music

  Stellar quartet graces Stanford A less-than-capacity crowd greeted the Vertavo String Quartet at Stanford’s Dinkelspiel Auditorium last Wednesday, January 26. But those that came were rewarded with a rare appearance by one of Norway’s top quartets. This all-female quartet is the winner of Norway’s coveted Grieg Prize, while their CD’s have won France’s Diapason...

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Music@Menlo winter concert virtuosic and playful If two heads are better than one, than four hands would trump two. Or so Wu Han, Alessio Bax and Anne-Marie McDermott would have us believe, and they made a very good case for that last Sunday, January 16, at the new Menlo-Atherton Center for the Performing Arts. These three renowned pianists played a program entirely consisting of four-hands piano works, alternating players in a blistering display of challenging virtuosity...

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Difficult program, dazzling moments The New Century Chamber Orchestra dazzled a full house at San Rafael’s Osher Marin Jewish Community Center last Sunday. But that was after the intermission. On their first half they embarked on a long and arduous mission, Dmitry Sitkovetsky’s chamber orchestra version of Bach’s Goldberg Variations. Bach’s...

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Perfection in Liszt… After a fabulous blue-themed gala opening and quick trip to Europe the San Francisco Symphony has settled down to some serious music making, some of it with guest conductors. On Saturday, October 30, a young Spanish conductor was paired with a very young—and accomplished—soloist in a program with memorable moments. The 33-year-old Pablo Heras-Casado conducted and 22-year-old Alice Sara Ott gave a sharply chiseled rendition of Franz...

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  New York sophistication at Kohl Mansion There is a spectrum from small salon to huge orchestra hall. The Great Hall at Kohl Mansion is so live that it is barely on that scale. At a concert there by the Lark Quarte+ on Sunday, October 24, that magical space, first built by Freddie Kohl for his wife Bessie, was beyond intimate. With eyes closed one could drown in that sound. And open? Well, I was...

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  From Ligeti’s fiendish fingerings… An eagerly awaited program by pianist Jeremy Denk held revelations and disappointments Sunday October 24 at Hertz Hall on the UC campus. In a last-minute program change Denk substituted Franz Liszt’s Dante Sonata for György Ligeti’s second book of piano...

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