Lisa Hirsch

Oakland

Music writer (SFCV, SF Chron, Opera News RIP). Stream is various fractions of opera, music, politics. She/her. Queer. Martial artist. Former tech writer.

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Articles

Review: Esa-Pekka Salonen’s next-to-last S.F. Symphony concerts promise renewal

3 weeks ago | sfchronicle.com | Lisa Hirsch

Music Director Esa-Pekka Salonen conducting the San Francisco Symphony in works by Richard Strauss, Jean Sibelius and Gabriella Smith on Friday, June 6, at Davies Symphony Hall. The program repeats through Sunday, June 8. Stefan Cohen/San Francisco SymphonyComposer Gabriella Smith knows how to make a lasting impression. Her organ concerto “Breathing Forests” was a highlight of the San Francisco Symphony’s 2023-24 season, a work of tremendous power and originality.
Harvey Milk Reimagined: What Works and What Doesn’t in Revised Opera Parallèle Production

3 weeks ago | sfcv.org | Lisa Hirsch

Harvey Milk is back. No, not the legendary civil rights activist, who was assassinated after becoming the first openly gay elected official in California history, but Harvey Milk Reimagined, a heavily revised version of composer Stewart Wallace and librettist Michael Korie’s 1995 opera. San Francisco Opera co-commissioned the original, performed here in 1996.
SF Symphony Presents an Explosive Cello Concerto

1 month ago | sfcv.org | Lisa Hirsch

Dalia Stasevska is just the sort of musician who can bring disparate worlds together. For the Ukrainian-born Finnish conductor’s latest program with the San Francisco Symphony, she juxtaposed two composers who might not initially seem to have much in common. First up was the richly tuneful music of the great symphonist Ralph Vaughan Williams, rooted in the English pastoral tradition and steeped in modal harmonies.
Review: S.F. Symphony presents an explosive cello concerto

1 month ago | datebook.sfchronicle.com | Lisa Hirsch

Conductor Dalia Stasevska leads the San Francisco Symphony in works by Ralph Vaughan Williams, Anna Thorvaldsdottir and Jean Sibelius on Thursday, May 15, at Davies Symphony Hall. Photo: Kristen Loken/San Francisco SymphonyDalia Stasevska is just the sort of musician who can bring disparate worlds together. For the Ukrainian-born Finnish conductor’s latest program with the San Francisco Symphony, she juxtaposed two composers who might not initially seem to have much in common.
Review: S.F. Symphony and Giancarlo Guerrero deliver orchestral showstoppers

1 month ago | datebook.sfchronicle.com | Lisa Hirsch

Conductor Giancarlo Guerrero, pictured here leading the San Francisco Symphony in 2023, returned to Davies Symphony Hall for a program of works by Kaija Saariaho, Igor Stravinsky and Ottorino Respighi. Photo: Kristen Loken/San Francisco SymphonyConductor Giancarlo Guerrero’s two previous appearances with the San Francisco Symphony amply showcased his flair for colorful, dramatic music. After a two-year gap, he’s back at Davies Symphony Hall with a program of glittering orchestral showpieces.
S.F. Symphony faces 'transitional moment' without Esa-Pekka Salonen in 2025-26 season

Mar 20, 2025 | sfchronicle.com | Lisa Hirsch

Esa-Pekka Salonen, the esteemed outgoing music director of the San Francisco Symphony, isn't named on the orchestra's 2025-26 season schedule - a striking absence that underscores a shift from the progressive programming his tenure promised to deliver when he was hired five years ago.
Berkeley Symphony’s “Spring’s Awakening” Celebrates Nature’s Beauty

Mar 18, 2025 | sfcv.org | Lisa Hirsch

Countless composers have incorporated birdsong into their music, from Beethoven to Ottorino Respighi to — most famously — Olivier Messiaen. But the Finnish composer Einojuhani Rautavaara went one step further than them all by having his own field recordings of birds star as the solo instrument in his 1972 piece Cantus Arcticus: Concerto for Birds and Orchestra.
Singing of Love’s Complexities With Voices of Silicon Valley

Mar 11, 2025 | sfcv.org | Lisa Hirsch

The French composer Gérard Grisey spent several years in the 1980s teaching at UC Berkeley, where he completed Les Chants de l’Amour (The Songs of Love), a work for 12 singers and tape lasting roughly 35 minutes. It was commissioned by IRCAM, the French electronic-music institute, and IRCAM software tools were used to produce the tape. According to Grisey’s publisher, Les Chants de l’Amour had never been performed in the U.S. until last weekend.
A World-Premiere Opera Tackles the Refugee Crisis With Hope and Humanity

Mar 9, 2025 | sfcv.org | Lisa Hirsch

If you go to The Pigeon Keeper expecting the usual operatic fare of murder, emotional betrayal, sexual violence, kidnapping, and abuse, you’ll be disappointed. Instead, composer David Hanlon and librettist Stephanie Fleischmann have crafted a new opera that offers hope and healing, albeit with wistful sadness and gentle reminders of how trauma undoes people.
Livermore Valley Opera’s Don Giovanni Has Swagger and Good Singing

Mar 4, 2025 | sfcv.org | Lisa Hirsch

Don Giovanni is a tough opera to stage. With seven principal characters, four major plot strands, and a dizzying procession of scenes, it’s easy to get Mozart’s masterpiece wrong. But director Robert Herriot has gotten everything right in Livermore Valley Opera’s current production, seen at its opening performance on Saturday, March 1.