Michael Zwiebach

When the exciting new music group Alarm Will Sound visits the Bay Area, tickets are normallyhard to find. 

Here is a short tribute to only a few of the great violinists who have played in the Bay Area in the last month, or who will play here shortly. If the list were complete, it would be twice as long.

For its first big concert, the newly-established Young Womens’ Choral Projects starts off with some fancy rhythms from Gershwin, leading to a whole set of Latin American polyrhythms, American spirituals, and other traditional tunes. 

Livermore Opera opens its La traviata with a known quantity, in Rebecca Davis, who has sung Violetta Valery at Opera San Jose and is an alumna of the Merola Opera Program.

Nathan Gunn is a refined, elegant singer of art song, and his Cal Performances recital promises to be a highlight, in a Bay Area season that’s just crammed with great singers.

This is a decorous early-music concert featuring the marvelous soprano Laura Heimes, trumpeter-extraordinaire John Thiessen, and the crew from Voices of Music, faves of SFCV and famed already for their widely-viewed YouTube and Vimeo channels.

Thank goodness for the problems two people have falling in love and the jams that love lands them in: Otherwise, there would be much less to sing about. 

Khatia Buniatishvili is the real deal, a pianist who is fleet of fingers, yet with a relaxed, musical touch. 

Gold Coast Chamber Players, a group which consistently brings superb professionals from all over to Lafayette and Orinda, is at it again.