Stella Chen at Davies Symphony Hall, June 26, 2024

San Francisco Symphony presents Stella Chen with George Li
Davies Symphony Hall
201 Van Ness, San Francisco, CA 94102 USA
7:30 PM, Wednesday, June 26, 2024

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[7:31 PM] {lights down, announcements, performers out}

1. [7:33 PM] Franz Schubert (1797–1828): Rondo in B minor, D.895 (1826)
   [7:47 PM] {applause at end of work; performers head offstage}

[7:49 PM] {performers return; greetings from SC; comments on the next work}

1. [7:52 PM] [Eleanor Alberga](https://www.eleanoralberga.com/) (b. 1949): No-Man’s-Land Lullaby (1996)
   [8:02 PM] {work ends}

[8:04 PM] {performers back out}

Ludwig van Beethoven (1770–1827): Violin Sonata in A major, Opus 47, Kreutzer (1804)

1. [8:05 PM] Adagio sostenuto–Presto
   [8:19 PM] {pause for tuning}
   02. [8:19 PM] Andante con variazioni
2. [8:35 PM] Finale: Presto
   [8:44 PM] {applause at end of work}

1. [8:45 PM] ? (unidentified quiet tune)
   [8:49 PM] {final applause}
   [8:51 PM] {show ends}

• Stella Chen: violin;
• George Li: piano.

Tonight's recital was a nice way to wrap up my regular season with the SF Symphony.

It was funny to look at the performers and think, “Oh, they're so young!,” then to look up their bios and find them to be 31 and 28, respectively. Clearly, my perception is being warped over time!

I liked the show, and I'd be happy to see either performer again, but it wasn't the sort of knock-out experience that gets me thinking that needs to happen next season. I bet that's another factor related to the pile-up of my personal record of the seasons: performances that I might have once found astounding are now perceived as displays of professional competance… solidly good, but not worth jumping up and down and shouting over.

I appreciated Stella's comments before the Alberga piece: hearing personal comments helps round out one's perception of a performer. In this case, while I liked her talk, I didn't hear a strong correlation between her description of Alberga's No-Man's-Land Lullaby and my listening experience. I enjoyed the piece, but I didn't find it particularly dark, frantic, or evocative of war terrors. Probably that means I should look it up and make another listen or two. Happily, that's easy enough: a few seconds work shows that PLATOON LTD has posted Stella's studio recording of the work to YouTube.

My favorite for the night was Schubert's Rondo. I didn't recall hearing that before, but quick reference to my blog shows that I last heard it just over ten years ago, in a recital featuring Anthony Marwood and Marc-André Hamelin. Too bad my notes there seem to cut right at the start. Hard to know now what happened, but clearly, I never finished that writeup, and opted instead to post the incomplete draft. I'm unhappy to find that lapse, but glad that I was able to look up the show: one reason for keeping this blog is to remind myself of all the good experiences I've had.

Program Notes or program notes

Back to the previous event! ☸ Up to the 2024 yearbox! ☸ Up to the 2024 event list! ☸ On to the next event!