Musings on ballet, classical music, the violin, and life
Concerts, recordings, reviews, musings, you name it. I’m a lifelong classical music fan.
Yuja Wang was the star we’d all come to see at San Francisco’s Davies Symphony Hall last Sunday afternoon. A change in programming had rewarded us in dividends; she’d be performing not just one but two piano concertos. For most of the audience, I’m guessing, it was Ravel’s intense Piano Concerto for the Left Hand … Read more
The list must begin with the Violin Concerto. Because it all began with the Violin Concerto. For me, at least. Sure, I’d heard Samuel Barber’s ever-popular Adagio for Strings, but although I loved it like most people do, it was simply that “that lovely, affecting tear-jerker” from a compilation CD I’d had for years and … Read more
It’s October, and the urge for theatrical, spooky music always arises for me right about this time. Cue a visit to the blog I wrote years back, “Ten Spooky Classical Faves for Halloween.” Each year, it seems, I have a different relationship with the music and its composers. This year, I’m taking a … Read more
Ask someone who’s seen the 1940 animated film, Fantasia, which piece they best remember, and the majority will respond with, “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice” or “the one with Mickey Mouse.” (Runners up might include Bach’s “Toccata and Fugue,” Tchaikovsky’s “Waltz of the Flowers,” or Mussorgsky’s “Night on Bald Mountain,” but that’s a blog for another time.) … Read more
I’ve never attended the symphony before with the sense that I might not stay for the program’s second half, but that was my thinking when I entered San Francisco Symphony’s Davies Hall on a recent Sunday afternoon. The first of the program’s two semi-staged works was Ravel’s Ma Mère l’Oye (“Mother Goose”) featuring dancers from … Read more