San Francisco Symphony at 100 Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		4.0
Audio		4.5
Extras		2.5
Overall		4.0

San Francisco Symphony at 100 Blu-ray Movie Review

Happy Birthday.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman June 12, 2012

Forgive me if I indulge in some momentary civic pride, but San Francisco’s downtown public library doesn’t (or at least didn’t) have anything near the music score collection that Portland’s main library does. I had lived in Portland for a couple of years when I decided to move down to the City by the Bay to work in a couple of jazz clubs, but I was also then manically studying classical scores and wanted to continue my learning curve. I dutifully managed to get a San Francisco library card and went to the music section and was appalled to see an absolute dearth of available material, at least compared to Portland’s really impressively large collection. That probably didn’t have a lot to do with my ultimate decision to move back to Portland, but I’ve often wondered how a city so full of musical life in so many different genres could not have a greater collection of classic scores available to the general public. My sojourn in San Francisco was filled with incredible music. I was barely 21 at the time, though I had already graduated from college over a year previously, and I was able to rustle up some gigs in little clubs down off of Market and also a funky little joint up in Haight Ashbury, but all of my free time was spent seeing a huge variety of other musicians, whether it be fantastic jazz players downtown or modern ensembles made up of students at the San Francisco Conservatory. (I got in trouble a couple of times dropping by the Conservatory and going into one of their practice rooms to “work out” on a piano— something strictly forbidden if you weren’t an actual paying customer-student, so to speak.) But being a poor, struggling musician meant I simply didn’t have the funds to ever attend a San Francisco Symphony concert, and that has been one of my major regrets from that period of my life. The west coast civic symphony orchestras have never seemed to really get their due in the grand scheme of things where Culture (with a capital C) is assumed to be an East Coast phenomenon, though Gerard Schwarz has managed to raise the cachet of the Seattle Symphony rather significantly, and the Los Angeles Philharmonic gets a little credit now and then simply due to the fact that L.A. is such a cultural bulwark. The Oregon Symphony is usually an also ran, though former maestro James De Priest did good work with it and current Music Director Carlos Kalmar gets respectful reviews. Perhaps surprisingly, the San Francisco Symphony probably comes out on top of all of the west coast consortiums and it is in the midst of some gala celebrations of its 100th anniversary. (Civic pride alert again: the Oregon Symphony—as well as the Seattle Symphony —predate San Francisco’s orchestra by several years.)

Part of the San Francisco Symphony’s luster and ascendancy can be traced to its current Music Director, Michael Tilson Thomas, who assumed the position in 1995. (Tilson Thomas was also Principal Guest Conductor of the Los Angeles Philharmonic around a decade earlier.) Tilson Thomas has a natural ebullience which makes him perhaps more accessible than the crusty conductor of yore, and as I’ve mentioned before in other reviews of Tilson Thomas discs, there’s little doubt that Tilson Thomas is the heir apparent to the Leonard Bernstein tradition of combining nuanced interpretation with music education. Tilson Thomas’ excellent Keeping Score series (Keeping Score: Shostakovich's Symphony No. 5 Blu-ray review, Keeping Score: Mahler Blu-ray review, Keeping Score: Berlioz's Symphonie Fantastique Blu-ray review, Keeping Score: Ives' Holidays Symphony Blu-ray review) follows in the tradition of Bernstein efforts like the Young People’s Concerts or The Unanswered Question: Six Talks at Harvard. Tilson Thomas “instructs” mostly through music on this particular outing, which is hosted by author Amy Tan (The Joy Luck Club).

This is a bit of an odd assortment of material, but it includes one iconic American composer, offers a showcase for guest performer Itzhak Perlman, features a performance that of one of the most iconic “educational” compositions of all time, and closes with an homage to another American composer whom Tilson Thomas has championed for years. The concert opens with a splendid reading of Aaron Copland’s Ballet Suite from Billy the Kid, a familiar piece which offers lots of little solo moments for a variety of the Symphony’s stellar players. Perlman takes the stage next for the lyrical but boisterous Mendelssohn Violin Concerto in E Minor. Tilson Thomas displays his penchant for edifying his audience with a brisk run through of Benjamin Britten’s Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra, a piece that probably introduced many classical music lovers to the various sections and sounds of a symphony orchestra. Bringing up the rear, so to speak, is an energetic reading of a piece Tilson Thomas premiered several years ago, John Adams’ Short Ride in a Fast Machine. Adams is in attendance and takes a quick bow, and there’s no mistaking the genuine affection that exists between Tilson Thomas and the composer. Davies Symphony Hall is home to a kind of light show for this performance, as some nice projections fill the billowing fabric hung above the audience, giving the impression that the entire venue is hurtling through space.

Tan is on hand between some of these offerings to give little snippets of the orchestra’s long and rather interesting history. Tilson Thomas also takes the microphone for a few minutes to thank an appreciative audience for continuing to support the Arts in San Francisco. Maybe he can do something about that score collection in the San Francisco library if he has some free time.

Note: Those of you who like to read credits (like I do) and who have a long memory may get a laugh out of something that flies by at the end of this concert. One of the video technicians is named William Steinberg. Some of you may know that another (hopefully, anyway) William Steinberg was the longtime conductor of both the Pittsbugh and Boston Symphony Orchestras, and Tilson Thomas in fact made his conducting debut when Steinberg took ill and Tilson Thomas replaced him in Boston (shades of Bernstein and Bruno Walter in New York).

San Francisco Symphony at 100 Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

San Francisco Symphony at 100 is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of SFS Media (the Symphony's own private boutique label) with an AVC encoded 1080i transfer in 1.78:1. This is a beautifully sharp and clear high definition presentation that offers very pleasing fine object detail throughout the extremely well choreographed camera coverage of the orchestra and its players (note for example how clearly the various worn tines on the marimba are during the John Adams piece). There is some murkiness in the wide shots and especially the shots from the various balconies, which suffer from a loss of shadow detail and a generally fuzzy quality. Otherwise, though, this is a nicely crisp presentation that continues the San Francisco Symphony's winning high definition video ways.

San Francisco Symphony at 100 Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

San Francisco Symphony at 100 features two Dolby TrueHD audio options, a 5.1 surround mix and a 2.0 stereo mix. The 5.1 mix is gorgeously spacious and is especially fine in numbers that offer soloists playing against the orchestra, as in several moments of the Billy the Kid Suite and (of course) the Mendelssohn Violin Concerto and the Britten Guide. Fidelity is top notch throughout both of these mixes, with beautiful reproduction of all frequency ranges. The 5.1 also adds the exemplary hall ambience of the Davies venue. Dynamic range is especially impressive across the course of the concert, varying from the bombastic tuttis of the Adams onslaught to more delicate shadings in the Copland piece.

San Francisco Symphony at 100 Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Historical Features (1080i; 58:14) is set of featurettes which documents the orchestra's long history. Starting with Walter Damrosch in the early years of the twentieth century, the featurettes proceed chronologically through a number of the Symphony's notable achievements, including its early recordings (in 1925) and its contributions to the cultural life of San Francisco.


• Musicians of the San Francisco Symphony is a list offering all of the players and singers who are part of the San Francisco Symphony.

San Francisco Symphony at 100 Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

San Francisco Symphony at 100 would have been a wonderful (if perhaps just slightly odd) concert even if it hadn't been celebrating the vaunted orchestra's 100th anniversary. But there's an understandably celebratory air about the festivities which ups the ante and makes the entire evening somehow more exciting. Tilson Thomas is his usual elfin self, conducting both with and without baton but shaping an evening of undeniable musical elegance and eloquence. Perlman is his typical brilliant self, moving through the flourishes of the Mendelssohn with apparent ease, and the evening has the added attraction of the unexpected "light show" accompanying the Adams finale. Tan's brief comments are also enjoyable. This Blu-ray offers excellent video and superior audio, and its Historical featurettes are really compelling as well. Highly recommended.