San Francisco Symphony & Chorus at Davies Symphony Hall, November 24, 2021

Daniel Stewart conducts the San Francisco Symphony & Chorus
Davies Symphony Hall
201 Van Ness, San Francisco, CA 94102 USA
7:30 PM, Wednesday, November 24, 2021

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• Anna Clyne: Sound and Fury [West Coast Premiere]
• Ludwig van Beethoven: Symphony No. 9

[7:35 PM] {lights down; announcements; concertmaster out for formal tuning}
[7:37 PM] {Daniel Stewart enters, gives a promo talk on the Clyne piece}

Anna Clyne (b. 1980): Sound and Fury (2019) [West Coast Premiere]

1. [7:41 PM] Sound and Fury
   [7:57 PM] {set ends; applause and bows; all off after a minute or so}

[8:16 PM] {lights down, choral performers out to fill the terrace seating above the stage}
[8:18 PM] {concert tuning}
[8:20 PM] {Daniel Stewart enters}

Ludwig van Beethoven (1770–1827): Symphony No. 9 in D minor, Opus 125 (1824)

1. [8:21 PM] I. Allegro ma non troppo, un poco maestoso
2. [8:36 PM] II. Molto vivace
   {brief pause for the vocal soloists to enter the center terrace and be seated}
3. [8:48 PM] III. Adagio molto e cantabile—Andante moderato
4. [9:03 PM] IV. Finale: Ode, “To Joy”
   [9:08 PM] {the Chorus unmasks}
   [9:27 PM] {show ends; bows and applause until 9:30 PM}

San Francisco Symphony & Chorus

• Daniel Stewart: conductor.
• David Xiques: assistant choral director;
  performers vary by program.

• Michelle Bradley: soprano vox;
• Jennifer Johnson Cano: mezzo-soprano vox;
• Mario Chang: tenor vox;
• Rod Gilfry: baritone vox;

What with weirdness in BART scheduling lately, I head over to SF early, and end up arriving at Davies Hall just a few minutes after the start of tonight's “Inside Music” talk by Elizabeth Seitz. It was kind of interesting, but since I didn't take notes, I can't really offer much in the way of opinion, except to say that she's not as engaging as Robert Greenberg. Anyways, listening to the talk was a good way to kill time before the show!

I don't remember having seen Daniel Stewart conduct before. In his favor, he worked the entire show from memory: no music stand whatsoever. On the other hand, this also meant no baton. His hand gestures were certainly very emphatic, but only sporadically seemed to have any sort of time-keeping function. In other words, I couldn't really figure out what he was doing up there, beyond making a spectacle of himself arranging cascades of sound like a symphonic version of an air guitarist.

Clyne's piece was pretty interesting. I'd like to hear it again … and ta-da! Looks like a 2020 performance is up at YouTube.

It was great to hear Beethoven's Ninth again: note to self, do it again before 2030!

Program Notes

Joshua Kosman posted a typically churlish review with SFGate.

Stephen Shaw posted a more positive review with SFCV. Major props also to Stephen for mentioning the KDFC stream archive for this show; thanks to his comment, you can listen to the show yourself!

Set One and Two

Back to the previous event! ☸ Up to the 2021 yearbox! ☸ Up to the 2021 event list! ☸ On to the next event!