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Month: November 2023

FIRES, FORESTS AND CRINGE-WORTHY EXERCISES  

FIRES, FORESTS AND CRINGE-WORTHY EXERCISES  

The weekend’s S.F. Symphony programs were downbeat more than upbeat leaving little to cheer about except the robust SFS Chorus under Jenny Wong. Well, maybe not that either. “Yes, they sang in Russian, but you couldn’t understand much of it,” a patron fluent in Russian divulged. This was the masterful oratorio of a Russian celebration by Igor Stravinsky, “Les Noces” (the Wedding), telling his century-old tale in his staunch neoclassical way, with soprano Lauren Snouffer playing the lead role of…

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RADICAL INVENTIVENESS IN STRING FOURSOMES

RADICAL INVENTIVENESS IN STRING FOURSOMES

BERKELEY—Striking enough were the unruly progressive touches in the Beethoven E Minor (“Razumovsky”) string quartet. On top of that came another four-movement string quartet, “Flow,” by Nokuthula Endo Ngwenyama, 47, breaking traditional bounds and expanding sonic boundaries with her world premiere. All this was poured out by the veterans of the Takács Quartet before a sizable audience at Hertz Hall on the UC campus Nov. 12, with the premiere composer in attendance. Enigmatic music is the new composer’s hallmark, giving…

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NEW AND NOVEL SOUNDS

NEW AND NOVEL SOUNDS

BERKELEY—-With some 100 groups participating, the California Festival: A Celebration of New Music  sprang to life with a bang as the San Francisco Symphony visited the Berkeley with all-modern music that was well-attended—a daring concert venture indeed. When it came to the world premiere, the students in the house were vociferous in their enthusiasm, perhaps most responsive to the rock-music blended into the orchestra by the black composer Jens Ibsen with his “Drowned in Light.” In his stimulating quarter-hour two-movement…

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FOLKSINGER’S MIDAS TOUCH WITH OPERA

FOLKSINGER’S MIDAS TOUCH WITH OPERA

The latest sensation in opera is the unorthodox “Omar,” written by the polymath folksinger Rhiannon Giddens, winner of a Pulitzer, MacArthur “genius” award and Grammy. With co-composer Michael Abels, she turned out the multicultural drama now staged at the San Francisco Opera. It is based on the true story of Omar ibn Sayyid, a 19th-century African-Arab Islamic savant and author who had been forced into slavery and shipped off to the cotton fields. The work is unique in opera annals,…

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