Classical guitar virtuoso Marcin Dylla will teach at SFCM during the fall semester of 2016. His guest appointment inaugurates a faculty artist-in-residence program that will allow guitar students to work in-depth with a different artist of international stature each fall. Read more.
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Alum to Innovate at
Toronto Symphony
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 The Toronto Symphony Orchestra has hired alumnus Adrian Fung '08 as its VP of Innovation, a new position with a broad purview over education, outreach and collaborations. Fung is an award-winning cellist, musical entrepreneur and founding member of the Afiara Quartet. Read more.
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 A Spirited Premiere
The Conservatory's annual Highsmith Award gives a composition student the invaluable opportunity to write a piece for full orchestra and to collaborate in its premiere. Michael Kropf '16 began writing his Highsmith entry even as he was moving across the country to study with composition chair David Conte, and aptly named it High Spirits. The Conservatory Orchestra performs the work along with Prokofiev's Suite from Romeo and Juliet and Sibelus' Symphony No. 1 in E Minor on Saturday, November 7 at 8 p.m. and Sunday, November 8 at 2 p.m. Scott Sandmeier conducts. Details.
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 SFCM to Host Klein CompetitionBeginning next June, SFCM will host the annual Irving M. Klein International String Competition, a prestigious contest for young musicians that has launched the careers of major artists and principal players in many U.S. orchestras. Now in its 31st year, the Klein Competition was previously presented at San Francisco State University. Read more.
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Celebrating David Conte's 60th
Never mind Happy Birthday To You... Friends of SFCM composition chair David Conte will toast his birthday with 32 premieres penned by his former students and two by the composer himself. SFCM faculty, alumni and members of the San Francisco Opera Orchestra honor Conte's musical legacy - and his 60th birthday - on Sunday, November 1 at 2 p.m. Admission is free. Details.
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Alumnae Adler Fellows
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 Soprano Amina Edris '15 is the latest SFCM grad to be named an Adler Fellow at the San Francisco Opera Center. She will join soprano Julie Adams '13 who returns in 2016 for her second year in the prestigious training program. Both singers study with voice department chair César Ulloa.
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 A Celebration of New Carols
SFCM heralds the holiday season with a concert of brand new carols by acclaimed American composers. The performance features music from the new PentaTone Classics CD December Celebration including selections written by Mark Adamo, William Bolcom and Joan Morris, Jake Heggie, SFCM faculty composer David Garner '79, and alumnus Gordon Getty '62. Performers include soprano Lisa Delan '89, baritone Bruce Rameker '87, Volti, musicians of the New Century Chamber Orchestra, and staff pianist Steven Bailey. Admission is free but reservations are required. Details.
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 Open Classroom Day
California State Assemblymember David Chiu demonstrated the value of a music education at SFCM's Open Classroom Day. Chiu, a trained violinist, gave an impromptu performance of All of Me backed by student pianists and director of recording services Jason O'Connell on guitar. More than 80 Conservatory supporters got a close-up look at how music is made and taught at SFCM by attending opera workshops, an orchestra rehearsal and classes in string pedagogy, among other subjects.
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When Guitarist Matt Bacon '14 left San Francisco in June for a teaching assignment in India, he didn't know what to expect. But it's fair to say, he probably didn't imagine that after only three months in the country, he'd be invited to tour as a featured artist for the India Guitar Federation and appear in a documentary about the differences between Western and Carnatic music. Read more. |
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November Highlights
The Baroque Ensemble, directed by Corey Jamason and Elisabeth Reed, performs cantatas by Vivaldi and Handel featuring vocal soloists on Sunday, November 1 at 2 p.m. Then, on Sunday, November 15 at 2 p.m., the ensemble presents "A Vivaldi Celebration," concerti for strings and orchestra with solo appearances by Sarah Bleile '17 and Julija Zibrat '16, winners of SFCM's annual concerto competition in violin. Admission is free at both concerts, but reservations are required.
In town to perform a joint recital program at San Francisco Performances , violinist Jennifer Koh and pianist Shai Wosner hold simultaneous master classes at SFCM on Thursday, November 5 at 7:30 p.m. Admission is free. Reservations are required for Jennifer Koh's master class.
Members of two renowned string quartets also hold master classes at SFCM next month. Members of the Kronos Quartet coach Conservatory students on how to interpret and unlock contemporary repertoire in a class on Tuesday, November 10 at 7:30 p.m. Members of the Danish String Quartet visit SFCM on Wednesday, November 18 at 7:30 p.m. Admission is free at both events.
The Conservatory Opera explores the delights and dilemmas of certain star-cross'd lovers in scenes from Romeo and Juliet as adapted by Gounod, Bellini and Bernstein, and in excerpts from Puccini's La bohème and Madame Butterfly. The program also includes selections from Britten's Peter Grimes and Weill's Street Scene, all performed with piano accompaniment. Saturday, November 21 at 7:30 p.m. Admission is free.
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 Café Crème offers a menu including beer and wine two hours before most performances and during intermission. Order in advance at 415.503.6295 or cafecreme@sfcm.edu.
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Trombonists Harry Gonazlez '17 and Brett Wyatt '17 recently serenaded residents of the Za'atari refugee camp in Jordan, while standing on a street corner a few blocks from SFCM. Watch this San Francisco Symphony video.
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Pianist and alumnus Warren Jones '77 tells stories of working at the Met and accompanying world famous opera stars in a new Oral History Project interview. Also a chamber musician, conductor, and acclaimed teacher, Jones is on faculty at the Manhattan School of Music and the Music Academy of the West.
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San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra
November 1, 2 p.m.
Pre-College cellist Elena Ariza is the featured soloist when the San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra performs Dvorák's Cello Concerto in B Minor at Davies Symphony Hall. The program also includes works by Ravel and Copland. Ariza, a student of Eric Sung, has performed twice at Carnegie Hall's Weill Recital Hall as winner of the American Fine Arts Festival and the American Protégé International Piano and Strings Competition. She has also appeared on NPR's From the Top as a soloist and with the Pre-College's Cambiata String Quartet. Details.
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at NVCM
November 1, 4 p.m.
Noe Valley Chamber Music presents the Telegraph String Quartet at St. Mark's Lutheran Church. Founded by SFCM alumni and described alternately as "intensely urgent" and "poignantly resonant", the Telegraph Quartet received the prestigious Grand Prize in the 2014 Fischoff Chamber Music Competition. They have gone on to perform in concert halls, music festivals, and academic institutions across the United States, from Santa Barbara to New York. Meet the artists at a post-concert reception. Ample free parking and childcare is available. Details.
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Violinist Andrea Segar at the Maybeck
November 7, 3 p.m.
The decade of 1910-1919 in classical music features a fascinating intersection of compositional styles, ranging from the romantic to the impressionistic to the avant-garde. Violinist and Pre-College alumna Andrea Segar and SFCM staff pianist Miles Graber explore the richly varied repertoire written for violin and piano during this decade in a recital at the Maybeck in Berkeley. Segar has appeared as soloist with orchestras throughout the United States and has been featured on NPR's Performance Today and classical music stations nationwide. Details.
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San Francisco Girls Chorus
October 30, 8 p.m.
November 1, 4 p.m.
Five-time Grammy Award-winning San Francisco Girls Chorus and acclaimed New York early music ensemble TENET join forces for Surprising Freedoms: Music from Behind Convent Walls, a specially curated program of 17th century music written by and for women in Italian monasteries. It's a rare thing in our digital age when gems of music history are re-discovered, and even more unusual when the composers were women, writing for women's voices. Be there for a revealing peak into cloistered life during the baroque era. Conservatory patrons save 25% with promo code SFCM25. Details.
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