An aria from Handel's Messiah proclaims, "The trumpet shall sound," and San Francisco Symphony trumpeter Mark Inouye expressed it brilliantly during recent performances of the oratorio in Davies Symphony Hall. It was a great way to finish off the year and the first third of the SFS season. Music-lovers, regardless of religion or lack thereof, would be hard-pressed to find a better way to get into the spirit of the holidays, and SFS Chorus Director Ragnar Bohlin conducted an edition that fulfilled an annual tradition with tasteful liveliness.
Mark Inouye is a front-runner for MVP when he solos, but German violinist Christian Tetzlaff, in an electrifying performance of the Shostakovich Concerto No. 1 last October, also showed what sparks can fly when a gifted visitor collaborates with the orchestra. The program, dedicated to Russian masterpieces, also allowed Finnish conductor Susanna Malkki to make some magic of her own.
Music Director Michael Tilson Thomas hasn't been taking a back seat, either. His roll-out of a complete Schumann symphony cycle (all being recorded for the SFS Media label) is off to a fine start, with the First Spring and the Third Rhenish already in the can. We look forward to performances this spring of the Symphonies Nos. 2 and No. 4. MTT has a wonderful understanding of the composer's pulse. His lithe readings offer fresh insights.
Praise also goes to the all-French concert conducted by Yan Pascal Tortelier in November with another returning star, pianist Jean-Efflam Bavouzet, playing the fiendish Ravel Piano Concerto for the Left Hand. Tortelier's selection of excerpts from Bizet's Carmen Suites 1 and 2 opened a dazzling bill that ended with Saint-Saens' Symphony No. 3, Organ, blowing the dust off the magnificent DSH Rufatti. Theme programs are always crowd-pleasers, as MTT has often demonstrated.
2016 gets cracking with conductor and violinist Itzhak Perlman appearing Jan. 9 & 10 in Beethoven (violin) and Mozart and Brahms (baton). Look out for the annual return of Conductor Laureate Herbert Blomstedt and some other remarkable guest conductors, including the exciting Pablo Heras-Casado, in April. MTT is giving us big helpings of Mahler in April, June and July, and Leonard Bernstein's On the Town is on the calendar for May.
Across the street, the San Francisco Opera's 93rd fall season ended with a thud as The Fall of the House of Usher: A Double Bill literally rained blood on the protagonist at the end of musicologist Robert Orledge's reconstruction of Debussy's La Chute de la Maison Usher. The first half, Gordon Getty's Usher House, was even more tedious, but Brian Mulligan as the central character (in both operas) braved the ordeal and proved why he has become David Gockley's current go-to baritone. He also appeared in two other gruesome productions, one actually filled (again literally) with buckets of gore.
Soprano Leah Crocetto (wow), tenor Michael Fabiano (double wow) and Company Music Director Nicola Luisotti were first in the fall line-up, with Francesca Zambello's coolly handsome production of Verdi's Luisa Miller . There were corpses at the final curtain, but the story, taken from Schiller, is filled with intrigue and violence. It was sort of a downer for an opening gala, but no one could say it wasn't a grand night for singing.
Mulligan was next up, and he got his first wallow in bloodshed in the season's biggest popular hit, Stephen Sondheim's Sweeney Todd. He replaced Gerald Finley (with his wife awaiting the birth of a child) to play the famously tortured soul bent on revenge. Relying on her own vocal strength to make an indelible mark, but with expert comic timing thrown in, mezzo-soprano Stephanie Blythe tore the place apart as Sweeney's partner-in-crime Mrs. Lovett. The big-voiced duo made a convincing opera out of an operatic musical. Director Lee Blakely's atmospheric staging from Theatre du Chatelet filled the War Memorial with marvelous spectacle.
Playing the title character's nasty brother in director Michael Cavanagh's overwrought vision of Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor , Mulligan didn't get much of a breather before returning to sing by the side of a blood-soaked Nadine Sierra. Star tenor Piotr Beczala also partnered well with the lovely soprano as she substituted for Diana Damrau. All three offered some spectacular singing amidst the heavy-handed symbolism.
A revival (after a short break) of visual artist Jun Kaneko's amazing designs for Mozart's The Magic Flute lightened the mood, and sopranos Kathryn Bowden (Merola alumna) and Julie Adams (first-year Adler Fellow) triumphed as the Queen of the Night and First Lady as they filled in for ailing singers. Baritone Efrain Solis (second-year Adler Fellow) made his role debut as Papageno, and went on to steal the show.
The SFO premiere of David McVicar's production of Wagner's Die Meistersinger von Nurnberg , conducted by Mark Elder and starring English baritone James Rutherford (in the enormous role of Sachs, after Greer Grimsley cancelled), Brandon Jovanovich and Rachel Willis-Sorensen took pride of place as a nearly flawless addition to the season. Smaller parts were sung by tenor Alek Shrader and mezzo-soprano Sasha Cooke in a musical marathon that still managed to engross us until the jubilant finale. Ian Robertson's choristers danced and sang with the best of them; their contributions throughout the season were a testament to professionalism.
Before the concluding dud ended things on a sour note, another popular (and quickly revived) staging filled the seats with happy fans who can't get enough of director Emilio Sagi's take on Rossini's Il Barbiere di Siviglia. Baritone Lucas Meachem, mezzo-soprano Daniela Mack, tenor Rene Barbera and veteran baritone Alessandro Corbelli filled Llorenc Corbella's charming scenery with zesty life.
Now we look forward to a summer season that looks even more tempting. David Gockley is ending his tenure in real style.