San Francisco Performances presents a recital by Jennifer Koh and Shai Wosner: Bridge to Beethoven, night 1
2015-11-04
Herbst Theatre
401 Van Ness Avenue, San Francisco, CA
7:30 PM, Wednesday, November 4, 2015

Back to the previous event! ☸ Up to the 2015 yearbox! ☸ Up to the 2015 event list! ☸ On to the next event!

• Beethoven: Violin Sonata No. 1, Op. 12, No. 1 in D Major
• Beethoven: Violin Sonata No. 2, Op. 12, No. 2 in A Major (moved to night 2)
• Beethoven: Violin Sonata No. 9, Op. 47 in A Major “Kreutzer”
• Vijay Iyer: Bridgewater Fantasy in conversation with “Kreutzer”

[7:32 PM lights down, announcements from Ruth Felt]

Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827): Violin Sonata No. 1, Op. 12, No. 1 in D Major (1798)

1. [7:35 PM] Allegro con brio
2. [7:44 PM] Tema con variazioni: Andante con moto
3. [7:51 PM] Rondo: Allegro
   [set ends 7:56 PM]

Vijay Iyer (b. 1971): Bridgewater Fantasy in conversation with “Kreutzer” (2015)

1. [7:57 PM] (part 1)
2. [8:0m PM] (part 2)
3. [8:08 PM] (part 3)
4. [8:m PM] (part 4)
   [set ends 8:15 PM]

[8:38 PM lights down]

Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827): Violin Sonata No. 9, Op. 47 in A Major, “Kreutzer” (1802)

1. [8:39 PM] Adagio sostenuto: Presto
2. [8:53 PM] Andante con variazioni
3. [9:09 PM] Finale: Presto
   [set ends 9:18 PM back to bow 2 or 3 times, but no encore for us tonight]

• Jennifer Koh: violin;
• Shai Wosner: piano.

Tried to time my arrival in the vicinity of Herbst with the 7 PM release of parking restrictions on McAllister near Van Ness, but found upon my first go round (not later than 7:05 PM) that every single spot was already taken. Buncha bold souls those drivers! So I circled around a few more times, then spotted a passenger loading zone on Polk that was inactive (after 6 PM!), and so ditched the car and walked over to the War Memorial Performing Arts Center on Van Ness. Inside Herbst for the first time since 2013, the renovated hall looks very nice. I like that the white paint has been replaced with wood paneling. Overall, it's really hard to detect any major changes inside the hall – just minor touches here and there.

After taking a few minutes to rearrange the seats (hooray for free-standing chairs in the Box Seating sections!), I settle down to relax and read a little before the show, then chit-chat with TC once he shows up. Ruth Felt welcomes a small turnout and reminds us that this is just the first of a four-part series, then departs to make way for the musicians. It seems very strange to me that the show isn't a sellout, but hey, it's not my job to analyze, so I let it go. Happy to be present!

The event unrolls in sparkling fashion. As it progresses, I'm reminded again and again how fun it is to listen to Beethoven. He might not always take the shortest route between two musical points of interest, but you can guarantee that the journey will be interesting! Vijay Iyer's new piece was considerably harder to grasp, and it sounded far more like avant-garde jazz than traditional classical writing to me. Iyer had both performers using an array of non-standard techniques throughout the piece, which appeared to be constructed in four sections (thus my division above), though no mention was made of such breakdown in the program notes, and the parts segued into one another pretty seamlessly (thus my omission of timestamps for two of the arbitrary divisions that I claim to have heard). I liked the piece, but it's connection to Beethoven seemed to rest entirely on the abstract etymological information provided in the program rather than any attempt by Iyer to approach or interpret Beethoven's sound-world for present day ears.

Lou Fancher penned a promo article for SFCV about this series.

Stephen Smoliar posted a positive review of the gig at the Examiner.

Back to the previous event! ☸ Up to the 2015 yearbox! ☸ Up to the 2015 event list! ☸ On to the next event!