Lisa Hirsch's Classical Music Blog.
The iron tongue of midnight hath told twelve. Lovers, to bed; 'tis almost fairy time.
Berce mollement sur ton sein sublime
Ô puissante mer, l’enfant de Dindyme!
Friday, October 24, 2025
Wednesday, October 22, 2025
Several Items Make a Post
Some not-random notes:
- SFS Chorus Director Jenny Wong has extended her contract with the orchestra through the 2028-29 season.
- San Francisco Girls Chorus has appointed Nicolás Lell Benavides as their 2025-26 composer in residence. (He is the composer of Dolores, which was a big hit at West Edge Opera this past summer.)
- Genevieve Graves is the new executive director of Volti (as of August; yes, I'm a little behind!). The press release noted that "She holds a Ph.D. from Santa Cruz University and a B.A. from Harvard University in Astrophysics, and brings over a decade of leadership experience across tech startups and data science consulting. She is an alumna of the Piedmont East Bay Children's Choir and played a significant role as that organization rose to a level of national and international prominence. She went on to found a chamber choir at Harvard and to sing with additional choirs in Boston, the Bay Area and Santa Cruz."
- Are you a French horn fan? Jesse Clevenger, who played with SFS for two seasons, is playing a couple of pieces of interest with the Vallejo Symphony this Sunday: the world premiere of John Williams's Serenade for Horn and Strings and Benjamin Britten's Serenade for Tenor, Horn, and Strings, the latter with Salvatore Atti. The Britten is a great masterwork. Also on the program are works by C.P.E. Bach and Stravinsky. October 26 at 3 p.m. and I'd go if I didn't have a conflict.
Emerging Black Composers
- Jens Ibsen
- Xavier Muzik
- Tyler Taylor
- Trevor Weston
- Jonathan Bingham
- Shawn Okpebholo
- Sumi Tonooka
Monday, October 20, 2025
Snapshot, 2026, at West Edge Opera
Snapshot is West Edge Opera's presentation of excerpts from new operas or operas under development. Here's the schedule for 2026; be there or be square!
The 2026 Snapshot program will be presented at the First Congregational Church in Berkeley on February 28, 2026, in San Francisco at the Taube Atrium Theater on March 1, 202 and will feature Cry, Wolf, Threshold of Brightness, The Joining, and Case Closed—four daring works by composers and librettists exploring extremism, memory, power, identity, and the consequences of truth and deception.
Cry, Wolf
Composer: JL Marlor
Librettist: Clare Fuyuko Bierman
It's a gorgeous Friday night at UCLA but instead of going out, Austin and Zach are inside, online, comparing their jawlines to pictures of strangers and trying to become "wolves". Cry, Wolf explores the ways that young men use love, friendship, and genuine care for one another to push themselves down darker and deeper ideological rabbit holes.
Threshold of Brightness
Composer: Niloufar Nourbakhsh
Librettist: Lisa Flanagan
Iranian poet Forugh Farrokhzad defied convention to write about life, culture & sexuality as freely as a man would, becoming a pariah and cut-off from friends and family. On February 13, 1967, after a violent incident, she finds herself in her childhood home at the start of a Solstice feast.
The Joining
Composer: Isaac Io Schankler
Librettist: Aiden K. Feltkamp
In the world of The Joining, golems are commonplace artificial companions for the citizens of the Underground. When disaster strikes and traditions must break, can the Undergrounders rely on the prosperous Overland to use the golems for good?
Case Closed
Composer: Martin Rokeach
Librettist: Steven Blum
Michelle Ahearn is a local TV news reporter who is about to be aged out of a job. In one horrible moment she causes an accident that kills local football legend Case Stahl and then flees the scene; a story that she’s assigned to cover making her a star while the lie she’s chosen to live causes her to lose everyone she loves.
Why Can't I Be In Six Places at Once?
Things I could be doing from November 12 to 16:
- San Francisco Silent Film Festival
- Parsifal at San Francisco Opera (last performance)
- The Monkey King at San Francisco Opera (first performance, which I am reviewing, so I will be there)
- Modigliani Quartet plays Kurtage, Haydn, Beethoven at SFP
- Esmé Quartet plays Schubert String Quartet No. 15 in G Major, D. 887 at SFP
- Ercole Amante at Ars Minerva
- Berkeley Symphony, conducted by Ming Luke
- San Francisco Contemporary Music Players
- Gautier Capuçon's amazing recital called Gaia
Friday, October 17, 2025
Monday, October 13, 2025
Museum Mondays
Friday, October 10, 2025
Wednesday, October 08, 2025
Berkeley Symphony: Lancaster, Adams, Haydn
- Joshua Kosman, On a Pacific Aisle. I heard that nod to the Berg violin concerto too.
Tuesday, October 07, 2025
Friday, October 03, 2025
Kavalier & Clay at the Met
- Joshua Barone, NY Times
- Justin Davidson, Vulture/New York, who incorporates a critique of Peter Gelb
- Heidi Waleson, WSJ (paywall)
- Sylvia Korman, Parterre Box
- Alex Ross, The Rest is Noise (a glancing blow only)
- Alex Ross, The New Yorker (a body blow)
- George Grella, NY Classical Review
- David Gordon, TheaterMania
- Financial Times (so paywalled I have no idea who wrote it)
Wednesday, October 01, 2025
Family Matters
- Steven Winn, SFCV and SF Chronicle
- Joshua Kosman, On a Pacific Aisle
- Charlise Tiee, Opera Tattler
- Patrick Vaz, The Reverberate Hills. Patrick's analysis of the role of honor in the opera is important to understanding how everyone behaves here, and I love his description of the sets. However, I've been privately arm-wrestling with him about Gilda for roughly as long as we've known each other. I think it's a misnomer to say that she "has sex with the Duke;" given her overprotected upbringing, what do we think she even knows about sex? Does she understand it well enough to give consent? She is extremely upset, and I don't think it's just shame, when she comes out of the room where she was locked up with the Duke. It's also worth keeping in mind that while she talks about going up to Heaven while she's dying, that's partly in relation to her dead mother, who she thinks is watching over her and whom she will join in Heaven. Being perverse and self-defeating is one thing; letting yourself be killed (SPOILER SORRY) in place of the awful man you're in love with is quite another.
- Lisa Hirsch, SFCV
- Joshua Kosman, On a Pacific Aisle. "Most mesmerizing was her commanding traversal of Act 3, from a wrenching “Addio del passato” through Violetta’s quavering death throes."
Tuesday, September 30, 2025
InterMusic SF: San Francisco Music Day
West Edge Opera 2026
- Britten, The Turn of the Screw. Mark Streshinsky, dir; Jonathan Khuner, cond.
- Handel, Rinaldo. Emily Senturia, cond.
- Geter, American Apollo. Nataki Garrett, dir., Kedrick Armstrong, cond.
The Metropolitan Opera in Saudi Arabia
Saudi Arabia’s record of human rights abuses, its restrictions on free speech and its role in the 2018 killing of the Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi, a Saudi dissident, have led some in the West to call for shunning the kingdom. But in recent years both the Biden and the Trump administrations have sought closer relations with Saudi Arabia. And the country’s de facto ruler, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, has relaxed some rules in the kingdom, tried to diversify its domestic economy beyond oil and worked to reshape its global image through large investments in business, sports, tourism and culture.
Under Mr. Gelb, the Met has been a vocal champion of political freedom and human rights in supporting Ukraine after Russia’s invasion, cutting ties with the Bolshoi Theater in Moscow and with artists who had supported President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, including the star soprano Anna Netrebko.
Mr. Gelb said his support for cultural exchange with Saudi Arabia was different. He called the killing of Mr. Khashoggi, which American intelligence officials said had been approved by Prince Mohammed, “a horrendous event.” But he said he had been encouraged by the new social freedoms given to Saudi women, saying that the country was “trying to improve itself in the eyes of its own population and in the eyes of the world.”
Monday, September 29, 2025
Museum Mondays
Saturday, September 27, 2025
Runnicles at San Francisco Symphony
Well, I was extremely happy with this week's SFS program, which featured Donald Runnicles conducting Berg's Seven Early Songs and Mahler's First Symphony. For the Berg, he had mezzo-soprano Irene Roberts as soloist, and...her performance was a revelation.
- Giulietta, Tales of Hoffman
- Carmen, Carmen
- Bao Chai, Dream of the Red Chamber
- Dorabella, Così fan tutte
- Offred, The Handmaid's Tale
Horns – Michael Stevens (Principal), Jonathan Ring, Jack Bryant, Jessica Valeri, Roy Femenella, Amy Sanchez, Meredith Brown and Alicia Mastromanco
Trombones – Ben Smelser (Principal), Paul Welcomer, Chase Waterbury and Kyle Mendiguchia
- Lisa Hirsch, S.F. Chronicle / SFCV
- Joshua Kosman, On a Pacific Aisle
- Harvey Steiman, Seen and Heard International
- Michael Strickland, S.F. Civic Center
- Stephen Smoliar, The Rehearsal Studio
- Patrick Vaz, The Reverberate Hills
Department of Speculation
San Francisco Opera hasn't announced when they're doing the Ring next, though since it's known that Eun Sun Kim will conduct, it'll be before her contract expires at the end of the 2030-31 season. Given the problematic financial environment for the arts just now, well, it could be a ways out. [Update: A couple of people have mentioned to me, and I have now seen with my own eyes, that Opera says it'll be in June, 2028. They're usually quite well informed.]
Still, as I wrote in my Santa Fe Die Walküre review, we're at a moment of generational change in Wagner singing. Let's take some time to speculate as to who might be in the next SFO Ring. I have absolutely no inside information on casting; these are strictly my hallucinations. Also, my lists are in alphabetical order, not the order in which I'd like to see these roles cast.
Wotan
- Nicholas Brownlee
- Ryan Speedo Green (singing his first this year, in Santa Fe and LA; apparently signed for the next Met Ring)
- Brian Mulligan (sang it in Europe, in concert, with YNS)
- Jamie Barton
- Tanja Ariane Baumgartner
- Raehann Bryce-Davis
- Irene Roberts
- Sarah Saturnino
- Annika Schlicht
- Tomas Konieczny
- Falk Struckmann
- Lise Davidsen (can SFO pay her fees?)
- Christine Goerke
- Anja Kampe (an impressive Isolde last year in SF)
- Camilla Nylund (an impressive Kaiserin in 2023 in SF)
- Tamara Wilson
- Vida Miknevičiūtė
- Irene Roberts (I know, I know, she's a mezzo, but believe me she has the vocal chops for this)
- Elisabeth Strid
- Suggestions from Charles Bush, hoisted from the comments, with my own comments added:
- Jennifer Holloway
- Elza van den Heever. By the end of 2025-26, she'll have been back at SFO for three productions, which makes her a strong candidate to be included in the Ring.
- Rachel Willis-Sorensen. I hear that she is aiming away from Wagner, but yes, she'd be great. Such a beautiful voice.
- Clay Hilley
- Brian Jagde
- Brandon Jovanovich
- Jamez McCorkle
- Simon O'Neill
- Russell Thomas
- Suggestions from Charles Bush, hoisted from the comments, with my own comments added:
- John Matthew Myers. I've seen him twice, in Gurrelieder, jumping in for Jovanovich, and as Iopas in the truncated Seattle Les Troyens. He's very impressive.
- Michael Spyres. HELL YES.
- Daniel Brenna
- Clay Hilley
- Simon O'Neill?
- Andreas Schager
- Stefan Vinke
- Suggestions from Charles Bush, hoisted from the comments:
- Klaus Florian Vogt (?)
- Michael Spyres (!?!)
- Russell Thomas
- Brenton Ryan
- Suggestions from Charles Bush, hoisted from the comments, my own comment added:
- Sean Panikkar. Oh, I wonder if he's a plausible Siegmund? He was wonderful in the L.A. Satyagraha and more recently as Stravinsky's Oedipus at SFS.
- Peixin Chen
- Jongwon Han
- Soloman Howard
Friday, September 26, 2025
Thursday, September 25, 2025
Dead Man Walking
Not long ago, I looked over the notes I had from the 2000 world premiere run of Jake Heggie and Terrence McNally's first opera together, Dead Man Walking. At the time, several years before I became a professional music writer, I didn't think all that much of it. I was therefore somewhat surprised by the opera's popularity (it has had 82 bring-ups to date, all over the United States and Europe), except for the obvious appeal of the story and the excellence of the singers who were in the premiere.
I saw the 25th anniversary production last Saturday, and boy, was I ever wrong. I did not have enough experience with new opera to adequately analyze the music and libretto. (I'm not the only one to have made this mistake; a friend said the same had been true of him back then.)
So I'll come down on the side of Joshua Kosman, whose review a couple of weeks ago mentioned that back in 2000 he'd called it a masterpiece. Dead Man Walking is a remarkable opera, for the strength and singability of the libretto, which is superbly structured, for the excellence of the text-setting, for the beautiful and imaginative orchestration. It's no wonder the opera has been produced so regularly over such a long period. It's an amazing record for a modern opera, and particularly amazing when you keep in mind that Dead Man Walking was Heggie's first opera.
The opera opens with a rape and double murder, and there is no doubt that Joe de Rocher and his brother are guilty. He's not going to be pardoned, his sentence isn't going to be commuted to life imprisonment. The opera isn't really focussed on him; the subjects are Sister Helen's journey to find true Christian forgiveness for the terrible crime he has committed and the terrible harm the crime and its aftermath have had on the families of the murdered teenagers. (Here I'll note that I am not a Christian and would feel no call to forgive a murderer for such a crime. Nonetheless, for many reasons I'm opposed to the death penalty and have been my entire adult life.)
Patrick Summers, who has lived with this opera since 2000, conducted the performance very beautifully. Jamie Barton sang with luminous beauty as Sister Helen, and acted with a kind of understated, plainspoken tartness. Brittany Renée, superb in Omar and La Bohème, was here terrific as Sister Rose, who teaches with Sister Helen. Susan Graham, who created the role of Sister Helen, has come full circle and was deeply moving as a fragile, frightened Mrs. de Roche. Ryan McKinney, one of the go-to baritones for new American opera, was an all-too-human Joe de Rocher. Rodney Gilfry was heart-rending as Owen Hart, father of one of the dead children. Caroline Corrales, Nikola Printz, and Samuel White were all excellent as the other parents of the children.
- Joshua Kosman, On a Pacific Aisle
- Lily Janiak, S.F. Chronicle
- Nicholas Jones, SFCV
- Gabe Meline, KQED
- Matthew Travisano, Parterre Box. Interesting insights into the weaknesses of the opera.
- Charlise Tiee, Opera Tattler
- Michael Strickland, S.F. Civic Center. Again, interesting insights into weaknesses
- Patrick Vaz, The Reverberate Hills
- San Francisco Opera, Dead Man Walking at 25 website: oral history and lots more about the creation of the opera.
Relocated Noise
Alex Ross's long-running blog, The Rest is Noise, has relocated from TypePad to WordPress. If your feed reader or other indicator (there's a Blogger function that acts like a feed reader...) fails to pick up new posts, that is why: the domain name has not changed, but its IP address has. So delete the old feed and search for the blog name, then add that feed. That is what I had to do on Inoreader, my current feed reader.
(If you don't have a feed reader, you should. Never –– well, almost never –– miss an article, which I say because Inoreader seems to occasional skip a Parterre Box article, and I don't know why.)
Shawnette Sulker and Sara Couden in Concert
Monday, September 22, 2025
Friday, September 19, 2025
Wednesday, September 17, 2025
So Do They All
- Lisa Hirsch, S.F. Chronicle (feature)
- Lisa Hirsch, SFCV (review)
- Related: Harvey Steiman, Seen & Heard, reviews Renée Fleming's production of Così, in which the soprano finds her own entertaining resolution for the plot.

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