San Francisco Symphony's 2019-2020 Season - Top Picks and Highlights
September 2, 2019
We can hardly believe that it's almost time for the San Francisco Symphony to kick off another season! This is a special time for the San Francisco Symphony because it's MTT's last season as the conductor after an amazing 25-year stint that truly shaped the orchestra into what the are today. If you haven't seen him conduct, this is your time to head to the Davies Symphony Hall and see and hear what magic really sounds like.
(Click here to read about some of MMT and the SF Symphony's achievement and find out who is going to take over the podium!)
There are SO many great concerts coming up in their 2019-2020 season and it's hard to narrow it down. After a lot of research, we found at least 1 monthly highlight for the remaining fo the year to give you some ideas of what concerts to check out and why. Scroll below to see what's on our list...!
The gala is one of our favorite events of the year because it's a celebration of our local symphony and everyone that comes (both the audience and the musicians!) is always looking their best and feeling their best. The gala marks the beginning of a new season for the San Francisco Symphony and funds raised benefit their artistic, education, and community programs throughout the Bay Area.
Click the video above to watch one of our season highlight videos from last year's gala!
In 1999, the San Francisco Symphony and Metallica partnered together to create a live album 'Symphony and Metallica' (S&M) at Berkeley Community Theatre where classical music collided with rock and roll. It was an instant hit! Now, 20 years later, the two groups are coming together for an anniversary concert called S&M2. This special concert will also inaugurate the brand new Chase Center, an 18,064-seat sports and entertainment arena in San Francisco's Mission Bay neighborhood and will now be the home of the NBA Champions, Golden State Warriors.
Get ready to celebrate your favorite iconic songs, like 'Nothing Else Matters (video above) and Enter Sandman, plus the first-ever Metallica/San Francisco Symphony renditions of songs written and released since the original S&M, with new orchestral charts by Bruce Coughlin.
MTT has been an avid fan of Mahler's work. So much so, that he launched the Mahler recording project in 2006 that that encompassed all of Mahler's symphonies and work for voice, chorus, and orchestra with the San Francisco Symphony. The project was such a success that it won MTT and the San Francisco Symphony SEVEN Grammy Awards!
The first of the recordings was Mahler's Sixth Symphony and lucky for us, we can witness this live on September 12-15th. Want to find out why MTT loves Mahler so much? Click the video above to watch his personal tour of some of Mahler's schools, churches, and homes...
We love when the San Francisco Symphony hosts special guest artists. One artist that we are particularly excited to see is Lang Lang. Lang Lang is a leading figure in classical music today - as a pianist, educator, and philanthropist he has become one of the world's most influential and committed ambassadors for the arts in the 21st century. Equally happy playing for billions of viewers at the 2008 Olympic Opening Ceremony in Beijing or just for a few hundred children in the public schools, he is a master of communicating through music.
Heralded by the New York Times as "the hottest artist on the classical music planet", Lang Lang plays sold-out concerts all over the world. So, what are you waiting for? Go grab your tickets!
The San Francisco Symphony will be celebrating Dia de los Muertos by hosting a music and movies night featuring one of our favorite Pixar films, Coco. If you're a fan of going to the movies, you're going to completely LOVE this experience! At San Francisco Symphony Symphony's movie nights, you'll get the watch the grammy award-winning film with the music played live! See, we told you it's the ultimate experience.
Guests will include the composer, Michael Giacchino and Director Lee Unkrich. Stay tuned for more information about a Red Curtain Addict Night Out for this event and be ready to mark your calendars...!
Widely regarded as the most popular classical voice in the world, legendary Italian singer Andrea Bocelli. Kicking off his 2019 tour, this performance marks Bocelli's first-ever appearance in the city of San Francisco and his debut with the SF Symphony. Experience Bocelli fill the arena with his soaring arias, famed love songs, and other masterpieces from his unmatched repertoire, along with music from his newest release and Billboard chart-topping record Si.
We're huge fans of Andrea because of his incredible career and the way that he continues to evolve and adapt to new audiences. He's performed not only with modern-day opera singers but also with Ed Sheeran (see above), Celine Dion, Christina Aguilera and the list goes on...
Watch the video above to hear about some of these highlights from Co-Founder Kari Lincks Coomans on KPIX!
We hope this list was helpful and that you pick a few SF Symphony concerts to see for yourself during MTT's last season as the San Francisco Symphony's conductor. What concerts are you most excited about? Leave us a note in the comments below!