Renée Fleming, soprano

RENÉE FLEMING, SOPRANO
Wednesday, January 12, 2005
Accompanist to-be-announced

PROGRAM

I: Arias by Georg Friedrich Handel (1685-1759)
Oh Had I Jubal’s Lyre from Joshua
O Sleep, Why Dost Thou Leave Me? from Semele
To Fleeting Pleasures Make Your Court from Samson
Calm Thou My Soul…Convey Me to Some Peaceful Shore from Alexander Balus
Endless Pleasure from Semele

II: Alban Berg (1885-1935)
Sieben Frühe Lieder (Seven Early Songs, 1907)
Nacht (Night)
Schilflied (Reed Song)
Die Nachtigall (The Nightingale)
Traumgekrönt (Crowned in a Dream)
Im Zimmer (In the Chamber)
Liebesode (Ode to Love)
Sommertage (Summer Days)

III:
André Previn (b. 1929)
I Can Smell the Sea Air from A Streecar Named Desire
John Kander (b. 1927)
A Letter from Sullivan Ballou
Carlisle Floyd (b. 1926)
Ain’t It a Pretty Night? from Susannah

IV: Lieder by Robert Schumann (1810-1856)
Ständchen (Serenade)
Mondnacht (Moonlit Night)
Er ist’s! (Spring It Is!)
Hochländisches Wiegenlied (Highland Lullaby)
Aufträge (Messages)
Stille Tränen (Silent Tears)

Sponsor: The Stephen & Carla Hahn Foundation
Co-Sponsors: Bertling & Clausen, LLC;
The CAMA Women's Board

With “the world’s most beautiful voice,” the reigning American soprano Renée Fleming has appeared to great acclaim on the operatic stage, in recital, on television, radio and on disc. She received a Grammy Award in 1999 for her Decca recording, The Beautiful Voice and honors from Musical America (1997 Vocalist of the Year) and L'Académie du Disque Lyrique (1996, inaugural Solti Prize). Fleming enjoys a stunning singing career across a wide range of musical styles as one of the most charismatic and versatile singers of our day.

"Quite apart from the sheer lyrical beauty of voice, she has an innate musicianship which makes every performance a great joy."

– Sir Georg Solti

SAN FRANCISCO SYMPHONY
Tuesday, January 18, 2004
Michael Tilson Thomas, music director
Mahler: Symphony No. 9
Principal Sponsor: Léni Fé Bland
Co-Sponsor: Nancy & Kent Wood

Planned in the wake of the 1906 earthquake, the San Francisco Symphony gave its first concert in 1911. Over the past century, the orchestra has grown in stature under such notable music directors as Pierre Monteux, Seiji Ozawa, Edo de Waart and Herbert Blomstedt. In 1995, Michael Tilson Thomas assumed his post as the Symphony's 11th Music Director. Maestro Tilson Thomas made his debut with the Symphony in 1974 at age 29 conducting Mahler's epic Symphony No. 9, and now 31 years later he brings this special program to the Arlington Theatre.

“In Mahler's Symphony No. 9... Michael Tilson Thomas led the San Francisco Symphony through a startlingly vivid performance… there was the clear sense that more was at work here than a mere farewell. It was a whole life.”

– Harvey Steiman, S & H International Concert Review

CHINA PHILHARMONIC
Tuesday, March 1, 2005
Long Yu, music director
Lang Lang, piano
Lüwa Ke, soprano
Rimsky-Korsakov: Overture to "The Tsar's Bride"
Hua Yanjun (A'bing) (trans. Wu Zuqiang): Moon Reflected on the Erquan Fountain
Rachmaninoff: Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini
Xiao Gang Ye: Das Lied auf der Erde (commissioned for this world tour)
Bartók: The Miraculous Mandarin Suite, op. 19
Sponsor: Herbert & Elaine Kendall
Co-Sponsors: Bitsy Gordy/Becton Family Foundation;
Robert & Sherry Gilson/Merrill Lynch Montecito;
André Saltoun & Michele Neely;
The CAMA Fellows

The China Philharmonic Orchestra was established in 2000 as an international standard orchestra. Its predecessor, the China Broadcasting Symphony was one of the first symphony orchestras founded in China after 1949. The founding of the China Philharmonic celebrates the increasingly active role of China in the performance of Western classical music. Born in 1982 in Shenyang, China, pianist Lang Lang has performed in the major concert halls of North America, Europe and Asia, establishing himself as one of the most exciting pianists of our time.

“Lang Lang is already one of today’s supreme keyboard athletes... There seems to be no keyboard challenge that he cannot mow down with apparent ease and evident pleasure.”

– Boston Globe

LOS ANGELES PHILHARMONIC
Saturday, April 2, 2005
Yuri Temirkanov, conductor
Ravel: Le Tombeau de Couperin
Debussy: La Mer
Tchaikovsky: Suite from Swan Lake
Principal Sponsor: The Samuel B. & Margaret C. Mosher Foundation
Co-Sponsor: Santa Barbara Bank & Trust

The Los Angeles Philharmonic returns for its 255th CAMA concert in Santa Barbara since 1919, the year of each organization's mutual founding. With the extensive international attention that the recent opening of the Disney Hall has brought the orchestra, the LA Phil has entered a new era of worldwide recognition as one of the finest orchestras of our times. This season the orchestra will perform under the guest directorship of the great Russian conductor Yuri Temirkanov. Mr. Temirkanov is a regular visitor to the United States where each season he conducts the major orchestras of New York, Philadelphia, Boston, San Francisco and Los Angeles. He is music director of the St. Petersburg Philharmonic and the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra.

“[Temirkanov is] almost always unconventional, and sometimes maddening, but you indulge him, because he's deeply musical.”

– Jay Nordlinger, National Review

KIROV ORCHESTRA
Thursday, April 14, 2005
Valery Gergiev, music director
Balakirev: Islamey
Rimsky-Korsakov: Scheherazade
Borodin: In the Steppes of Central Asia
Mussorgsky: Pictures at an Exhibition (orch. Ravel)
Underwriter: The Andrew H. Burnett Foundation

The Kirov Orchestra is one of Russia’s oldest musical institutions, founded in the 18th century during the reign of Peter the Great. Since 1860, the orchestra has made its home in St. Petersburg’s Mariinsky Theatre, birthplace of numerous operas and ballets including Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake, The Nutcracker and Sleeping Beauty. Valery Gergiev is one of the foremost international conductors of our time. As well as being one of the most highly sought after artists by the world's top orchestras and opera houses, he occupies a unique, preeminent position in Russia as both the Music Director of the Kirov Opera and the Kirov Ballet and the overall Intendant of the Mariinsky Theatre. He is also the Principal Guest Conductor for the Metropolitan Opera in New York.

“Valery Gergiev is extraordinary... simply one of the most exciting podium talents in years.”

– San Francisco Examiner

RICHARD GOODE, PIANO
Tuesday, February 8, 2005
Bach: Partita No. 6 in E minor
Schoenberg: Six Little Piano Pieces, op. 19
Beethoven: Sonata No. 30 in E Major, op. 109
Debussy: Preludes, Book I
Sponsor: The Stephen & Carla Hahn Foundation
Co-Sponsor: Nancy & Kent Wood

American pianist Richard Goode is acknowledged as one of the leading interpreters of Beethoven and Mozart. His refined musicianship brings an exciting combination of grandness and humility, boldness and depth. He is the first American pianist to have recorded the complete Beethoven Sonatas.

“It is virtually impossible to walk away from one of Mr. Goode's recitals without the sense of having gained some new insight, subtly or otherwise, into the works he played or about pianism itself.”

— The New York Times

ALFRED BRENDEL, PIANO
Wednesday, March 16, 2005
Mozart: Nine Variations in D on a Minuet by J. P. Duport, K. 573
Schumann: Kreisleriana, Op. 16
Schubert: Moments Musicaux, D. 780
Beethoven: Piano Sonata No. 15 in D Major, "Pastoral," Op. 28
Principal Sponsor: Judith L. Hopkinson
Sponsors: The Castagnola Family Foundation;
The Stephen & Carla Hahn Foundation

Recognized the world over for his profound ability to convey the emotional and intellectual development of the music he performs, Alfred Brendel is one of the most revered and eminent musicians of our time. He has performed for over 50 years with the leading orchestras of the world and in recitals at all of the world's major music centers.

"In fifty years of concert going, I cannot recall performances any finer in style, execution or content than these by Alfred Brendel."

— Chicago Tribune

EROICA TRIO
Erica Nickrenz, piano
Adela Peña, violin
Sara Sant'Ambrogio, cello
Friday, April 22, 2005
Mark O'Connor: Piano Trio No. 1, "Poets and Prophets"
Astor Piazzola: Three Tangos (Otoño Porteño, Oblivión, Primavera Porteña)
Ravel: Trio in A minor
Sponsor: Dolores M. Hsu
Co-Sponsors: The CAMA Women's Board;
Carol L. Valentine

The vibrant Eroica Trio, winner of the 1991 Naumburg Award, returns by popular demand following their exciting CAMA debut last season with the Prague Chamber Orchestra. The talented and vivacious young women of the Eroica Trio have extensively toured the U.S., Europe and Asia and released 5 recordings for Angel/EMI Classics garnering multiple Grammy® nominations.

"[The Eroica Trio] plays with refinement, passion, spontaneity, imagination and the fullest grasp of stylistic nuances."

— Chicago Sun-Times