October 9, 2024
Benjamin Britten (1913–1976) The Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra, Op. 34 (1945) Compositions that teach the instruments of the orchestra make up a lively sub-genre of the literature, including beloved mainstays as Camille Saint-Saëns’s Carnival of the Animalsand Serge Prokofiev’s Peter and the Wolf. Benjamin Britten’s Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra stands tall…
March 21, 2024
Saad Haddad (b. 1992) Mishwar (World Premiere, 2024) Saad Haddad, the California Symphony’s current Resident Composer, is acclaimed for his distinctive blend of Western art music and Middle Eastern idioms. Haddad has drawn Mishwar (Arabic مشوار(, meaning “A Trip,” out of his own memories. He tells us that: “Throughout my childhood, my family and I made frequent…
January 30, 2020
By California Symphony Concertos usually offer a single soloist the chance to shine at center stage—to work in partnership with the conductor and orchestra, and put on a show that wows the audience with their virtuosic skills. So why did Brahms deviate from the norm and complicate things by adding a second soloist? In conceiving…
January 22, 2020
Within his Hungarian Dances, Johannes Brahms captured the rich and vibrant soul of Hungary’s beloved tradition of dance. Perhaps one of his most well-recognized works, Brahms’ Hungarian Dances is a set of 21 dances inspired by Hungarian folk music, a diverse genre home to the colorful blend of the aural histories of Hungarians and Hungarian-minorities…
January 22, 2020
By California Symphony Instantly recognizable, Brahms’ Hungarian Dance No. 5 has provided the soundtrack to some memorable pop culture moments, including a Charlie Chaplin skit, a Looney Tunes cartoon, and a routine performed by two naked Frenchmen with a couple of towels. Would Brahms have approved? 1. A CLOSE SHAVE “Make your work a pleasure….
January 10, 2020
By California Symphony Whether it’s Frank Sinatra crooning it, Carlos Santana picking it, or Robert Mitchum playing it at the piano, the melody in the slow third movement of Brahms’s Symphony No. 3 has inspired many tributes. (Or rip offs, if you prefer, since Brahms is rarely credited as a writer.) Chances are that even…
January 10, 2020
Brahms and the Orchestra It has been said that Brahms was an indifferent or unimaginative orchestrator. However, it has also been said that the bathtub was invented in Philadelphia in 1842, so let’s not believe everything we hear. Bathtubs date back thousands of years; Johannes Brahms was a wonderful orchestrator, imaginative, creative, and insightful. That…
January 7, 2020
By California Symphony Music Director Donato Cabrera. For those of you who are new to classical music, the music of Johannes Brahms is similar to the music of the Beatles — there are few pieces in his entire output that aren’t adored by every musician and appreciated by every audience member. Every time one performs or hears…
April 16, 2018
The 2017–18 season finale features two European masterpieces (“Something Old”), a world premiere (“Something New”), and a program with a difference At first glance, the line up for the California Symphony’s May 6 season closer —SOMETHING OLD, SOMETHING NEW—may look like business as usual. However delve deeper, and there is more to the finale than…
