Press - Morrison Artists Series





	In the News 2005-2006 Season Making chamber music appealing to the masses--with a little help from a Metallica guitarist - San Francisco Chronicle Metallica guitarist's raw energy infuses offbeat chamber concert - San Francisco Chronicle Other Seasons "An ensemble whose trademark feat is to play Morton Feldman's six-hour String Quartet No. 2--and by all accounts do it superbly--is not a group to be taken lightly. In its long-awaited West Coast debut Sunday afternoon, the Flux Quartet established it credentials as one of the most fearless and important new-music ensembles around. No, Feldman's late-period marathon did not figure on the program. But the recital, presented in San Francisco State University's McKenna Theatre as part of the Morrison Artists Series of free chamber concerts, offered more than its share of uncompromising excitement. Feldman was represented instead by his brief, early "Structures," and there were gritty and often beautiful scores by Renaud Gagneux, Gyorgy Ligeti and the late Giacinto Scelsi. John Zorn's diffuse and silly "Cat o' Nine Tails" was served up at the end as dessert after the meatier offerings that had preceded it. The entire program boasted just the sort of zest and commitment that this music demands. The performances were energetic, finely blended and utterly focused; when bursts of lyricism or tonal harmony rose to the surface, the sound of the quartet was unnervingly rich." -San Francisco Chronicle, 2004 "Hindsight is a treacherous thing, yet it can often be tempting to try to detect the foreshadowings of genius in the early work of a great composer. The temptation was irresistible in the case of Gyorgy Ligeti's powerful first String Quartet, which formed the high point of Sunday afternoon's impressive recital by the Sine Nomine Quartet. The rest of the program, presented at San Francisco State University as part of the indispensable (and still underappreciated) Morrison Artists Series of free chamber concerts, put those qualities to use in music of Mendelssohn and Schubert. The ensemble boasts terrific ensemble playing and a ripe, sweetly blended texture, particularly in the lower strings. At the same time, though, there is a rough, even wheedling quality to its sound (especially in Genet's more individualistic tone) that works better in more vigorous writing than in lyrical chordal passages." -San Francisco Chronicle, 2003 "Viola virtuosos are a rare breed, and all the more precious for their scarcity. Kim Kashkashian, who gave a wondrous recital Sunday afternoon at San Francisco State University's McKenna Theatre, is one of the rarest--an artist who combines a probing, restless musical intellect with enormous beauty of tone. The free recital, the final offering in the school's invaluable Morrison Artists Series, was as striking for its programming as for its depth of execution. Accompanied deftly if reticently by pianist Tatevik Mokatsian, Kashkashian served up music by Bach, Hindemith and Rebecca Clarke, as well as a few all-too-brief solo offerings by the 75-year-old Hungarian master Gyorgy Kurtag." -San Francisco Chronicle, 2001 "Bay Area audiences enjoy a healthy profusion of new-music concerts. But few are as thrilling or as hugely enjoyable as the one given Sunday afternoon by the Ohio-based ensemble eighth blackbird. Appearing in San Francisco State University's McKenna Theatre as part of the excellent Morrison Artists Series, this young and phenomenally gifted sextet offered a note-perfect lesson in how to purvey contemporary music. Kudos to Saul Gropman, the Morrison Series' artistic director, for giving local audiences our first glimpse of a major asset to the contemporary scene. With any luck, it won't be the last." -San Francisco Chronicle, 2000 "The free Morrison Artists Series at San Francisco State University, for the past 47 years one of the Bay Area's greater musical bargains, has traditionally favored instrumentalists over vocalists for its annual six-matinee season. But the voices reigned supreme Sunday afternoon, when the six-man German a cappella group, Die Singphoniker, made its West Coast debut at the McKenna Theatre with an all-20th century program." -San Francisco Examiner, 2000 "The St. Lawrence String Quartet hails from Canada, but last year it became the ensemble-in-residence at Stanford. The group's superb new disc suggests that the Cardinals made a canny choice. Here is a young ensemble that plays with all the energy and fearless adventurousness of youth, yet there's nothing callow or underdeveloped about it. When the quartet made its local debut in 1992, on San Francisco State University's indispensable Morrison Artists Series, it sounded promising but was still finding its voice. Not the group has clearly hit its stride." -San Francisco Chronicle, 1999 "In an engaging, frustrating recital at San Francisco State University on Sunday afternoon, the Petersen String Quartet's playing alternated between robust splendor and almost unbearable delicacy. That kind of range in admirable in principle, I guess, but the reasons for it were never made clear in performance. Sunday's free program, part of the Morrison Artists' Series, was the first local appearance by the young and highly touted Berlin ensemble. The reasons for the groups' burgeoning reputation eventually became clear, but it took a while. Specifically, it took until the second piece of the program, the String Quartet No. 1 by the Czech-Jewish composer Erwin Schulhoff. Schulhoff, who perished in a Nazi concentration camp in 1942, was an accomplished and free-spirited radical when he wrote this gripping score in 1924, and the quartet delivered it with splendid sonic zeal." -San Francisco Chronicle, 1998 "Considering the inroads women have made into the ranks of American orchestras during the last generation, it's surprising how few all-female chamber ensembles are encountered in concert halls?There's the Lafayette String Quartet, which you can hear in a series of excellent recordings on the Dorian label. And there's the Eroica Trio, which made a smashing return to town Tuesday evening at the Herbst Theatre, sponsored by San Francisco Performances, as its annual special event for subscribers. The group made its local debut a few years ago in the Morrison Artists Series at S.F. State and, on Tuesday's evidence, should be better known." -San Francisco Chronicle, 1996 "The only thing better than a well-played concert is a well-played concert whose program has been planned with care and imagination. The Quatuor Sine Nomine Lausanne offered the latter Sunday afternoon at San Francisco State's McKenna Theater. This young Swiss string quartet boasts a vibrant tone, neither too ponderous nor too flighty, and an air of artistic purpose that doesn't rule out humor nor spontaneity. The members' melodic sensibility is appealingly graceful, their ensemble nearly flawless. The program for Sunday's free concert, part of the estimable Morrison Artists Series, was framed by two quartets in C minor, Beethoven's Op. 18, No. 4, and Brahms' Op. 51, No. 1. The echoes between the two pieces go beyond the superficial similarities of key--there are gestures and textural ideas in the Brahms that, heard in context, almost feel like replies to the earlier score." -San Francisco Chronicle, 1996 "It's rare enough to encounter a superb young violinist who plays with precision, exquisite tone, vitality and soul. Rarer still is to find such a talent deployed in a blend of music as heady and unusual as the playing itself. But there it was at San Francisco State on Sunday afternoon, when the Morrison Artists Series brought its season to a triumphant close with a concert by Gilles Apap and the Transylvanian Mountain Boys." -San Francisco Chronicle, 1995 "One of the side benefits of a free concert is that programming decisions can be made without worrying about filling the seats. The Tokyo Quartet demonstrated the point at San Francisco State University Sunday afternoon, opening the 40th season with a 20th century program that they would never have been able to sell to paying customers." -San Francisco Chronicle, 1992