California Symphony Announces 2017-18 Season

The California Symphony today announced its 2017-18 season, its thirty-first, and its fifth with Music Director Donato Cabrera. The season includes a world premiere and a West Coast premiere, first performances of Mozart's Requiem and Sibelius's Third Symphony, the first performances in more than 20 years of Beethoven's Symphony No. 6, Pastoral, and Mahler's Symphony No. 4, the first performance of a work of Mahler's since the Orchestra's 1997-98 season. The Orchestra also welcomes guest soloists Haochen Zhang in Brahms' Piano Concerto No. 2; soprano Maria Valdes in Barber's Knoxville: Summer of 1915 and in Mahler's Symphony No. 4; and Bruch's Violin Concerto No. 1 with Alexi Kenney. The Orchestra gives the world premiere of new Young American Composer-in-Residence Katherine Balch's newest work, a California Symphony commission; and performs two works by Bay Area-based composer Nathaniel Stookey: the West Coast premiere of YTTE (Yield to Total Elation), and The Composer is Dead, the popular orchestral whodunit by Stookey and author Lemony Snicket, with Broadway star Manoel Felciano as narrator. Other highlights include performances with the San Francisco Conservatory Chorus and conductor Ragnar Bohlin of Vaughan Williams' Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis and Arvo Pärt's Te Deum, as part of the Mozart Requiem concert, and a performance of Smetana's Vltava (Die Moldau).

Following a tremendously successful 2016-17 season, in which it experienced large increases in sales, donations, and subscription renewal rates, the Orchestra also announced it is expanding the number of concerts it performs in the 2017-18 season, with three new Saturday night concerts at the Lesher Center for the Arts, in addition to its Sunday afternoon concerts. Diablo Regional Arts Association is the presenting sponsor of the California Symphony's new Saturday night concert series.

"The California Symphony's 31st season offers our audiences a great range of musical experiences: our first performances of Mozart's Requiem and Sibelius' Third Symphony, the West Coast premiere of Bay Area composer Nathaniel Stookey's YTTE (Yield to Total Elation), and the world premiere of our new Young American Composer-in-Residence Katherine Balch's first new orchestral work," said Cabrera. "Also, we'll give our first performances since 1990 of Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony, and Mahler's Symphony No. 4, which we'll perform for the first time in 20 years. We're welcoming some great artists and musicians with connections to the Bay Area, including soprano Maria Valdes, a graduate of the Merola and Adler programs; Manoel Felciano, from San Francisco, who'll narrate Stookey's The Composer is Dead; Alexi Kenney, the young violinist and San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra alumnus, originally from Palo Alto; and Ragnar Bohlin, San Francisco Symphony Chorus and San Francisco Conservatory of Music Chorus director, leading our Orchestra and the Conservatory Chorus. We are very excited to be bringing music from Mozart to Arvo Pärt, from Beethoven, Mahler, and Sibelius, to some of the most recently-written new music by Stookey and Katherine Balch."

Subscription ticket package prices for the California Symphony's 2017-18 season range from $99 to $288 and are on sale today to renewing subscribers and the general public. Season subscribers can save up to 40% and choose their own season with 3-, 4-, or 5-concert packages, including the new Saturday night series. Tickets can be purchased through the California Symphony's website at www.californiasymphony.org and at 925-280-2490. All regular season 2017-18 California Symphony concerts will go on sale to buyers of individual concert tickets on July 27.

The California Symphony's 2017-18 season opens Sunday, September 24 at the Lesher Center for the Arts, with Cabrera leading the Orchestra in its first music by Gustav Mahler in 20 years: Mahler's Symphony No. 4, with soprano Maria Valdes as soloist. Valdes also performs in Samuel Barber's Knoxville: Summer of 1915. A recent graduate of the San Francisco Opera Adler Fellowship program, she makes her debut with the Orchestra in this concert. The West Coast premiere of Bay Area-based composer Nathaniel Stookey's YTTE (Yield To Total Elation), which Cabrera premiered with the Las Vegas Philharmonic in January 2017, completes the program.

"'Yield To Total Elation' was the name given to a vast and elaborate imaginary city created during the 1930s and '40s by San Francisco "outsider" artist A.G. Rizzoli," Stookey explained. "I can relate to that sort of striving, which is both a pursuit and, at its best, a sort of giving in. From the moment I saw the words 'Yield To Total Elation,' I thought: This is how I want music to feel." Stookey's score includes an OOVE, a one-of-a-kind, electro-acoustic instrument created by San Francisco engineer Oliver DiCicco, which Stookey will play in the orchestral performance.

As an Adler Fellow with San Francisco Opera in 2014 and 2015, Maria Valdes appeared in The Magic Flute as Papagena, and also sang the roles of Musetta in La Bohème for Families, Clorinda in La Cenerentola, and Barbarina in The Marriage of Figaro. In 2014, she sang the title role in Donizetti's Rita with the New Century Chamber Orchestra, conducted by Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg. Prior to that, she appeared as Susanna in Merola Opera Program's 2013 production of The Marriage of Figaro. More recently, in 2016, Valdes covered the role of Juliette in Roméo et Juliette for her debut at the Lyric Opera of Chicago, and made her New York recital debut with the New York Festival of Song, performing the music of female Latin composers, opposite Steven Blier and Michael Barrett. San Francisco Classical Voice praised Valdes for her "silvery tone, glassily smooth phrasing, and fine-caliber dynamics."

Stookey's The Composer is Dead, with text by Lemony Snicket (aka Daniel Handler), highlights the Orchestra's two holiday performances on Saturday, December 23. Broadway star and Tony Award nominee Manoel Felciano, who opens in Amelie: A New Musical on Broadway in April, narrates this hilarious orchestral whodunit, as he quizzes each orchestral section to determine who is responsible for the composer's murder. Composed in the style of Prokofiev's Peter and the Wolf and Britten's The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra, The Composer is Dead is an introduction to the instruments and sounds of the orchestra, and an entertaining experience for all ages. Felciano was nominated for a Tony Award for Best Performance by a Featured Actor in a Musical for his performances as Tobias Ragg in the Broadway revival of Sweeney Todd. A San Francisco native, he joined American Conservatory Theater's core acting program in 2009 and has since performed many roles in ACT productions, including Tales of the City, The Caucasian Chalk Circle, Clybourne Park, November, and At Home in the Zoo. On Broadway, he has been seen in Disaster!, Brooklyn, Jesus Christ Superstar, and Cabaret. He is also a musician, and plays the piano, violin, and clarinet. Felciano makes his California Symphony debut in The Composer is Dead. The Orchestra's annual holiday concert leads off with selections from Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker Suite, and an audience singalong follows, with traditional holiday carols.

Beethoven's magnificent Symphony No. 6, Pastoral, anchors the Orchestra's concert programs on Saturday, January 20 and Sunday, January 21. The Orchestra last performed Beethoven's Sixth Symphony in 1990. Violinist Alexi Kenney, a native of Palo Alto and the winner of a 2016 Avery Fisher Career Grant, joins the Orchestra for Bruch's popular Violin Concerto No. 1, and the concerts open with performances of Smetana's Vltava (Die Moldau). Kenney, who makes his California Symphony debut in these concerts, has been praised by The New York Times for "...immediately drawing listeners in with his beautifully phrased and delicate playing." Born in 1994, his win at the 2013 Concert Artists Guild Competition, at 19, led to his critically acclaimed Carnegie Hall debut recital at Weill Hall. Since then, Kenney has given recitals at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., Jordan Hall and the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston, Napa's Festival del Sole, Chicago's Dame Myra Hess series, and the Mondavi Center for the Performing Arts, and he has been featured on Performance Today, WQXR-NY's Young Artists Showcase, and NPR's From the Top. He was a member of the San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra. He began the 2016-17 season with recitals at New York's Mostly Mozart Festival and at Festival Napa Valley. His concerto performance highlights this season include performances with the Indianapolis, Jacksonville, Portland, and Santa Fe symphonies.

The Orchestra's first performances of Mozart's Requiem Mass in D minor highlight the concerts of Saturday, March 17 and Sunday, March 18. The San Francisco Conservatory of Music Chorus, led by conductor Ragnar Bohlin, sings a program of choral works in the first half of the concert, including Vaughan Williams' Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis and Arvo Pärt's Te Deum. Cabrera conducts the full Orchestra and Chorus in the Mozart masterpiece on the second half. The Orchestra's collaboration with the Chorus marks the first time it has performed a mass or requiem in its history. Under Bohlin's direction, the San Francisco Conservatory of Music Chorus performs choral masterworks, works by student and faculty composers, and participates in an annual Student Composition Contest in the spring semester.

The Sunday, May 6 season finale, Something Old, Something New, and a highlight of the California Symphony's 31st Anniversary season, is the world premiere performance of a newly-commissioned orchestral work by Young American Composer-in-Residence Katherine Balch, who was named to the post in February. Haochen Zhang joins Cabrera and the Orchestra for a performance of Brahms' Piano Concerto No. 2, and the Orchestra performs Sibelius's Symphony No. 3 for the first time. Zhang, 26, was awarded the gold medal at the Thirteenth Van Cliburn International Piano Competition in 2009, and the acclaimed Chinese pianist has since appeared with many of the world's leading festivals and many notable orchestras. Of his performance, the Jerusalem Post wrote: "Such a combination of enchanting, sensitive lyricism and hypnotizing forcefulness is a phenomenon encountered very rarely." His new recital recording includes works of Schumann, Brahms, Janacek and Liszt. He is a frequent soloist with Chinese orchestras and has toured extensively in Asia as a soloist and in recital. A graduate of Curtis Institute, Zhang made his debut with the California Symphony in March 2013, with Cabrera leading Zhang and the Orchestra as guest conductor in Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 4.

"That experience was so profound," Cabrera said. "That piece is one of my favorite piano concertos, and the way he played it was the way I've always envisioned it."

This summer, California Symphony and Music Director Donato Cabrera celebrate the Orchestra's 30th anniversary with Symphony Surround, a special event and fundraiser Saturday, June 17, 2017 at the Blackhawk Auto Museum in Danville with guest violinist Anne Akiko Meyers, who returns to perform with California Symphony for the first time since 2007. The proceeds from Symphony Surround will benefit the Orchestra's nationally recognized education programs, including Sound Minds, Music in the Schools, and its Young American Composer-in-Residence program. Anne Akiko Meyers' program with the Orchestra includes works by Piazzolla, Giorgio Morricone, Gershwin, Charlie Chaplin, and Gade, and the evening opens with a performance of Mason Bates' Attack Sustain Decay Release.

ABOUT The California Symphony and Music Director Donato Cabrera

The California Symphony, celebrating its 31st season in the 2017-18 season, is distinguished for its concert programs that combine classics alongside American repertoire, music from living composers, and lesser-known works, its pioneering Young American Composer-in-Residence program, its nationally-recognized education programs, and for its industry-leading initiatives and successes in understanding what young people and new audiences are seeking in the orchestral music experience. The Orchestra enters its fifth season in 2017-18 with Music Director Donato Cabrera. 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 three-decade existence. California Symphony has launched the careers of some of today's most-performed composers and soloists, including violinist Sarah Chang, cellist Alisa Weilerstein, and composers such as former Young American Composers-in-Residence Mason Bates, Christopher Theofanidis, and Kevin Puts. Its 2016-17 season included a work of one of its Young American Composers-in-Residence on each program. Following a highly successful 2016-17 season, in which ticket sales (concerts are averaging 90% capacity), new subscriptions (up 29 percent), and individual donations (up 51 percent over two seasons) increased by large percentages, the Orchestra is expanding its concert offerings in 2017-18 to accommodate a growing audience with a new three-concert Saturday night series, in addition to its five Sunday concerts at its home at the Lesher Center for the Arts in Walnut Creek. For more information, please visit www.californiasymphony.org.

Donato Cabrera has been Music Director of the California Symphony since 2013. He also has been the Music Director of the Las Vegas Philharmonic Orchestra since 2014, and has a thriving international conducting career. He was the Resident Conductor of the San Francisco Symphony (SFS) and the Wattis Foundation Music Director of the San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra (SFSYO) from 2009 to 2016. As Music Director of the California Symphony, Cabrera is committed to featuring music by American composers, supporting young artists in the early stages of their careers, and commissioning new world premieres from talented resident composers. Cabrera was a co-founder of the New York-based American Contemporary Music Ensemble. He made his Carnegie Hall debut leading the world premiere of Mark Grey's ?tash Sorushan. In 2002, Cabrera was a Herbert von Karajan Conducting Fellow at the Salzburg Festival. He has served as assistant conductor at the Ravinia, Spoleto (Italy), and Aspen Music Festivals, and as resident conductor at the Music Academy of the West. Cabrera has also been an assistant conductor for productions at the Metropolitan Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago, and Los Angeles Philharmonic. From 2005-2008, he was Associate Conductor of the San Francisco Opera and in 2009, he made his debut with the San Francisco Ballet. Cabrera was the rehearsal and cover conductor for the Metropolitan Opera production and DVD release of Doctor Atomic, which won the 2012 Grammy® Award for Best Opera Recording. In 2010, Donato Cabrera was recognized by the Consulate-General of Mexico in San Francisco as a Luminary of the Friends of Mexico Honorary Committee for his contributions to promoting the Mexican community in the Bay Area. He holds degrees from the University of Nevada and the University of Illinois and has also pursued graduate studies in conducting at Indiana University and the Manhattan School of Music. For more information, visit www.donatocabrera.com.

ABOUT Katherine Balch, Young American Composer-in-Residence

Katherine Balch, 25, was named the California Symphony's newest Young American Composer-in-Residence in February 2017, for the three-year period beginning in fall 2017. Often influenced by the extra-musical arts, literature, and philosophy, she pursues a heterogeneous yet formally cohesive aesthetic characterized by gestural lyricism. Her music has been commissioned and performed by the Albany Symphony Orchestra, the New York Youth Symphony, Ensemble Intercontemporain, International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE), Alea III, Antico Moderno, FLUX Quartet, New York Virtuoso Singers, Yale Philharmonia, American Modern Ensemble, wildUp and others in such venues as Carnegie Hall, Disney Hall and Wiener Konzerthaus. Performances in the 2016-17 season include those by Contemporaneous, Minnesota Orchestra (Minnesota Orchestra Institute), Albany Symphony Orchestra (American Music Festival), Tokyo Symphony Orchestra (Suntory Hall Summer Arts Festival), and violist Christophe Desjardins as a composer-in-residence with the MANCA festival in Nice, France.

A 2017 Charles Ives Scholarship winner from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, she has been recognized by fellowships from IRCAM Manifeste, Fontainebleau, Aspen and Norfolk music festivals, several ASCAP Morton Gould Awards, New England Conservatory's Donald Martino Prize, Fontainebleau's Prix du Composition, the Grand Prize in the International Society of Bassists Composition Competition, Yale's Alumni Association Prize, and the Woods Chandler Memorial Prize.

Katherine completed her B.A./B.M. in the Tufts University/ New England Conservatory joint-degree program, where she double majored in history and political science at Tufts and studied composition at NEC. During her M.M. at Yale School of Music, she studied with Aaron Kernis, Christopher Theofanidis (a former California Symphony Young American Composer-in-Residence), and David Lang. She recently began her D.M.A. at Columbia University, studying with Georg Haas. Passionate about education at all levels, she is a faculty member of Bard College-Conservatory's preparatory division and the Walden School, a renowned summer program for young composers in Dublin, NH.

CALIFORNIA SYMPHONY SUMMER and 2017-18 SEASON CONCERT CALENDAR

Saturday, June 17, 2017 at 5 pm

Blackhawk Auto Museum, Blackhawk Plaza, 3700 Blackhawk Plaza Circle, Danville

California Symphony: Symphony Surround

A special event and fundraiser celebrating the Orchestra's 30th Anniversary Season

Donato Cabrera, conductor

California Symphony

Anne Akiko Meyers, violin

PROGRAM:

Mason Bates (Young American Composer-in-Residence, 2007-10) - Attack Sustain Decay Release

With Anne Akiko Meyers:

Morricone - Love Theme from Cinema Paradiso

Gershwin - Someone to Watch Over Me

Piazzolla - Oblivion

Chaplin - Smile

Gade - Jealousie 'Tango Tzigane'

TICKETS: Tickets are $135 for cocktail/performance tickets, $500 for dinner/performance tickets, and from $5,000 to $30,000 to sponsor tables. Table tickets are available now by contacting California Symphony Executive Director Aubrey Bergauer at aubrey@californiasymphony.org. Dinner/performance tickets and performance-only tickets are on sale now at www.californiasymphony.org/surround or 925-280-2490.

Sunday, September 24, 2017 at 4 pm

Lesher Center for the Arts, 1601 Civic Drive, Walnut Creek

Opening Night, 2017-18 Season

Lyrical Dreams

Donato Cabrera, conductor

California Symphony

Maria Valdes, soprano

PROGRAM:

Barber - Knoxville: Summer of 1915

Maria Valdes, soprano

Nathaniel Stookey - YTTE (Yield To Total Elation) (West Coast premiere)

Nathaniel Stookey, OOVE

Mahler - Symphony No. 4

Maria Valdes, soprano

Saturday, December 23, 2017 at 4 pm and 8 pm

Lesher Center for the Arts, 1601 Civic Drive, Walnut Creek

A Lemony Snicket Holiday

Donato Cabrera, conductor

California Symphony

Manoel Felciano, narrator

PROGRAM:

Tchaikovsky - Selections from the Nutcracker Suite

Nathaniel Stookey/Lemony Snicket - The Composer is Dead

Manoel Felciano, narrator

Various - Audience Sing-Along

Saturday, January 20, 2018 at 8 pm

Sunday, January 21, 2018 at 4 pm

Lesher Center for the Arts, 1601 Civic Drive, Walnut Creek

Pastoral Beethoven

Donato Cabrera, conductor

California Symphony

Alexi Kenney, violin

PROGRAM:

Smetana - Vltava (Die Moldau)

Bruch - Violin Concerto No. 1

Alexi Kenney, violin

Beethoven - Symphony No. 6 (Pastoral)

Saturday, March 17, 2018 at 8 pm

Sunday, March 18, 2018 at 4 pm

Lesher Center for the Arts, 1601 Civic Drive, Walnut Creek

Mozart Requiem

With the San Francisco Conservatory of Music Chorus

Donato Cabrera, conductor

Ragnar Bohlin, conductor

California Symphony

San Francisco Conservatory of Music Chorus, Ragnar Bohlin, director

PROGRAM:

Vaughan Williams - Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis (conducted by Bohlin)

Arvo Pärt - Te Deum (conducted by Bohlin)

Mozart - Requiem Mass in D minor (conducted by Cabrera)

Sunday, May 6, 2018 at 4 pm

Lesher Center for the Arts, 1601 Civic Drive, Walnut Creek

Something Old, Something New

Donato Cabrera, conductor

California Symphony

Haochen Zhang, piano

PROGRAM:

Katherine Balch - New Work (World Premiere, Young American Composer-in-Residence; California Symphony commission)

Sibelius - Symphony No. 3

Brahms - Piano Concerto No. 2, Op. 83

Haochen Zhang, piano

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