Previews

PBO's Reason for the Season

Chelsea Nicole Spangler - November 9, 2009

The holiday sales are on, airlines are offering special home-for-the-holidays rates, and pop versions of holiday tunes have already hit the radio airwaves and are playing in malls. Many bemoan the commercialization of the holiday season, and long for a return to a remembered (or perhaps only imagined) past.

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Christmas Pieces, Brand New and Wonderfully Old

Joseph Sargent - November 9, 2009

Traditional December choral concerts, with their well-worn carols and holiday themes, can be great for lifting the spirits. But for concertgoers who want more than just another sing-along, San Francisco Choral Artists’ upcoming program, “Old Chestnuts, New Fire!,” offers a tantalizing alternative.

Brentano String Quartet

Lisa Hirsch - November 3, 2009

The award-winning, Princeton-based Brentano String Quartet has a proven ability to create unusual programs.This year, the quartet brings to Cal Performances a program of two lyrical masters of the quartet form, in which Franz Schubert's Quartettsatz, D. 703, and Quartet in G Major, D.

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Picasso Quartet

Michael Zwiebach - November 3, 2009

It might just be worth an hour or two to check out the new Picasso String Quartet at Noe Valley Chamber Music this weekend.

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NCCO Showcases Bolcom

Michael Zwiebach - November 3, 2009

The upcoming New Century Chamber Orchestra concerts will introduce the music of this year’s “featured composer,” William Bolcom. A major name in American music, Bolcom is one of the old guard whose compositions, from the rags like Graceful Ghost and Galloping Ghost to the Songs of Innocence and Experience, have become staples in the American music repertory.

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Eric Himy, Reviving the Piano Transcription

Ken Iisaka - November 3, 2009

American pianist Eric Himy has carved out a niche in an intriguing way.

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Virtuosity and Variety

Rebecca Liao - November 2, 2009

Despite the name, there’s nothing old school about Old First Concerts.

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Prokofiev, Probed and Performed

Jessica Balik - November 1, 2009

Sergei Prokofiev was a Russian composer who lived through tumultuous historical events.

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No Sticky Wicket For This Otello

Janos Gereben - October 31, 2009

There are a few places in the world where Johan Botha, who is making his San Francisco Opera debut in Verdi's Otello on Nov. 8, is not the most famous man by that name.