Santa Rosa Symphony's free @ Home series with Beethoven’s Second Symphony

Santa Rosa Symphony presents an enhanced concert experience on Sunday, November 15, 2020 at 3 PM on its YouTube channel. This virtual concert, conducted by Francesco Lecce-Chong, the second in the Symphony's SRS @ Home series, features Beethoven's Second Symphony and works by Scott Joplin, Chen Yi, Gabriela Lena Frank and Max Bruch.

This concert will premiere on November 15 at 3 PM, preceded by a live pre-concert talk at 2 PM and followed by a live post-concert Q&A with Lecce-Chong—all on YouTube. All three elements of this event will be free, though donations to support the ongoing music and outreach programs of the Symphony will be gratefully received during the event.

Music Director Francesco Lecce-Chong says, "I am delighted to showcase several of our own musicians as soloists on this program, violinists Jay Zhong and Michelle Maruyama, and cellist Adelle-Akiko Kearns. Our concert features a selection of colorful dances from a diverse group of American composers - Gabriella Lena Frank, Chen Yi, and Scott Joplin. We also continue our Beethoven journey with his second symphony - full of dazzling virtuosity and comedic wit!"

Beethoven’s Symphony No. 2, which anchors the November program, is replete with the full gamut of emotions that the composer wrestled with at the onset of his increasing deafness. Already pushing the envelope, Beethoven begins to rewrite the rules and forge new musical territories with his then unconventional nuances, showing himself to be a master composer.

The shorter works offered in this concert comprise a vibrant variety of works, many of which are too seldom heard in modern orchestral settings.

The program opens with “Coqueteos” from Leyendas: An Andean Walkabout by Gabriela Lena Frank, a composer whose high-energy Escaramuza, based on an Incan Warrior dance, delighted SRS @ Home viewers in October. This piece blends Andean folk music traditions with western Classical and, Frank says, “is direct in its harmonic expression, bold and festive.”

In addition to Frank’s three-minute work, Francesco will conduct a subset of the orchestra for two rags by the “The King of Ragtime," Scott Joplin. The Entertainer gained increased fame in popular culture as the theme song for The Sting, a feature film starring Robert Redford and Paul Newman. Maple Leaf Rag, composed in 1899, is the most famous and most imitated rag ever written.

Chen Yi’s Romance and Dance for Two Violins and String Orchestra, together invite listeners into a realm where Chinese and Western Classical music blend to become more than the sum of their parts. In Romance, western instruments imitate the sound of the Chinese ch’in, a 2000-year-old seven-string zither. Dance evokes the “dancing ink on paper in Chinese calligraphy and the fiery moving gestures of ancient Chinese women dancers,” says Yi. SRS associate concertmaster Jay Zhong and assistant principal second violin Michelle Maruyama are the violin soloists.

The spotlight shines on SRS Principal Cellist Adelle-Akiko Kearns in Max Bruch’s lyrical Canzone in B-flat major for Cello and Orchestra. Critics praise Kearns as an “impressive” cellist exhibiting “beautifully sensuous cello playing.” The San Francisco native is a recipient of the prestigious Artists International Award. Kearns made her New York recital debut at Carnegie’s Weill Hall in November of 2008. Read her full bio here.

WHAT: Santa Rosa Symphony concert "SRS @ Home"

WHEN: Sunday, November 15, 2020 at 3:00 PM - Pre-concert Talk 2:00 PM-2:30 PM

WHERE: Santa Rosa Symphony’s YouTube Channel (access also from event page)

COST: Free, with donations gratefully accepted

INFORMATION: Leave message at (707) 546-8742 (Weekdays 9:00 AM – 5:00 PM)

ENHANCEMENTS:

• Program book (online flipbook and printable version) available on concert event page
• Overview video with Lecce-Chong on event page and YouTube Channel
• Informative, engaging, 30-minute pre-concert talk on YouTube with Lecce-Chong at 2 PM concert day
• Post-concert Q&A on YouTube with Lecce-Chong. immediately following the performance