Igor Stravinsky is a giant among composers—not because he pioneered a new sound that revolutionized music, but because he did it more than once. Insatiably curious, Stravinsky reinvented himself again and again. And so it was that he shocked the disciples of the avant-garde by setting aside his bad boy image to find new ideas in classic structures. Using a style that came to be called Neoclassicism, Stravinsky found new freedom in economy, balance, clarity, and restraint—all hallmarks of Joseph Haydn, the standard bearer of eighteenth-century Classicism.
In an inspired pairing of the Classical and the Neoclassical, Michael Tilson Thomas presents Stravinsky and Haydn together. The superb SF Symphony Chorus joins the Orchestra in Stravinsky’s kaleidoscopic three-movement choral masterpiece, Symphony of Psalms. A tireless advocate for young musicians, MTT welcomes cellist Oliver Herbert, an alumnus of the San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra, as soloist in Haydn’s Cello Concerto No. 2.