Music at Kohl: A Season of Silver

Is there a conspiracy here? After enjoying the mellifluous playing of the Talich String Quartet at the opening concert of Music at Kohl’s silver anniversary season, it’s hard to believe that people aren’t beating down the doors of Burlingame’s Kohl Mansion to get in. Where else in the Bay Area can you hear some of the finest chamber music groups on the planet in such a perfect acoustic? The only possible explanation for why classical music lovers aren’t swarming the place is that Music at Kohl’s dedicated, fiercely loyal long-term patrons and subscribers are in cahoots to keep the series all to themselves. The setting is ideal: the Great Hall of Burlingame’s Kohl Mansion. Built in 1914 by Frederick Kohl, who inherited a mint from his father’s shipping business, the Tudor Revival mansion sits in the easily accessed hills of Burlingame, with beautiful lawns and oaks, a formal rose garden, and a great view. While the mansion’s history is far from rosy — Frederick lived in the house for only two years, committed suicide five years after moving out, and reportedly still haunts the place — it has always served as a refuge: first as the convent of the Sisters of Mercy, since 1931 as Mercy High School, and for the past 25 years, home of a superb concert series. Kohl Mansion’s most impressive feature, and a major inspiration for the series, is its Great Hall. Described by its architects, Howard and White (whose firm also built the Palace of Fine Arts), as "of noble proportions — 27 feet by 60 feet, the arched ceiling rising to a height of 40 feet," the oak-paneled and floored hall, complete with a black Belgian marble fireplace and floor-to-ceiling mullioned windows, was originally designed for music and entertaining. Converted to a chapel by the Sisters of Mercy, it now hosts high school performances, concerts, and private events such as weddings. If anything, the Great Hall’s acoustics have improved over the years. Within six years of Music at Kohl’s first concert, the Loma Prieta earthquake damaged the mansion. During reconstruction, the Great Hall's once-closed archways were opened onto the second floor, positively affecting the hall's reverberant energy. Pianist Garrick Ohlsson, a longtime supporter of the series and honorary chair of Music at Kohl’s 25th anniversary season, praises the space as “an extremely responsive acoustic, very live, and very present. The intimacy is a given.”

Humble Beginnings

Music at Kohl Mansion began rather humbly. Elizabeth Dossa, then a part-time English teacher at Mercy High, explains that she was “seduced” by the idea of chamber music resounding in the lovely, oak-paneled hall. With the support of Mercy High’s former principal, Sister Amy Bayley, and a $2,500 foundation grant, Liz volunteered as program director. A small group of volunteers launched the first four-concert season on Feb. 23, 1983, with a local folk dance group. Although organizations as diverse as a brass ensemble and Pocket Opera have since performed on the series, it soon became clear that the venue’s layout and acoustics were best suited to chamber music. For most of its first decade, Music at Kohl featured only local ensembles and musicians. Save for established groups like the Alexander String Quartet and Stanford String Quartet, concerts mostly presented “hand-picked” ensembles, created for the occasion from a pool of stellar musicians that included Robin Sutherland and Emil Miland. “I don’t want to slight the people who came earlier,” Dossa acknowledges, “but there’s a big difference with people who are committed to performing in one particular chamber group full-time.” In 1992, Dossa decided it was time to move on, and Carol Eggers (now development director for Smuin Ballet) became Music at Kohl’s first executive director. The artistic committee suggested inviting the FOG Trio (named in part for Jorja Fleezanis, violin; Garrick Ohlsson, piano; and Michael Grebanier, cello), which played every year at the Legion of Honor. "I knew Michael, so I gave him a call," says Eggers. "The FOG Trio’s participation served to kick us up to the next level. The name recognition helped me realize that if I liked a group, no matter where they were from, I could just call and ask them to play. Once the groups would come, and experience the wonderful room and fantastic audience, they’d want to come back. It was that simple.” Eggers also cannily chose touring ensembles that would welcome filling in a free Sunday night during their tours. This enabled Music at Kohl to work out “mutually satisfactory financial arrangements” (translation: it could pay less-than-premium fees). Eggers’ ability to lure first-rank chamber ensembles to Burlingame was so enthusiastically received that the series was oversubscribed for over five years. "It was almost like what Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney said in that movie, ‘I’ve got a barn and a bucket of paint, let’s put on a show,’ " Eggers recalls.

School Days

With the implementation of Music at Kohl’s Chamber Music Education Program, which Liz Dossa initiated toward the end of her tenure, Eggers was finally able to secure foundation funding. Recognizing Music at Kohl's significance to the cultural life of the Peninsula, the California Arts Council and the Hewlett, Packard, and other foundations began to pitch in. Today Music at Kohl serves the Burlingame and Millbrae public schools, annually reaching more than 3,500 students in grades K-12. Schools in Foster City and San Mateo have recently been added. Outreach includes in-school events, as well as Music at Kohl’s Web-based curriculum guide, Sounds Like Learning. In 2008, the Puff & Pluck tuba and harp duo will visit kindergartens, the Sitka Quartet will visit grades 1 and 2, and the Del Sol String Quartet will go to grades 3-5. For the second year in a row, the theme for grades K-5, “La Paz por la Musica” (Peace through music) will use musical examples to explore conflict resolution. At the middle and high school level, Music-in-Schools focuses on training opportunities for music students. This year, as many as six schools are receiving visits from two longtime participants, the Alexander String Quartet and the Del Sol String Quartet. The quartets also lead master classes and cross-disciplinary seminars, using chamber music to illuminate history and culture. Since 2006, cellist Eric Gaenslen of the Rossetti String Quartet and violinist Anthony Blea of the San Francisco Opera Orchestra, have given master classes for middle and high school string players. Music at Kohl also offers family concerts on Friday evenings in January, February, and March, and 45-minute weekday children’s concerts. “We’re now just seeing what happens when we decrease arts education in the schools,” says Eggers. “When kids don’t see the performing arts as an entertainment option when they get older, audiences decrease. Our programs make classical music accessible, helping kids realize that attending concerts is a great way to spend their leisure time as they grow older.”

Ohlsson Holds the Keys

In 2005, Garrick Ohlsson launched Music at Kohl’s Artistic Development Fund to make it possible to rent great pianos for the pianists who perform at the mansion. To raise money for the fund, the FOG Trio will present a special 25th anniversary holiday concert on Sunday, December 16, at 7 p.m. The evening will conclude with an artists’ reception and a holiday benefit version of Music at Kohl’s customary, unbelievably generous postconcert buffet.

Patricia Kristof Moy, Music at Kohl’s current executive director, is quick to praise Ohlsson. “Garrick is the knight in shining armor of Music at Kohl,” she says. “I think he has a special fondness for us, because he makes it financially possible for us to engage an artist of his stature. And having friends like Garrick on our series makes it very attractive for other musicians to come and play.” Ohlsson has come a long way since winning first prizes at the 1966 Busoni Competition in Italy and the 1968 Montréal Piano Competition. It was his 1970 triumph at the Chopin Competition in Warsaw that put him on the map. “I didn’t really have a grand plan when I entered the competition,” he acknowledges. “But I did think forward. One of the reasons I wanted to win a big competition like Chopin was to give me many, many more musical opportunities than I had in the past. How should I put it? You’d rather play with the Philadelphia Orchestra than with the Missoula Montana Philharmonic, no disrespect to them intended. “Of course, that’s what happened. The night before the Chopin competition, I was a promising young American pianist who had a couple of dates next season. A few days after I won it, I had about 100 dates next season, including the Philadelphia Orchestra," he says with a chuckle. "It opened the career door.” These days, Ohlsson’s “grander plan” is to build upon his successes “to do more and more," what he wants, where he wants, when he wants. That includes finding a way to play a lot more music by living composers without scaring the average concertgoer. “If we don’t hear the music by those who are composing now,” he says, “it doesn’t exist. From that standpoint, recording is very important. Even if you play, as I have and will, the sonata by Justin Dello Joio – I played it a half -dozen times last year, and will do so again this year – the fact that I’ve recorded it for Bridge [Records] makes a major difference."

The FOG of Performing

That the FOG Trio can actually find time to perform makes the occasion quite special. The trio's three, extremely busy musicians no longer all reside in the Bay Area, and have trouble synchronizing their schedules. When they first formed the trio, Jorja Fleezanis performed with the San Francisco Symphony; since 1989, she's been concertmaster of the Minnesota Orchestra. Michael Grebanier, who has been principal cellist of the San Francisco Symphony for 30 years, shares Fleezanis' inability to travel during much of the year. And San Francisco resident Ohlsson is often on the road, performing 80 to 90 times a year. In choosing works by Haydn, Beethoven, and Brahms for the benefit, Ohlsson says, “We took into consideration which pieces we’ve played there in recent years, so that we were not repeating ourselves. We also considered what we could adequately rehearse in only five days instead of our usual week. We take our rehearsing very seriously. We’re not a shake ’n bake chamber ensemble where you just get together and say, ‘Hey, we know this stuff, let’s dust it off.’ We work really hard. That’s part of the reward of it. "The three of us love playing in Kohl’s intimate setting, because we’re always playing in 2,500-seat concert halls," Ohlsson adds. "It’s thrilling to actually play music that was written for smaller venues in a smaller, more intimate setting where you have the possibility of contact without having to project. Small venues that develop successful series are an important sign of the success of our musical culture." Before the December bash, San Francisco Symphony Friends will occupy the intimate setting with a Nov. 4 program of Hungarian and Hungarian-inspired works by Kodály, Ligeti, Bartók and Brahms. The other chamber performances are Jan. 20, Ying Quartet; Feb. 10, Rossetti String Quartet; March 2, Jupiter String Quartet; March 30, Borealis String Quartet, from Vancouver, Canada, in its Kohl debut; and April 13, Triple Helix Piano Trio. More information is at www.musicatkohl.org. "We’re pleased to salute Music at Kohl on the anniversary of this wonderful series," Ohlsson says. "If they had space to get twice as many people in there, I think they would, which is a great tribute to them.”