San Francisco Contemporary Music Players at Herbst

Freedom from constraint… The San Francisco Contemporary Music Players ended their season last week with a program titled “His Own Space of Freedom,” with a demonstration at ODC April 25 and a performance at Herbst Theater the next evening. Philippe Hurel’s Figures libres pits constraint against freedom. A jazzy array of rhythmic figures—reminiscent of bebop improvisation—found common ground between the grouped instruments. Bass clarinet, oboe and...

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Pacific Boychoir at Lake Merritt Cathedral

Glorious Russian Mass in Oakland Sanctuary On Saturday, April 24, ninety voices filled the sanctuary of Oakland’s newly built Christ the Light Cathedral by Lake Merritt. The Pacific Boychoir, a world-renowned choir that makes its home in Berkeley, is also celebrating their recent Grammy for Best Choral Performance, a product of their collaboration with the SF Symphony in Mahler’s Symphony No. 8. Three years ago choral director Kevin Fox decided to recreate Sergei...

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Oakland Symphony at the Paramount

A "letter from the Front.” So I get up in the morning and find that the first thing I want to do is not write a review of the concert I attended the night before. Which is to say I don't want to get up and immediately assume the pontifical role of critic. Let the sleeping dog lie a little while longer! But it seems a natural thing simply to write you a note about the concert. And there's this—I find that my memory of such a thing the morning after is a truer impression,...

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SF Performances hosts Auerbach and Weilerstein

Herbst Theater spellbound Hot young composer Lera Auerbach joined Alisa Weilerstein, arguably the next generation’s great cellist, in a program that explored Bach through the lens of Shostakovich, and then re-imagined it for piano and cello. This layering of composers revealed...

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