A Warm Holiday Welcome to One and All

We give you the inside scoop on what to expect when you attend A LEMONY SNICKET HOLIDAY, the California Symphony’s holiday program.

A LEMONY SNICKET HOLIDAY features The Composer is Dead by Nathaniel Stookey, with text by Lemony Snicket. — Illustrations copyright © 2009 by Carson Ellis, used by permission of HarperCollins Publishers.

There’s nothing quite like the buzzing atmosphere of the California Symphony’s holiday concerts, with family-friendly activities in the hall and a program that’s geared to getting everyone into the holiday spirit. Our two performances of A LEMONY SNICKET HOLIDAY — December 23 at 4PM and 8PM at the Lesher Center in Walnut Creek—attract an audience of all ages and with a wide range of orchestra experience: For some, it will be their first ever time seeing a live, professional orchestra, while for others the Symphony has been an annual holiday tradition for up to 20 or 30 years already, maybe enjoyed with kids and grandkids of their own now!

Whether you’re a regular or a first timer, we want you to feel welcome at the California Symphony, right here in Walnut Creek. Here’s a quick run down on what to expect for these special holiday concerts.

Before the Performance

Family-friendly fun starts in the lobby an hour before the show and continues during the twenty-minute intermission.

Hot Cocoa in the Hall

In addition to the usual selection of wine and sodas, hot cocoa will be available in the lobby (price: $2). You can even have your intermission drinks order lined up in advance when you flag down one of the gold vest-wearing, iPad-wielding members of the catering staff in the 2nd and 3rd floor lobbies before the performance.

Instrument Petting Zoo (Hint: It’s Not Just for the Kids)

Want an up close look at orchestra instruments? Our always popular instrument petting zoo is a place where you can touch, hold, and even try playing the different instruments in the orchestra. Try your hand at bowing a violin or a cello, or pucker up and try the trumpet or trombone. Find the petting zoo in the 3rd floor lobby.

Getting to know you… Trying out the musical instruments in our Instrument Petting Zoo.

Pick Up a Baton!

Step up to the conductor’s podium in the 2nd floor lobby, take up the baton and pretend you’re our guest conductor for the evening! Post your podium pictures to Facebook or Instagram and tag #CaliforniaSymphony for a chance to win tickets to our January performance, PASTORAL BEETHOVEN.

WANTED: Help to Solve “The Composer is Dead” Whodunit Mystery

The Composer is Dead and someone in the orchestra is guilty… The Inspector invites all the young amateur sleuths in the audience to come and collect your musical instrument suspect cards packet at the info table in the 2nd floor lobby. Match the suspects to their orchestra family and alibis in the center pages of your free program book to help solve the case.

The Performance

You can learn more about the program in another blog post here.

Full details will be in the free program book you’ll be handed as you enter the auditorium but here, in a nut(cracker)shell, is a preview of the music you’ll hear. The duration of each piece is listed in the program for your convenience, and you’ll find the words for the audience sing-along in the book too—so you can join in the singing with gusto!

The Program

Anderson—A Christmas Festival (6 minutes)

Tchaikovsky—Selections from The Nutcracker: Overture Miniature, March, Russian Dance, Arabian Dance, Chinese Dance, Dance of the Reed Flutes, Waltz of the Flowers, Waltz of the Snowflakes (28 minutes)

—I N T E R M I S S I O N (20 minutes)—

J. Strauss Sr.—Radetzky March, Op. 228 (3 minutes)

Stookey, Nathaniel—The Composer is Dead, With text by Lemony Snicket Manoel Felciano, narrator (30 minutes)

Audience Sing-Along (Hint: Find the Lyrics in the program book.)

Deck the Hall (2 minutes)

Silent Night (3 minutes)

Jingle Bells (2 minutes)

Anderson — Sleigh Ride (3 minutes)

Pro-tip: You can listen to Music Director Donato Cabrera’s holiday program playlist on Spotify.

Questions?

Our online Guide for Newcomers has answers to all the FAQs we could think of about attending the Symphony for the first time, including what to wear (A: whatever you like), are phones allowed in the auditorium (A: yes, but in silent mode), and whether you can take your drink into the auditorium (A: yes, you can!)

Whether you’re coming back for your 31st year or joining us for the first time, we look forward to welcoming you, and to sharing a memorable holiday tradition with you, your friends, and your family. Thank you for supporting live music and your resident professional orchestra that’s based right here in Walnut Creek!

CONCERT DETAILS

Saturday, December 23 at 4:00PM and 8:00PM at the Lesher Center for the Arts, 1601 Civic Drive, Walnut Creek, with activities in the lobby starting one hour earlier, and 3:00PM and 7:00PM.

TICKETS

Tickets start at $42 for adults and $20 for students, subject to change. Tickets are available at www.californiasymphony.org or by calling the Lesher Center at 925–943–7469.

** UPDATE: The matinee program is almost sold out. For better availability and better prices, choose the evening performance.**

This program is also part of our new Saturday Night Series, with tickets from $33 when you choose all three concerts in the series, including:

A LEMONY SNICKET HOLIDAY — Saturday, December 23 at 8pm

PASTORAL BEETHOVEN — Saturday, January 20 at 8pm

MOZART REQUIEM — Saturday, March 17 at 8pm

For details, visit our website.

ABOUT CALIFORNIA SYMPHONY

The California Symphony, now in its fifth season under the leadership of Music Director Donato Cabrera, is a world-class, professional orchestra based in Walnut Creek, in the heart of the San Francisco East Bay since 1990. Our vibrant concert series is renowned for featuring classics alongside American repertoire and works by living composers. The Orchestra is comprised of musicians who have performed with the orchestras of the San Francisco Symphony, San Francisco Opera, San Francisco Ballet, and others, and many of its musicians have been performing with the California Symphony for nearly all its existence.

Outside of the concert hall, the symphony actively supports music education for social change through its El Sistema-inspired, “Sound Minds” program at Downer Elementary School in San Pablo, CA, which brings intensive music instruction and academic enrichment to Contra Costa County schoolchildren for free, in an area where 94% of students qualify for the federal free or reduced price lunch program.

We also host the highly competitive Young American Composer-in-Residence program, which this year welcomes its first female composer, Katherine Balch.

California Symphony has launched the careers of some of today’s most-performed soloists and composers, including violinists Sarah Chang and Anne Akiko Meyers, cellist Alisa Weilerstein, and composers such as Mason Bates, Christopher Theofanidis, and Kevin Puts. The Orchestra performs at the Lesher Center for the Arts in Walnut Creek.

For more information, please visit californiasymphony.org.

A LEMONY SNICKET HOLIDAY — December 23 at the Lesher Center in Walnut Creek

The California Symphony’s A LEMONY SNICKET HOLIDAY offers Walnut Creek audiences a sing-along, the Nutcracker, hot cocoa, and a whodunit orchestra mystery, with two shows at the Lesher Center for the Arts in Walnut Creek on Saturday December 23, at 4PM and 8PM. Tickets start at just $20 for kids and students.

FAST FACTS

· With festive favorites plus new orchestral classic The Composer is Dead, the California Symphony’s holiday program is an annual, family-friendly, annual, symphony tradition — right here in Walnut Creek.

· Tony nominee and Broadway star Manoel Felciano narrates The Composer Is Dead, by Nathaniel Stookey with text by Lemony Snicket — a whodunit mystery, in the style of Peter and the Wolf and The Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra.

· Arrive an hour early for kid-friendly fun, including a musical instrument petting zoo, hot cocoa, and free activities in the lobby.

Photographs (L-R) by Paul Smith, Carson Ellis (illustration), and Lindsay Hale.

Join the California Symphony and Music Director Donato Cabrera to ring in the holiday season with A LEMONY SNICKET HOLIDAY on Saturday, December 23 2017 at 4PM and 8PM at the Lesher Center in Walnut Creek. The program features an audience sing-along, selections from the Nutcracker, Sleigh Ride, and modern narrated orchestral classic The Composer is Dead. Tickets also include free, family-friendly activities in the lobby starting an hour before the show.

The Composer Is Dead, Plus Festive Favorites

The Composer is Dead.

“Composer” is a word which here means “a person who sits in a room, muttering and humming and figuring out what notes the orchestra is going to play.” This is called composing. But last night, the Composer was not muttering. He was not humming. He was not moving, or even breathing.

This is called decomposing.

The Composer is Dead by Bay Area composer Nathaniel Stookey, with text by famed children’s author Lemony Snicket (A Series of Unfortunate Events), is a modern classic in the style of Prokofiev’s Peter and the Wolf and Britten’s The Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra. The composition was originally commissioned by the San Francisco Symphony and premiered in 2006, with Snicket himself as the narrator.

In the piece, the composer is dead and someone in the orchestra is guilty! The Inspector — Broadway star and Tony nominee Manoel Felciano — tries to solve the mystery and in the process of the interrogation, he uncovers the sounds and characteristics of various instruments in the orchestra. In addition to being a great introduction for those new to the symphony, Snicket’s witty wordplay and inside jokes make the piece fun for audiences of all ages.

“Perhaps the murderer is lurking in the woodwinds! Where were you last night, woodwinds?”

“We were doing bird imitations,” said the Flutes, the shiniest and highest pitched of the woodwinds. “It seems like that’s all we ever do. Whenever the orchestra needs a bird, there we are.”

The program also includes selections from the Nutcracker, Johann Strauss Sr’s rousing Radetzky March (with the audience clapping the beat), plus an audience sing-along (Deck the Hall, Silent Night and Jingle Bells), with lyrics provided in the free program book — so you can tell your “fa”s from your “la, la, la”s.

Arrive Early for Kid-Friendly Activities

The fun starts in the Lesher Center Lobby an hour before the show:

· Drop by the musical instrument petting zoo to touch, hold and even try playing the different instruments in the orchestra.

· Take pictures on the conductor’s podium on the lobby.

· Collect a set of free musical instrument cards to help the Inspector identify suspects in The Composer is Dead.

· Hot cocoa will be available for purchase in the lobby, along with a selection of adult beverages for grown ups.

CONCERT DETAILS

Saturday, December 23 at 4:00PM and 8:00PM at the Lesher Center for the Arts, 1601 Civic Drive, Walnut Creek

California Symphony’s Holiday Concerts: A LEMONY SNICKET HOLIDAY

Donato Cabrera, conductor California Symphony

Manoel Felciano, narrator

PROGRAM

Anderson — A Christmas Festival

Tchaikovsky — Selections from The Nutcracker: Overture Miniature, March, Russian Dance, Arabian Dance, Chinese Dance, Dance of the Reed Flutes, Waltz of the Flowers, Waltz of the Snowflakes

Strauss, Sr. — Radetzky March, Opus 228

Stookey — The Composer is Dead, text by Lemony Snicket; Manoel Felciano, narrator

Various — Audience Sing-Along: Deck the Hall, Silent Night, Jingle Bells

Anderson — Sleigh Ride

TICKETS

Tickets are $42-$72 and $20 for students, subject to change. Tickets are available at www.californiasymphony.org or by calling the Lesher Center at 925–943–7469.

** UPDATE: The matinee program is almost sold out. For better availability and better prices, choose the evening performance.**

This program is also part of our new Saturday Night Series, with tickets from $33 when you choose all three concerts in the series, including:

A LEMONY SNICKET HOLIDAY — Saturday, December 23 at 8pm

PASTORAL BEETHOVEN — Saturday, January 20 at 8pm

MOZART REQUIEM — Saturday, March 17 at 8pm

For details, visit our website.

ABOUT CALIFORNIA SYMPHONY

We also host the highly competitive Young American Composer-in-Residence program, which this year welcomes its first female composer, Katherine Balch.

For more information, please visit californiasymphony.org.

Three Composers and their Irrational Fear of Numbers

From October 13th to the 31st, the California Symphony will be exploring mysteries and superstitions surrounding symphonic composers.

Pictured left to right: Gustav Mahler, Arnold Schoenberg, and Alban Berg.

Composers can be a superstitious bunch. For this Friday the 13th during the spooky month of Halloween, we look at three who were fixated on the power of numbers. Judge for yourself if they were undone by the numbers, or if the obsessions themselves may have played a greater role in their demise….

Malicious Muse

Gustav Mahler’s wife, Alma, was known for being an artistic muse to many artists of the 20th century, but she was also ambitious and calculating. Alma claimed that Mahler’s Kindertotenlieder, completed in 1904, was a forewarning of their daughter Maria’s death in 1907, and soon after Maria’s passing, Mahler began fretting about the numerology of his symphonies. Beethoven had died right after writing his Ninth, Bruckner died while writing his Ninth, and Mahler had just completed his Eighth. Mahler therefore believed that he could cheat death if his next symphony was titled rather than numbered.

Sadly, that did not work out as planned: As Alma documented in her letters, “He did not live to see the Ninth performed, or to finish the Tenth.”

As a side note, historians believe that Alma’s motivation for encouraging her husband’s morbid concerns may have been to deflect from the fact that she was cheating on him shortly before his death with Walter Gropius, a famous architect.

An Unlucky Number Indeed

Another numerophobic composer was Arnold Schoenberg. The father of 12-tone music was terrified of the number 13. He avoided rooms, floors, and buildings with the number 13. As Schoenberg aged, the anxiety over the number 13 worsened. He dreaded his sixty-fifth birthday in 1939 because the year was a multiple of 13. He wrote, “Indeed, I am not so well at the moment. I am in my 65th year and you know that 5 times 13 is 65 and 13 is my bad number.”

In 1950 on his seventy-sixth birthday, fellow composer and musician Oskar Adler wrote that because 76 added up to 13 (7+6), it would be a dangerous year for Schoenberg. One day of that year, Schoenberg took to his bed, sick with worry. That day was Friday, July 13, 1951. Schoenberg didn’t make it through the night. He passed away later that day — at 11:45 p.m. — at the age of 76.

To the Memory of an Angel

Alban Berg, who was Arnold Schoenberg’s student also strongly believed in the significance of numbers. In his compositions, he would weave his lover’s and his astrological numbers. He did this in his famous Lyric Suite as well as his Violin Concerto. His Violin Concerto strikes many similarities to Mahler’s works in its focus of life and death and use of folk songs, however there is a more notable connection between Mahler and Berg’s Violin Concerto. The piece was composed in honor of Manon Gropius, who was the daughter of Alma Mahler and Walter Gropius. Manon Gropius died suddenly and tragically at the age of 18 from polio. Even in his grief, Berg astonishingly accomplished the work in less than four months. When asked by his wife to slow down, he replied, “I cannot — I don’t have time.”

Was this urgency caused by the desire to memorialize an unfortunate young girl’s life, or a premonition of his own imminent death? Alban Berg died from sepsis caused by an insect bite at the age of 50 on Christmas Eve — just four months after finishing his Violin Concerto.

Did the numbers really have it in for these three composers — they couldn’t escape their fates? Or was it all just simple chance and coincidence, perhaps exacerbated by the phobias themselves?

We’d put good money on the latter. But then again, maybe we’ll wait until after this Friday the 13th to place that bet…

COMING UP:

A Lemony Snicket Holiday — Saturday, December 23, 2017 at 4PM and 8PM

Pastoral Beethoven — Saturday, January 20, 2018 at 8PM & Sunday, January 21 at 4PM

Mozart Requiem — Saturday, March 17, 2018 at 8PM & Sunday, March 18 at 4PM

Something Old, Something New — Sunday, May 6, 2018 at 4PM

Tickets are available at 925.943.SHOW and LesherCenter.com. Prices start at just $33 per concert.

ABOUT CALIFORNIA SYMPHONY

The California Symphony, now in its fifth season under the leadership of Music Director Donato Cabrera, is a world-class, professional orchestra based in Walnut Creek, in the heart of the San Francisco East Bay since 1990. Our vibrant concert series is renowned for featuring classics alongside American repertoire and works by living composers. The Orchestra is comprised of musicians who have performed with the orchestras of the San Francisco Symphony, San Francisco Opera, San Francisco Ballet, and others, and many of its musicians have been performing with the California Symphony for nearly all its existence.

Outside of the concert hall, the symphony actively supports music education for social change through its El Sistema-inspired Sound Minds program at Downer Elementary School in San Pablo, CA. The initiative brings intensive music instruction and academic enrichment to Contra Costa County schoolchildren for free, in an area where 94% of students qualify for the federal free or reduced price lunch program.

We also host the highly competitive Young American Composer-in-Residence program, which this year welcomes its first female composer, Katherine Balch.

California Symphony has launched the careers of some of today’s most-performed soloists and composers, including violinists Sarah Chang and Anne Akiko Meyers, cellist Alisa Weilerstein, and composers such as Mason Bates, Christopher Theofanidis, and Kevin Puts. The Orchestra performs at the Lesher Center for the Arts in Walnut Creek.

For more information, please visit californiasymphony.org.

About our Season Opener Pre-Concert Talk Speakers

We have a blockbuster line up for our pre-concert talk on Sunday. Joining Music Director Donato Cabrera onstage in the Hofmann Theater at the Lesher Center for the Arts at 3PM, one hour before the performance, will be OOVE inventor Oliver DiCicco, composer Nathaniel Stookey, and soprano Maria Valdes. The talk is free to ticket holders of our LYRICAL DREAMS season opener and will also be streamed live via Facebook LIVE. Just go to our Facebook page and click the “Follow” button to receive an alert and watch from wherever you are.

Oliver DiCicco

Oliver DiCicco — creator of the OOVE, a brand new musical instrument that’s featured in Nathaniel Stookey’s YTTE (Yield To Total Elation) — is a multi-talented designer, sculptor, fabricator, scientist, engineer, and musician. He has made San Francisco his base of operations for over thirty years.

Early in his career he was the owner and chief engineer of Mobius Music Recording, a highly respected, state of the art recording facility. His work in the audio field has been recognized by several Grammy nominations, and RIAA gold record awards. His sculptural work focuses primarily on musical instrument sculpture and kinetic sound sculpture.

Check out his other musical instrument designs, including the whimsically named Olivetti, Anenome, and Crawdad at his website.

Nathaniel Stookey

First commissioned by the San Francisco Symphony at age 17, Nathaniel Stookey has collaborated with many of the world’s great orchestras including The Philadelphia Orchestra, The Cleveland Orchestra, The Chicago Symphony Orchestra, The Los Angeles Philharmonic, The National Symphony, The Toronto Symphony, The City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, and The Hallé Orchestra, where he was composer-in-residence under Kent Nagano.

Stookey’s YTTE (Yield To Total Elation), which originally debuted in April 2016 as part of the San Francisco Symphony’s Sound Box series, makes its West Coast full orchestra version premiere in our season opener concert. The piece was inspired by 1930s architect A.G. Rizzoli’s intricate architectural renderings of friends, imagined as grand and fantastical buildings and stars the OOVE, DiCicco’s new musical instrument, which Stookey will play in performance during our season opener.

Stookey’s The Composer Is Dead, a “whodunit” guide to the orchestra with words by Lemony Snicket, will be featured in our holiday program, A LEMONY SNICKET HOLIDAY. It has been performed by hundreds of orchestras worldwide and is one of the five most performed works of the 21st century.

Maria Valdes

Soprano Maria Valdes makes her debut with the California Symphony on Sunday, however it’s not the first time that Ms Valdes has worked with Music Director Donato Cabrera. She performed Mahler’s Symphony №4 last September with the Las Vegas Philharmonic under Cabrera’s direction.

A former Adler Fellow and alumna of the San Francisco Opera Merola Program, Ms Valdes also debuts with Opera San José in their 2017–18 season, first as Despina in Cosi fan tutte and later Lisette in La rondine. She is featured soloist for the Mahler and on Samuel Barber’s Knoxville: Summer of 1915, which she performed with the Kaleidoscope Chamber Orchestra last November.

Donato Cabrera

Donato Cabrera is the Music Director of the California Symphony and the Las Vegas Philharmonic, and served as the Resident Conductor of the San Francisco Symphony and the Wattis Foundation Music Director of the San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra from 2009–2016.

Since Cabrera’s appointment as Music Director of the California Symphony, the organization has been reinvigorated. With its expanded concert series, dramatically increased ticket sales, and innovative programming, the California Symphony and Cabrera are redefining what it means to be and orchestra in the 21st Century.

Our season opener LYRICAL DREAMS takes place Sunday, September 24 at 4pm, at Lesher Center for the Arts, 1601 Civic Drive, Walnut Creek.

· Donato Cabrera, conductor

· Maria Valdes, soprano

PROGRAM:

Barber’s Knoxville: Summer of 1915, Op. 24

Stookey YTTE (Yield To Total Elation)

Mahler Symphony №4

Tickets are available at 925.943.SHOW and LesherCenter.com. Prices start at just $33 per concert.

PRE-CONCERT TALK:

Music Director Donato Cabrera gives a pre-concert talk, free to ticket holders, offering insights about the music, beginning one hour before the performance at 3PM.

Cabrera will be joined on stage by soprano Maria Valdes, Bay Area Composer Nathaniel Stookey, and Grammy-award nominated sound engineer and inventor Oliver DiCicco. The talk will also be live-streamed from our Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/californiasymphony/

TICKETS:

Tickets are $42 to $72 and $20 for students and are available by calling 925.943.SHOW and online at californiasymphony.org.

Season ticket packages are also on sale for as little as $99 — just $33 per concert — including the new Saturday night series.

COMING UP:

A Lemony Snicket Holiday — Saturday, December 23, 2017 at 4PM and 8PM

Pastoral Beethoven — Saturday, January 20, 2018 at 8PM & Sunday, January 21 at 4PM

Mozart Requiem — Saturday, March 17, 2018 at 8PM & Sunday, March 18 at 4PM

Something Old, Something New — Sunday, May 6, 2018 at 4PM

ABOUT CALIFORNIA SYMPHONY

We also host the highly competitive Young American Composer-in-Residence program, which this year welcomes its first female composer, Katherine Balch.

For more information, please visit californiasymphony.org.

Remembering Dawn Foster-Dodson (1959~2017)

On July 24, we lost to cancer Dawn Foster-Dodson — a talented cellist and long-time member of the California Symphony family of musicians. Our 2017–18 season opener concert, LYRICAL DREAMS, is dedicated to her memory.

Dawn joined the California Symphony in 1992 and she continued to play for us through until last season. According to music director Donato Cabrera, “Dawn glowed. Perhaps others would call it an aura but whatever it was, she brightened the room. Not too long after I became music director, we performed Rimsky-Korsakov’s epic, Scheherazade, and Dawn was our principal cellist for that concert. She played the many cello solos with such aplomb and musicality, but it was her gentle countenance and personality that shone through.”

Dawn was born and raised in Lafayette. She received her B.M. degree in music performance from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music in 1982. In her subsequent career, she performed as a soloist on most of the major concert series in the Bay Area.

In addition to playing for the California Symphony, she also acted as Principal Cellist with the San Diego Chamber Orchestra, Reno Philharmonic, and the Fresno Philharmonic. For 27 years she played with the San Jose Symphony and then the Silicon Valley Symphony, and the MidSummer Mozart Festival Orchestra, and she freelanced with most of the other Bay Area orchestras. Dawn performed as a concerto soloist with the San Francisco Concert Orchestra, Oakland Youth Orchestra and she premiered the “Concerto №1 Scenes from the Wildwood” which was written for her and the Los Angeles African American Chamber Orchestra by Josephine Saunders Herbison.

Outside of her orchestra work, she was frequently the Principal Cellist at the Best of Broadway theatrical productions at the Orpheum, Curran, and Golden Gate Theaters in San Francisco, on plays such as “Phantom of the Opera”, The King and I”, and “Miss Saigon.”

She also played with many of the world’s favorite artists including Pavarotti, Marion Anderson, YoYo Ma, Andre Watts, Jon Nakamatsu, Mercedes Ellington, Ray Charles, Liza Minelli, Stevie Wonder, George Benson, Al Jarreau, Ben Vereen, Rod Stewart, Johnny Mathis, Smokey Robinson and others. She had an active teaching studio, The Lafayette Cello Academy, which she created and of which she was immensely proud. She joined the Performing Arts Department faculty at St. Mary’s College in 1998, coaching chamber music ensembles and teaching string classes. Dawn was creator of the famed “Vibrato Doctor Course” — a tutorial course she taught to improve Vibrato technique.

Passionate about her work, Dawn influenced the lives of many who were lucky enough to call her their teacher, friend or colleague. She is remembered by husband Kenneth Dodson, son Austin and his partner Nicole, and by son Kenny. She is much missed by her extended family of brothers and sisters at the California Symphony.

“We have lost a member of our musical family and we miss and mourn her, but I know that whenever we make music together, Dawn’s shining presence will continue to be felt and celebrated.” — Donato Cabrera.

Our season opener is dedicated to her memory.

Here is video of Dawn playing with the Midsummer Mozart Festival Orchestra Ensemble in 2012.

LYRICAL DREAMS is at the Lesher Center in Walnut Creek on Sunday September 24 at 4pm and includes:

Barber’s Knoxville: Summer of 1915

Stookey YTTE (Yield To Total Elation)

Mahler Symphony №4

Tickets are available at 925.943.SHOW and LesherCenter.com. Prices start at just $33 per concert.

ABOUT CALIFORNIA SYMPHONY

We also host the highly competitive Young American Composer-in-Residence program, which this year welcomes its first female composer, Katherine Balch.

For more information, please visit californiasymphony.org.

Welcoming our Newest Recruits to the California Symphony!

Newest members, Stephen Zielinski (pictured on the left) and Alex Orfaly (pictured on the right).

We are delighted to welcome Stephen Zielinski, clarinetist, and Alex Orfaly, timpanist as our newest members of the California Symphony.

Stephen Zielinski just won the highly competitive audition for Clarinet 2/Eb in June (though, on Sunday he is playing Principal Clarinet). He is a graduate of the Manhattan School of Music AND The Julliard School. But like many superheroes, Stephen also has a day job — as a software engineer at Silicon Valley tech giant Airbnb. We may not have a phone booth backstage for him to change in, but we hear that if you look closely you may see a hint of a cape trailing out from under his concert attire on Sunday.

“Extraordinary!” That’s what the committee said when they heard Alex’s audition from behind a screen this June. Alex is the newest addition to fill out our Percussion section as Principal Timpanist. Hailing from Boston, Alex is a graduate of The Cleveland Institute of Music and he most recently has played as Acting Principal Timpani at San Francisco Symphony. He maintains positions as Principal Timpani at Sun Valley Symphony and Stockton Symphony.

Look for them in the orchestra starting at our season opener concert on Sunday, September 24.

LYRICAL DREAMS is at the Lesher Center in Walnut Creek on Sunday September 24 at 4pm and includes:

Barber’s Knoxville: Summer of 1915

Stookey YTTE (Yield To Total Elation)

Mahler Symphony №4

Tickets are available at 925.943.SHOW and LesherCenter.com. Prices start at just $33 per concert.

ABOUT CALIFORNIA SYMPHONY

We also host the highly competitive Young American Composer-in-Residence program, which this year welcomes its first female composer, Katherine Balch.

For more information, please visit californiasymphony.org.

Maestro on Mahler

Music Director Donato Cabrera reflects on Mahler, whose Symphony №4 is featured in our season opener, LYRICAL DREAMS, on Sunday, September 24.

When listening to a composition by Gustav Mahler, try to think about time and place. As in, the precise time and place Mahler aimed to convey in the music.

Mahler was trying to create an entire environment, whether it’s going back to his childhood in Bohemia or dealing with the knowledge of his own mortality. His music is an entire universe. It’s a philosophy, it’s geography, it’s smelling the blossoms in the air. Through his music, he’s really trying to touch all the senses.

The Austrian composer, born 1860, applied unique methods to his music. These included infusing his compositions with the melodies of street musicians and sounds depicting everyday noises, all with the aim of creating a snapshot of life. It had really never been explored to this degree by other composers, and it’s for this very reason that his music wasn’t popular in Vienna during his lifetime.

Mahler’s Symphony №4 is a prime example of the composer’s style. The symphony, written as an exploration of the world through a child’s eyes, includes sounds borrowed from Mahler’s own rural childhood, such as sleigh bells that were commonly strung on horses. The symphony’s second movement goes a step further, with a solo violin recreating a common fairy tale of the time, in which a sinister pied piper lures children out of a village.

It’s a direct reference to what was a very real concern for children, noting the many dangers for children in an era when outdoor lighting at night was uncommon. This was the typical message: Don’t talk to strangers. Bad things will happen if you follow a stranger out of the village.

Another strong theme can be observed in many of Mahler’s compositions: death. This includes his “Kindertotenlieder” (“Songs on the Death of Children”), comprised of songs based on poems about the grieving process. Some even link elements of his symphonies to deaths and illness experienced in his own family. This merely reflects the era Mahler lived in when the average lifespan was short and most families expected to lose multiple children to illness. It’s sort of like the Blues. It’s only through accepting hardship and looking it straight in the face that one finds solace and beauty in it.

Mahler’s music has had tremendous influence with composers throughout the 20th century emulating his musical style and focus. Mahler’s style can still be seen in European music composed today. The prevalence of his music stems back to the relatability of his compositions, which held greater appeal to audiences as society opened up to understanding human emotion and experience at the turn of the century.

Why it’s become so popular and why it captures the hearts of so many people is really that it’s a great reflection of the 20th century and who we are as modern individuals. That’s why his music became so ubiquitous.

Originally published on the Smith Center’s Blog http://www.thesmithcenter.com/blog/listening-to-mahler-more-than-just-music/

LYRICAL DREAMS is at the Lesher Center in Walnut Creek on Sunday September 24 at 4pm and includes:

Barber’s Knoxville: Summer of 1915

Stookey YTTE (Yield To Total Elation)

Mahler Symphony №4

Tickets are available at 925.943.SHOW and LesherCenter.com. Prices start at just $33 per concert.

ABOUT CALIFORNIA SYMPHONY

We also host the highly competitive Young American Composer-in-Residence program, which this year welcomes its first female composer, Katherine Balch.

For more information, please visit californiasymphony.org.

76% of California Symphony Musicians Favor this Program in our New Season

Wonder what the musicians think of the music in our new 2017–18 LARGER THAN LIFE season? Well so did we, and so we asked them.

In a poll of California Symphony musicians this summer, an astonishing 76% indicated a preference for our season opener, LYRICAL DREAMS, a program that includes pieces either written about or inspired by dreams: Samuel Barber’s Knoxville: Summer of 1915, YTTE (Yield to Total Elation by Bay Area composer Nathaniel Stookey, and Mahler’s Symphony №4.

Perhaps it’s in part a proximity effect (enthusiasm for the next program they’ll be working on?) but some of the comments we got revealed a deep affinity for the works — especially the Mahler, and most notably from members of the string section.

In their own words…

Christina Knudson (violin): “I’m excited to play Mahler. I think his music can be appreciated at many different stages in life. It’s been a long time and I feel like I’m a wiser and more experienced person now. I am looking forward to performing his music again at this stage in my life.”

Andy Butler (bass): “Mahler Symphony #4. This was the first Mahler symphony I ever played, and it was with the SF Youth Orchestra when I was 19. It was such an amazing composition and the unison string writing was so fantastic!”

Daria D’Andrea (violin): “It is too hard to pick one piece. I can’t wait to play Mahler 4 because of the scope of the work, and the depth of themes of life and death to get immersed in. The Barber Knoxville is exquisite, I’m looking forward especially to that.”

David Steele (violin): “Mahler 4. I have very fond memories of performing that in college. Can’t wait to perform it again.”

Monica Daniel-Barker (flute): “Mahler is always delicious and the Barber is certainly a treat to perform.”

Concertmaster Jennifer Cho (violin): “Barber Knoxville Summer of 1915. Such a mesmerizing piece.”

Julie Feldman (cello): “Mahler 4 — emotional, dark, and enlightening at the same time.”

Marcel Gemperli (viola): “Mahler’s 4th Symphony is a masterpiece, showing a more innocent and idealistic side of the composer in comparison to his darker and more melodramatic symphonies. It is one of my favorites!”

Laura Reynolds (oboe): “Mahler 4. I am a Mahler geek, can hardly hear and/or play enough Mahler in a live concert hall.”

Patricia Minet (violin): “Mahler 4 because it has been over 15 years since the California Symphony performed Mahler.”

Stephen Zielinski (clarinet): “Barber’s Knoxville is one of my all-time favorites.”

Laurien Jones (violin): “Mahler Sym. №4. It is meaningful to perform a Symphony of substance that gives to others as it gives to me. It is exhilarating to perform.”

Betsy London (viola): “Mahler 4…. great viola solos !!!”

Robert Hoexter (cello): “Definitely Mahler 4. We seldom play Mahler, and it is always so immersive and rewarding.”

Our season opener LYRICAL DREAMS takes place Sunday, September 24 at 4pm, at Lesher Center for the Arts, 1601 Civic Drive, Walnut Creek.

· Donato Cabrera, conductor

· Maria Valdes, soprano

PROGRAM:

· Barber — Knoxville: Summer of 1915, Op. 24

· Stookey — YTTE (Yield To Total Elation)

· Mahler — Symphony №4

PRE-CONCERT TALK:

Music Director Donato Cabrera gives a pre-concert talk, free to ticket holders, offering insights about the music, beginning one hour before the performance at 3 pm. Cabrera will be joined on stage by soprano Maria Valdes, Bay Area Composer Nathaniel Stookey, and Grammy-award nominated sound engineer and inventor Oliver DiCicco.

TICKETS:

Tickets are $42 to $72 and $20 for students and are available by calling 925.943.SHOW and online at californiasymphony.org.

Season ticket packages are also on sale for as little as $99 — just $33 per concert — including the new Saturday night series.

COMING UP:

A Lemony Snicket Holiday — Saturday, December 23, 2017 at 4PM and 8PM

Pastoral Beethoven — Saturday, January 20, 2018 at 8PM & Sunday, January 21 at 4PM

Mozart Requiem — Saturday, March 17, 2018 at 8PM & Sunday, March 18 at 4PM

Something Old, Something New — Sunday, May 6, 2018 at 4PM

ABOUT CALIFORNIA SYMPHONY

We also host the highly competitive Young American Composer-in-Residence program, which this year welcomes its first female composer, Katherine Balch.

For more information, please visit californiasymphony.org.

A Deathly Violin Solo and its Unique Challenges

—By Jennifer Cho, California Symphony Concertmaster.

Arnold Böcklin’s self portrait inspired the chilling, creepy violin solo in the second movement of Mahler Symphony №4

According to Gustav Mahler’s wife Alma, the second movement in his Symphony №4, which features a uniquely challenging violin solo, was inspired by a self portrait of Arnold Böcklin. Behind the artist, the grim reaper — a symbol of death for many centuries — is portrayed playing the violin.

It’s very interesting to play this work after performing Saint Saen’s Danse Macabre last season and representing the devil. I never thought I would be portraying the devil or death so often! But I love any opportunity to be a little bit evil at work…

There are some unique challenges to preparing this solo, which requires the violin to be tuned up a whole note from normal. My mental check list as I prep for the piece looks something like this:

Acquire second violin.
Break in new strings, before transferring them to second violin and tuning them up an entire whole step.
Cross fingers that weather won’t be too wonky, adding extra stress on an extremely taut instrument.
Have plenty of back up strings on hand, especially the thinnest E string which is tuned up to an F.
Prepare second shoulder rest, and some sort of violin stand to rest the second instrument.
Learn solo based on muscle memory and fingerings rather than by ear. Having perfect pitch presents an extra challenge since the notes I see will not be the notes I hear.

This solo requires an unusual amount of preparation. But the effect is chilling, creepy, and certainly one of a kind.

California Symphony Concertmaster Jennifer Cho plays the violin solo in the Mahler Symphony №4 at our season opener LYRICAL DREAMS, Sunday, September 24 at 4pm, at Lesher Center for the Arts, 1601 Civic Drive, Walnut Creek.

· Donato Cabrera, conductor

· Maria Valdes, soprano

PROGRAM:

· Barber — Knoxville: Summer of 1915, Op. 24

· Stookey — YTTE (Yield To Total Elation)

· Mahler — Symphony №4

PRE-CONCERT TALK:

TICKETS:

Tickets are $42 to $72 and $20 for students and are available by calling 925.943.SHOW and online at californiasymphony.org.

Season ticket packages are also on sale for as little as $99 — just $33 per concert — including the new Saturday night series.

COMING UP:

A Lemony Snicket Holiday — Saturday, December 23, 2017 at 4PM and 8PM

Pastoral Beethoven — Saturday, January 20, 2018 at 8PM & Sunday, January 21 at 4PM

Mozart Requiem — Saturday, March 17, 2018 at 8PM & Sunday, March 18 at 4PM

Something Old, Something New — Sunday, May 6, 2018 at 4PM

ABOUT CALIFORNIA SYMPHONY

We also host the highly competitive Young American Composer-in-Residence program, which this year welcomes its first female composer, Katherine Balch.

For more information, please visit californiasymphony.org.

California Symphony Appoints Jennifer Cho as Concertmaster

San Francisco Opera first violinist Jennifer Cho is confirmed as Concertmaster for the California Symphony after four years with the orchestra, including a year as Acting Concertmaster during the 2016–17 season.

Here’s the official announcement…

http://mailchi.mp/ee98f0c29b71/jennifer-cho-appointed-concertmaster-for-the-california-symphony

Cho debuts as Concertmaster with the California Symphony at our season opener LYRICAL DREAMS, Sunday, September 24 at 4pm, at Lesher Center for the Arts, 1601 Civic Drive, Walnut Creek.

· Donato Cabrera, conductor

· Maria Valdes, soprano

PROGRAM:

· Barber — Knoxville: Summer of 1915, Op. 24

· Stookey — YTTE (Yield To Total Elation)

· Mahler — Symphony №4

PRE-CONCERT TALK:

TICKETS:

Tickets are $42 to $72 and $20 for students and are available by calling 925.943.SHOW and online at californiasymphony.org.

Season ticket packages are also on sale for as little as $99 — just $33 per concert — including the new Saturday night series.

COMING UP:

A Lemony Snicket Holiday — Saturday, December 23, 2017 at 4PM and 8PM

Pastoral Beethoven — Saturday, January 20, 2018 at 8PM & Sunday, January 21 at 4PM

Mozart Requiem — Saturday, March 17, 2018 at 8PM & Sunday, March 18 at 4PM

Something Old, Something New — Sunday, May 6, 2018 at 4PM

ABOUT CALIFORNIA SYMPHONY

We also host the highly competitive Young American Composer-in-Residence program, which this year welcomes its first female composer, Katherine Balch.

For more information, please visit californiasymphony.org.