San Francisco Performances presents Philip Glass @ 80: Music with Changing Parts featuring Philip Glass Ensemble
Davies Symphony Hall
201 Van Ness, San Francisco, CA 94102 USA
7:30 PM, Tuesday, February 20, 2018
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[7:31 PM chorus out, then PGE, in multiple waves; 7:36 PM lights, announce, GO!]
I really enjoyed my vantage point in the terrace tonight for the opportunity to watch the stage craft and technical direction of the ensemble. It seemed to me that while Reisman may have been highest in command as far as steering things, most of the actual conducting work got delegated to Valerie Sainte-Agathe. Ryan Kelly appeared to be keeping a close watch on things as well, presumably looking for cures from the performers that he should be making adjustments to their monitor mixes. I also liked watching the timing (?) displays, but it was super difficult distinguishing how the primary counter corresponded to anything that was happening onstage or in the score. It wasn't simply time (that was in a tiny window at the bottom of the screen, only barely legible from my seat), and it wasn't the measure number (the count went up way too slowly for that). Not do I think it was the page number, since the performers seemed to be working from scores that didn't really share information that way (which is to say, the keyboards weren't turning pages twice as fast, even though they had two staves to read). Maybe it was a phrase number? Guess I need to go find some technical description of the work! Anyways, that number ran up, but sometimes repeated sections, like 1-24, then 13a-24a, then 25-48, and so on. In retrospect, I should have kept track: more data to use for reverse engineering their secrets!
Joshua Kosman posted an interesting promo article about the show at SFGATE.
And very happily, last week's concert at Carnegie Hall was recorded via multi angled pro shot video, and has been posted for your time-limited viewing pleasure by MediciTV … You have until 5/17/18 to watch it (though paying subscribers might not suffer that deadline). Highly recommended!
Back to the previous event! ☸ Up to the 2018 yearbox! ☸ Up to the 2018 event list! ☸ On to the next event!