February 28 - From Hour to Shining Hour

Up and out for Purcell Dioclesian



(watched over by Durand [the fight coach] and Harriet) /



Alburger Diocletian rehearsal at Chamber Arts, where we begin staging the latter --

Maria Mikheyenko (Edward Gibbon),

Alexandre Jerenic (Diocletian, surrounded by her court of sycophants: Erin Lahm, Robin Costa, Kathrine Cornelius, Annemarie Ballinger, Allison Collins)

Kimberly Anderman (Drusilla)



-- and make an initial press photo plunge with Kim and Alix.




Then we're off to San Francisco, lunching at Thinker's Cafe, before dropping Harriet off at Community Music Center and getting that concert look at Louis' Barber Shop.



Across San Francisco, past Delores Park



and palms,



Bernal Heights and



San Bruno Mountain loom north of Colma, where a score is scored for Sex and the Orchestra.



The San Francisco Composers Chamber Orchestra concert features a full house and excellent performances.

***

SAN FRANCISCO
COMPOSERS CHAMBER ORCHESTRA
Mark Alburger, Music Director

Free-for-All (But for You, $15)

8pm, Saturday, February 28, Old First Church, San Francisco, CA
Mark Alburger, David Sprung, Martha Stoddard, and Erling Wold, conducting

Program

Phil Freihofner - What Are You Going to Dream Tonight

Davide Verotta - Yanitl

John Beeman - Adagio

Gary Friedman - Romance for Wind Sextet

Lisa Scola Prosek - Serenade for Trumpet



David Sprung - Serendipities

Intermission


Erling Wold - Two Orchestral Waltzes for Lynne
I. Ludmilla Waltz
II. Empress Waltz

Mark Alburger - Sex and the Orchestra, Op. 171
I. Happy Funeral Music (The Little Death)
II. Downfall (Detumescence)

Michael Cooke - String Theory

David Graves / Clare Twohy - Fireproof Winds

Loren Jones - February's Children

***


Big fete afterwards at an Italian place in Polk Gulch, then home, contemplating the beginning of the orchestration to Saul! Saul!: X. Author of Peace.

February 27 - Golden Gate Years

Finish the orchestration of Saul! Saul!: IX. Hide and Seek Ye before heading into the sunset of Alcatraz,



the Marin Headlands.



Mt. Tamalpais,



and San Francisco.



Then over the Bay towards



Coit Tower,



the TransAmerica Building



Sutro Tower, Twin Peaks,



One Rincon,



and the Peninsula.



Tonight, it's the dress rehearsal of the San Francisco Composers Chamber Orchestra's Free-For-All (But for You, $15) show at Old First Church (concert 8pm tomorrow), including
Lisa Scola Prosek's Serenade for Trumpet and Orchestra,



Erling Wold's Two Orchestral Waltzes for Lynne, and



the two movements of Sex and the Orchestra (I. Happy Funeral Music and



II. Downfall).



It's also Harriet's birthday,



so a quick blitz to the Community Music Center (where the first dress rehearsal of Marriage of Figaro -- featuring Meghan Dibble and Eliza O'Malley) is being held, with cake, champagne, and flowers follows... and a good time is had by all.

February 26 - Quiz Show

Test days are definitely the easy ones, even when the hours include another rehearsal with the San Francisco Composers Chamber Orchestra. So, after Quiz 6 for the Theoreticians (with examples from music of Claudio Monteverdi, Carlo Gesualdo, Heinrich Schutz, Henry Purcell, Antonio Vivaldi, and Johann Sebastian Bach), there's even time to record Saul! Saul!: VII.-VII. Oh Beauty! - Is There a Man in the lab and beginning of IX. Symphony (Passacaglia) - Hide and Seek (Ye) (three more pages orchestrated previous to this), plus take a short stride from Olympic West Trailhead (with its views of Mt. Diablo)



up Reliez Station Road (with glimpses of Lafayette Ridge).



Then back in the car, past Shakespeare Hill



to rehearsal of the Orchestra, including Lisa Scola Prosek's Serenade for Trumpet



and Erling Wold's Two Orchestral Waltzes for Lynne,



the latter having close to the same instrumention as Sex and the Orchestra,



Michael Cooke's String Theory, David Graves and Clare Twohy's Fireproof Winds, and Loren Jones's February's Children (for more info on Saturday's concert -- sfcco.org).

February 25 - In Cumuli

Down the 680 corridor past the Sulfur Springs Mountains, Long Barn, Chinese Wall,



Eden,



Horse Farm,



Stone Wind Running Fence,



The Rills --



under clouds over the Benicia Bridge --



to the glare of a blooming St. Mary's with works from the Dublin Virginal Composer (b. c. 1540) to Giovanni Gabrieli (1553-1612), and DVC for dictation and harmony based on J.S. Bach's Passacaglia in C Minor, plus engaging compositions by Tyler Layne, Thomas Magleby, and Diocletian: Happy Funeral Music. Marin run, back to the classroom briefly, then home -- helping Harriet with Marriage of Figaro costumes and projections, finishing up orchestration of Saul! Saul!: VII.-VIII. Oh, Fairest! / Is There a Man? (12 pages total) and beginning that of IX. Hide and Seek (6).

February 24 - If It's Tuesday It Must Be Inferno

The sun rose on Henry Purcell's When I Am Laid in Earth from Dido and Aeneas for Theory dictatation, whereupon Bruce Cooke, Jerry Kuderna, and I make deep-laid plans to fulfill new beaurocratic folderol -- the antidote being lunch at Elephant Bar. Still early enough in the semester (re paper grading) such that there's time to head to the lab and record Saul! Saul!: VI. Eldest Born of Hell and much of VII. O Fairest!


Evening class proceeds apace from the Early Renaissance with Johannes Ciconia (what kind of a name is that?) to the Late with Andrea Gabrielli and Claude Gervaise; followed by Left Bank with Doug, Owen, and one of the latter's old Theory students; and one more page of orchestration (now 10 total) of S!S!: VII.

February 23 - Enlightenment

Music of Thoinot Arbeau (1519-1595), Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina (1525-1594), Orlando di Lasso (1532-1594), and Giorgio Mainerio (1535-1582) for the Enlighteners; followed by Claudio Monteverdi's L'Orfeo: Tu se' Morta sent the way of the Theoreticians; then back to St. Mary's to get a form and touch base with Marty Rokeach (they will perhaps have need of a Music Lit course next spring). After a brief jaunt on the Lafayette Moraga Trail from Las Heurtas north to close to the Elementary School, make the jump home in increasingly dramatic light,



past the stark Mothball Fleet,



Sulfur Springs Mountains,



Quarry and Benicia,



Chinese Wall,


Cordelia Junction,



and the ever-faithful North Lagoons to Harriet and another orchestrated page of Saul! Saul!: VII. O Fairest!