Just spent a beautiful evening at The American Bach Soloists' Summerfest. It all began at 6pm with ABS principal violone, contrabass and viola da gamba player, Steven Lehning, giving a lighthearted yet informative lecture on early string instruments. Then there was a delicious picnic supper with music provided by the early music ensemble The Whole Noyse. The evening ended with a (mostly) expertly played concert of string quartets by Beethoven, Schubert and Mendelssohn. (I say mostly because the intonation on the opening number, Beethoven's D … [Read more...]

The 17th annual San Francisco Fringe Festival kicks off on September 3. Judging by what I've read about the lineup so far, a notable difference between this year's Festival and its previous incarnations seems to be the plethora of site-specific work.In recent years, the festival has offered one or two site specific shows -- I caught one offering in a cramped hotel bedroom last year; another company staged a show on a traveling bus a couple of years earlier.In addition to hosting 30 shows at the festival's headquarters, The Exit Theatreplex, the … [Read more...]

Yesterday, I had interesting phone conversations with the dramatist David Henry Hwang and the movie director David Cronenberg. We were talking about the new opera version of The Fly, for which Hwang has created t he libretto based on David Cronenberg's cult 1986 movie (as well as the 1958 Kurt Neumann film and the original 1957 novella by George Langelaan.) The score has been written by Howard Shore, who wrote the music for the 1986 film.From talking to Hwang and Cronenberg, it sounds like they've been aiming for a compelling fusion of film and … [Read more...]

As I read over Tom Lubbock's interesting piece in today's UK Independent newspaper about society's obsession with explaining works of art, I couldn't help but be reminded of my own recent attempts to impose meaning on an approach to a theatre production which I don't fully understand.I'm currently involved in what's being billed as a "fusion" production of Hildegard von Bingen's 12th century musical drama Ordo Virtutum. My vocal ensemble, San Francisco Renaissance Voices, is performing the work in the original Germanized Latin chant. But the … [Read more...]

Following last week's post about two great music radio shows that I've been listening to lately -- London Calling and Thistle and Shamrock -- I received a variety of mail not just from fans of these shows, but also from radio buffs about other interesting musical offerings on the radio. I am particularly grateful to Mark Urycki, Program Director at WKSU in Kent,OH for pointing me in the direction of Folk Alley. This online folk music radio station boasts some ear-grabbing content. Just now, as I've been typing, I've heard a gorgeous ballad by … [Read more...]

The French soprano Natalie Dessay has the opera world in thrall. People are crazy about her for more than her singing. For one thing, she's a tremendous actress. Around 23,000 people were putty in her hands the other day during a live simulcast of Lucia di Lammermoor at San Francisco ballpark. And some people are talking about her turn in La Fille du Regiment at The Met recently as trumping Juan Diego Florez's famed nine high C's.On top of that, she seems like a very down to earth person. At a recent CD signing event at SF Opera, staff were … [Read more...]

It seemed as if I had my finger on the radio dial in my car forever last night until, thankfully, I happened upon the late, great Joe Strummer's wonderful BBC radio show, London Calling, on KALW 91.7 FM. The ex-Clash frontman's radio show, which showcased music from all over the world, aired for several series before the musician died very prematurely of heart failure in 2002 at the tender age of 50. Last night, Strummer's show offered sweet relief from the barrage of Dave Matthews-like schlock and watered-down jazzmatazz that was coming at me … [Read more...]

It's an election year, and theatre companies are tripping over themselves to put on plays with political content.One such play, Oscar Wilde's An Ideal Husband, is currently receiving a revival at the California Shakespeare Theater. Wilde's potent 1895 social comedy is, at least on the surface, an ideal kind of election year play. Telling the story of a politically-ambitious woman's attempt to bring down an up-and-coming statesman by exposing a dirty secret from his past, the work satirizes the sordid deals that underpin many political careers, … [Read more...]

MSNBC ran an intriguing article a few days ago about a new study which suggests a link between pre-historic cave paintings and singing."Analyzing the famous, ochre-splashed cave walls of France, scientists found that the most densely painted areas were also those with the best acoustics," wrote MSNBC LiveScience reporter Heather Whipps in her story. "Humming into some bends in the wall even produced sounds mimicking the animals painted there."Researcher Iegor Reznikoff, a specialist in ancient music at the University of Paris X in Nanterre, … [Read more...]

Another July 4th. Another sunburn. Another fireworks display. Do I sound like I've been in this country for too long?It's actually been ten years, almost to the day, since I first arrived on these shores -- a mere slip of a girl with little idea that cheese could be squeezed out of a tube, let alone that skyscrapers were capable of collapsing if hit by a couple of exploding planes.The world has changed a great deal over the past decade, so it seems to me. And yet some things, like Independence Day fireworks, never seem to change. And yet, in a … [Read more...]