BERKELEY, CA—Peter Phillips has been conductor of Britain’s Tallis Scholars chamber chorus so long, some of his 10 singers were not even born when he started. Amazingly, over these 47 years the Scholars have maintained their amazing prowess at renaissance music in concert and recordings as they returned to the First Congregational Church for the 19th time. Needless to say, the performance  was sold out with modern-day enthusiasts thronging for olden-day church music. Is anything ever new in renaissance music?…

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OPERA PREMIERE: SIZE IS IMMATERIAL

OPERA PREMIERE: SIZE IS IMMATERIAL

The future of opera in America points more than ever to small, mobile, no-star troupes like Opera Parallèle. Consider the financial pinch of the vaunted major companies like the Metropolitan Opera (pressed despite orchestra seats running close to $500 a night), and now the San Francisco Opera, which just recently laid off 10 staffers. Here in the Bay Area, the fire is lit by lesser-known, versatile troupes in compact theaters, like the local Opera Parallèle in a rough-and-tumble 240-seat theater…

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