San Francisco Symphony History Overview

In San Francisco, music has always been a need, not a luxury.

Even in the wake of the 1906 earthquake, establishment of a permanent orchestra was high on the civic agenda, and in December 1911, the San Francisco Symphony (SFS) gave its first concert. Almost immediately, the Symphony revitalized San Francisco's cultural life with programs that offered a kaleidoscope of classics and new music. In the Great Depression, when economic disaster imperiled the Symphony's existence, the people of San Francisco confirmed the spirit that had given birth to the Orchestra, endorsing a bond measure to ensure that the music would go on.

The Orchestra grew in stature and acclaim under such distinguished music directors as Henry Hadley, among the foremost American composers of his era; Alfred Hertz, who had led the American premieres of Parsifal , Salome , and Der Rosenkavalier at the Metropolitan Opera; the legendary Pierre Monteux, who introduced the world to Le Sacre du Printemps and Petrushka; Enrique Jordá; Josef Krips; Seiji Ozawa; Edo de Waart; and Herbert Blomstedt - who, after a decade-long tenure that began in 1985, continues as Conductor Laureate of the San Francisco Symphony. In September 1995, Michael Tilson Thomas assumed his post as the SFS's eleventh Music Director. Together, he and the San Francisco Symphony have formed a musical partnership hailed as one of the most inspiring and adventurous in the country. Maestro Tilson Thomas has had a strong relationship with the SFS that goes back to 1974, when he first conducted the Orchestra in Mahler's Symphony No. 9 at the age of twenty-nine. One of the world's most prominent musicians, he is also among a handful of American conductors to have achieved leadership of one of this country's major orchestras.



In recognition of this artistic collaboration, Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony signed an exclusive contract with BMG Classics/RCA Red Seal, resulting in nine acclaimed recordings for that label. Their first recording together, a live concert recording of scenes from Prokofiev's ballet Romeo and Juliet immediately debuted at No. 3 on the Billboard Classical Chart and won the 1997 Grammy Award for Best Orchestral Performance. Other MTT/SFS RCA Red Seal releases are Aaron Copland – The Modernist ; Mahler's Das klagende Lied ; Berlioz's Symphonie fantastique ; a two-CD set, George Gershwin – The 100th Birthday Celebration released in September 1998 in celebration of the 100th anniversary of George Gershwin's birth; a three-disc all-Stravinsky recording featuring Le Sacre du printemps, The Firebird, and Perséphone which won three 2000 Grammys for Best Classical Album, Best Orchestral Recording, and Best Engineered Classical Album; and Aaron Copland – The Populist. In February 2001, RCA Red Seal released Charles Ives, An American Journey , an exploration of the visionary American composer featuring baritone Thomas Hampson and the SFS Chorus.

In 2001, the San Francisco Symphony launched its own recording label, SFS Media. For SFS Media, Tilson Thomas and the Orchestra have embarked on an ambitious Mahler recording project which includes plans to record all of the composer's nine symphonies and the Adagio from the unfinished Tenth Symphony over the course of five seasons in the emerging SACD format. The label's first offering, Mahler's Symphony No. 6, was released in February 2002 to international acclaim, and won the 2003 Grammy Award for Best Orchestral Performance. In September 2002, SFS Media released its second disc, Mahler's Symphony No. 1, followed by the release in March 2003 of a double-disc set featuring Mahler's Symphony No. 3 and the Kindertotenlieder , with mezzo-soprano Michelle DeYoung. All three SFS Media releases have been top ten hits on the Billboard classical chart.

The San Francisco Symphony's recordings under Herbert Blomstedt for the London/Decca label have won some of the world's most prestigious recording awards, including the United States's Grammy Award (Orff's Carmina burana and Brahms's A German Requiem /Best Choral Recordings, and Bartók's Concerto for Orchestra/Best Classical Engineered Recording); France's Grand Prix du Disque and Belgium's Caecilia Prize (Nielsen Symphonies nos. 4 and 5); Britain's Gramophone Award (Nielsen Symphonies nos. 2 and 3/Best Orchestral Recording); Japan's Record Academy Award (Grieg's Peer Gynt ); and Germany's Preis der Deutschen Schallplattenkritik for their recording of Mahler's Symphony No. 2, which also garnered a Best Classical Album Grammy nomination.

The SFS's ambitious touring program initiated during the Blomstedt year - five trips to Europe, including a stunning debut at the 1990 Salzburg Festival, three Asian tours, and performances throughout California and the East Coast - continue under the leadership of Michael Tilson Thomas. In 1996, Tilson Thomas led the Orchestra on the first of their seven national tours together. A 2001 East Coast tour featured two sold-out performances of Mahler and Stravinsky in Carnegie Hall with the Grammy Award-winning SFS Chorus. The Orchestra's 1998 national tour commemorated the 100th anniversary of George Gershwin's birth and included Carnegie Hall's season-opening concert, broadcast on PBS's Great Performances .

In 1996, Tilson Thomas and the SFS made their first appearances together in New York and Europe with a three-week concert tour which received universal critical acclaim. The tour featured violinist Anne-Sophie Mutter (who performed the U.S. premiere of Penderecki's Violin Concerto No. 2 in Carnegie Hall) and was highlighted by an American work on nearly every program. In 1997, the Orchestra and Tilson Thomas toured Japan and Hong Kong together for the first time with violinist Kyoko Takezawa. In 1999, MTT and the SFS returned to Europe for a four-week tour with guest soprano Dawn Upshaw and violinist Gil Shaham.

In September 2000, MTT and the SFS embarked on a 13-concert, 11-city European Festival Tour with pianists Martha Argerich and Hélène Grimaud as soloists. The May 2003 European Tour , with violinist Hilary Hahn and soprano Barbara Bonney, featured the music of Copland, Mahler, Prokofiev, Stravinsky, and Tchaikovsky in 15 concerts throughout 10 cities. The tour also included the European premieres of Tilson Thomas's Songs of Emily Dickinson and John Adams's My Father Knew Charles Ives , commissioned by the San Francisco Symphony. The November 2004 European Tour included concerts with pianist Leif Ove Andsnes in Spain, Italy, and Greece.

Some of the most important conductors of our time have been guests on the San Francisco Symphony podium, among them Bruno Walter, Leopold Stowkowski, Leonard Bernstein, Kurt Masur, Sir Georg Solti, and Mstislav Rostropovich; and the list of composers who have led the Orchestra is a who's who of twentieth-century music, including Igor Stravinsky, Sergei Prokofiev, Maurice Ravel, Arnold Schoenberg, Paul Hindemith, Aaron Copland, and John Adams. The SFS has been honored eleven times by the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers for adventuresome programming of new music and commitment to American music, including recognizing Tilson Thomas and the SFS with the 2001 and 1997 ASCAP John S. Edwards Awards for Strongest Commitment to American Music. In 2001, the San Francisco Symphony gave the world premiere of Henry Brant's Ice Field , which later won that year's Pulitzer Prize for Music. In 1979, the appointment of John Adams as New Music Advisor became a model for a composer-in-residence program since adopted by major orchestras across the country (Adams served as Composer-in-Residence until 1985, Charles Wuorinen held the post from 1985 until 1989, and George Perle from 1989 until 1991). In May 2001, John Adams and the SFS announced a ten-year commissioning project to include four commissions culminating in a work to celebrate the San Francisco Symphony's 100th season. The first work, My Father Knew Charles Ives , was premiered in April 2003. The project will also feature a work to be written for the San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra.

In 1980, the Orchestra moved into the newly built Louise M. Davies Symphony Hall, which in 1992 underwent a renovation that has given its acoustics brilliant depth and presence. 1980 also saw the founding of the San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra, considered one of the finest youth orchestras in the world and winner in 1985 of the world's highest honor for a young musicians' ensemble, the City of Vienna Prize.

SFS Resident Conductor Edward Outwater began his tenure as SFS Youth Orchestra Music Director in September 2001. In 1995, the SFS Youth Orchestra released a critically acclaimed CD of Mahler's Symphony No. 5, and completed a successful tour of some of Europe's major concert halls including the Gewandhaus of Leipzig and Amsterdam's Royal Concertgebouw. A live recording of the Concertgebouw concert was also released to rave reviews. In the summer of 1998, the SFS Youth Orchestra completed their fourth European Tour and released its fourth disc, a recording of Rachmaninoff's Symphony No. 2, recorded live in Prague.

In 2001, the SFSYO celebrated its 20th anniversary season, performing Mahler's Symphony No. 2 with the Grammy Award winning SFS chorus and renowned soloists, and traveled on its sixth international tour to Russia, Lithuania, and Ireland, including critically acclaimed debuts in Moscow and at the “Stars of the White Nights Festival” in St. Petersburg.

The San Francisco Symphony Chorus, established in 1973 and led by Chorus Director Vance George since 1983, celebrated its 30th anniversary during the 2002-2003 season. The ensemble has been heard around the world not only on award-winning SFS recordings but also on the soundtracks of the films Amadeus , The Unbearable Lightness of Being , and Godfather III . In May 2001, the SFS Chorus released their second solo disc Voices 1900/2000 on Delos Records, in which Chorus Director Vance George leads the ensemble through a choral journey of the twentieth century.

Beginning in September 2002, through a unique arrangement with the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, the San Francisco Symphony is loaned Jascha Heifetz's prized Guarnerius violin for the exclusive use of SFS Concertmaster Alexander Barantschik. “The David” Guarnerius del Gesu is the instrument Jascha Heifetz played in virtually all of his concerts and recordings, and is named after Ferdinand David, a highly acclaimed violinist who owned it in the mid-19th century and for whom Mendelssohn wrote his legendary violin concerto. Mr. Barantschik will play the prized violin in all SFS concerts and in a special chamber series at the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco.

The San Francisco Symphony knows that music lovers of tomorrow are molded today. To fill the gap left by cuts in school music programs, the Symphony began the innovative Adventures in Music (AIM) educational program for the city's schoolchildren. Established in 1988, AIM is a comprehensive music education program that introduces children to music from around the world through in-school ensemble performances, program curricula, study guides, student journals, and, in some schools, an interactive computer program, culminating in a specially designed San Francisco Symphony concert in Davies Symphony Hall. Annually touching the lives of more than 25,000 San Francisco students from every public elementary school in addition to private and parochial schools, AIM reaches children from all cultural and economic backgrounds. In March 2002, the SFS launched SFSKids.com, a comprehensive and interactive online music education resource for children, schools, and families. SFSKids.com has attracted more than one million users worldwide, and has garnered rave reviews locally and nationally in media outlets such as Time magazine, the Wall Street Journal, London's Classic FM magazine, Symphony magazine, Martha Stewart Living and Radio Disney . Awards include "Best Music Site" in the 2002 WebAwards, and honors from the American Library Association, Communication Arts Interactive, HOW Design Magazine. One of the oldest traditions of its kind in the nation, students throughout the Bay Area hear the San Francisco Symphony in its Concerts for Kids , begun in 1923.

The San Francisco Symphony's dedication to community is as important a priority today as it was in 1911. In October 1992, Davies Symphony Hall was the site of a free Open House that attracted more than 9,000 people of all cultural, ethnic, and economic backgrounds to a program of music reflecting the diversity of San Francisco itself. In October 1989, in a gesture that harkened back to the Symphony's beginnings, Herbert Blomstedt and the Orchestra and Chorus, together with singers from the San Francisco Opera, helped initiate civic healing five days after the Loma Prieta Earthquake, playing Beethoven's Ninth Symphony to an audience of more than 20,000 in Golden Gate Park. And as part of the Opening Week festivities celebrating Michael Tilson Thomas's inaugural SFS season, MTT led the Orchestra in a free outdoor concert attended by nearly 11,000 in downtown San Francisco. The Orchestra continues to present numerous free and community concerts throughout each season.

The San Francisco Symphony was the first to feature symphonic radio broadcasts in 1926. Today, the Symphony is heard in nationally syndicated radio broadcasts on over 300 radio stations, confirming an artistic vitality whose impact extends throughout American musical life.

(August 2003)

Mailing address:

San Francisco Symphony
Davies Symphony Hall
201 Van Ness Ave.
San Francisco, CA 94102

Phone numbers:

Administration
(415) 552-8000
Box Office
(415) 864-6000

Source: http://www.sfsymphony.org/

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