January 2010 – Repeat Performances

January 31, 2010

SF Performances brings Midori to Bay Area

Exploring contemporary music—five composers, five directions On Sunday, Jan. 31, famed violinist Midori held an all-day workshop in anticipation of her concert next Saturday, Feb. 6 at Herbst Theater. The symposium included panels and a master class, and started with a lecture/demonstration, a...

Categories: music

Ensemble Parallèle present ‘Wozzeck’

Darkness unto death ... Startling and emotionally complex, the music of Alban Berg’s Wozzeck weaves through the story of Franz Wozzeck, threading his mad and despairing visions with rich instrumental color. This past...

Categories: opera

January 27, 2010

Smuin Ballet’s Winter Concert Preview

Discovering new territory ...

Categories: dance

January 22, 2010

Oakland Symphony’s Armenian concert

Violinist Simonyan delivers the goods The Oakland East Bay Symphony rewarded the faithful Friday night at the Paramount Theater with an exhilarating performance by Mikhail Simonyan. The 23-year-old violinist blistered the air (if not the hairs of his bow)...

Categories: music

January 15, 2010

George Benjamin leads San Francisco Symphony

Exotic birds fill Davies Symphony Hall The San Francisco Symphony held a two-week mini-festival to honor George Benjamin, this year’s British composer-in-residence. He personally conducted the second of three programs, held Jan 14 -16, interspersing an early success and a recent piece of his own between Ravel and Messiaen, composers who shaped his work. It was informative to hear a composer amid his influences, drawing our ear to musical lineage and strands of harmonic...

Categories: music

January 3, 2010

Starting the New Year at Kohl Mansion

A program of romantic sweep and subtlety “Music at Kohl Mansion” rang in the New Year with a gala concert on Sunday, January 3, celebrating with the FOG Trio. This Burlingame music series is held at the impressive Kohl Mansion, built in 1914 by the scion of a shipping magnate and willed by his mistress to a convent. Now a religious college preparatory school for girls (Mercy High School), the ornate Great Hall is also the site of a long-running chamber music...

Categories: music