| The San Francisco Chamber Orchestra joins the Festival for a uniquely fascinating concert spanning three centuries and five countries. The evening will feature works by Chevalier de St. Georges, an accomplished statesman, athlete, and musician in 18th century Paris who was the nicknamed “the black Mozart;” Jamaican composer and pianist Eleanor Alberga; San Francisco composer and instrumentalist Wayne Wallace; Kentuckian composer and flutist Valerie Coleman; and the “original Mozart.” The program will include two world premieres and soloists William Chapman Nyaho, piano, and Karla Donahew, violin.
“Even by the Orchestra’s eclectic programming standards this concert is very special,” said Benjamin Simon, San Francisco Chamber Orchestra Music Director. “I think that audience members truly will appreciate the great diversity of composers, musicians, musical styles, cultural traditions represented in this extraordinary concert experience.”
The mission of the San Francisco Chamber Orchestra is to bring the immediacy and intimacy of music for small orchestra and chamber ensemble to audiences of all ages by presenting classical, contemporary, and commissioned works as well as to educate and enlighten the next generation of music lovers through outreach programs.
Founded by conductor Adrian Sunshine, the first concert of the SFCO took place in April 1953 in Berkeley’s Hillel Foundation. The musicians in the early years were all members of the San Francisco Symphony, which was then a very part-time engagement. The name San Francisco Chamber Orchestra wasn’t used until 1957, when the orchestra made its “debut” at the University of San Francisco under Maestro Sunshine's direction.
Edgar Braun (July 4, 1933 - August 4, 2002) was a founding conductor of the SFCO in 1955, and took charge of the ensemble when Maestro Sunshine departed for Europe in 1958. Maestro Braun led the orchestra for more than forty years until he asked Ben Simon to take over in January 2002. Under his leadership, the orchestra presented over 600 admission-free concerts in venues throughout California, received rave reviews from the press, became the first orchestra-in-residence at the Lake Tahoe Summer Music Festival, and presented two generations of Bay Area musicians as soloists and ensemble players.
In January 2002, Benjamin Simon became the SFCO’s new Music Director. A violist by training and a chamber musician at heart, Maestro Simon has assembled a team of friends and colleagues to revitalize this cultural treasure, and to turn the San Francisco Chamber Orchestra into a vibrant, exciting “player” on the stage of the Bay Area’s classical music scene. Executive Director Richard Aldag, a new Board of Directors, and volunteers from our three concert communities - Palo Alto, Berkeley, and San Francisco - are building a new organization, based on the solid foundations and accomplishments of the past 52 years.
The first full-time R&B band Wayne Wallace worked in was a James Brown cover group. Wallace grew up in the same neighborhood with many of the members of Sly Stone and the Family and Santana. Greg Adams of Tower of Power and Wallace were in a Boys Club jazz group together. They would spend every available free night going to the Fillmore West and other rock clubs to listen to Cold Blood, Buddy Miles, Chicago and other horn groups.
His other great love is studying the Afro-centric music of Cuba, Puerto Rico, Brazil and Perú. In the 1980s Wallace joined Pete Escovedo’s band, the Machete Ensemble and later on Conjunto Céspedes. From 1993 to 1998, he had the pleasure of studying Afro-cuban music at the National School of the Arts in Havana, Cuba. This experience opened him up to a universe of new musical possibilities.
”The songs and arrangements on my albums reflect my take on the ‘search’ I have been on,” says Wallace. “I love finding the intersections where different styles of music meet and blend. The touches of rhythm and blues in the guitar work, the jazz harmonies in the horns and the keyboards, the polyrhythms of the drums, the voices “bringing down the spirit”, all working together in a variety of musical settings. Early jazz groups mainly played for dances. The relationship between musician and dancer is an act of synergy where each one constantly feeds the other. All the songs on this project are derived from dance styles (mambo, cha-cha-chá, samba, “Old School R+B-Funk”, danzón, bolero).”
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