Music I'm Listening to: Paavo Järvi and Kirill Gerstein with the San Francisco Symphony

Last night (February 7) I attended the San Francisco Symphony concert at Davies Symphony Hall. Paavo Järvi conducted Shostakovich's Piano Concerto No. 2 and, after intermission, Mahler's Symphony No. 7, a long but engaging program. Gerstein really attacked the piano. It was an aggressive performance. At times I felt like I was listening to a recording with too much of the mics on the piano mixed in. It was enjoyable nevertheless. After the main event, he played a Chopin waltz as an encore that the symphony performers, particularly concertmaster Alexander Barantschik, really seemed to enjoy – as did the audience. 

Among Mahler's symphonies, Nos 2, 7, and 8 are the ones I've never really understood or appreciated. I know No. 2 is particularly revered by many, but it's never appealed to me. Someday, perhaps, I will make headway toward better understanding it. I've felt the same way about No. 7, but the performance last night was eye-opening for me. The piece is complex and long and it's never really held my attention all the way through, but Järvi and the San Francisco Symphony made it come alive and I found myself enjoying every detail. I had no idea that there was a guitar part in the piece or that the mandolin makes an appearance. Hearing it live brings out nuances easily lost in a recording. 

I have only two recordings of No. 7, one with Maurice Abravanel conducting the Utah Symphony (Vanguard – VSD 71141/2), one with Georg Solti conducting the Chicago Symphony (London CSA2231). Although I love the Abravanel/Utah recordings of some of the other Mahler Symphonies (particularly No. 3), I can't say their presentation of No. 7 has ever done much for me. This morning, the day after, I'm listening to the Solti recording, which I think is much better and, having just heard the piece live last night, I'm suddenly hearing a great deal that I never noticed before – and enjoying it. I seem to have made a breakthrough.

Books I'm reading: Robert Motherwell: Early Collages

I recently finished reading Robert Motherwell: Early Collages (The Salomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, 2013), the catalog accompanying a show of Motherwell's early work in collage at The Peggy Guggenheim Collection in Venice in 2013 and the Guggenheim Museum in New York in 2014. In addition to about 60 color plates, the book includes four essays on Motherwell's first experiences doing collage, an interest that he continued to pursue throughout his career. 

Among these essays, I found "Made of Paper: Motherwell's Materials in the 1940s" particularly interesting. It discusses the types of paper and other materials the artist used in the early works, the glue he typically used, and the backing materials he employed. I was a bit startled to learn that he used Duco Cement (which I remember from my childhood as a cheap, all-purpose hardware store glue), Lepage's Mucilage, and Lepage's Liquid Glue (inexpensive household glues I remember as well). Clearly, the idea of using archival materials was not well established at the time even among the artists that were starting to lead the world art scene. 

A number of the papers he used were colored with fugitive dyes. Bright purples and magentas, in particular, have faded in some of the work to light brown or a pinkish beige. The essay includes photos of some of the work as it looks now alongside digital recreations with the color restored to what it likely was when the work was new. The digital restorations were based on areas where the original color was protected from light exposure by overlapping collage elements. The fading was fairly rapid, it seems. Motherwell is quoted in the essay in later interviews and he seems to have accepted the changes without too much regret, but clearly the original, vibrant colors make for stronger compositions. Below is just one example.  

Rain: Early February storms

On February 1 and 2, another atmospheric river has been passing through the area. As of the morning of February 2, there were four inches of new precipitation in the rain gauge at the location I monitor in northeast Santa Rosa. That brings our total for the 2024–2025 rain year to 28.50 inches so far, but it's still raining and more rain is expected tomorrow and the day after. 

[Update: As of the morning of February 4, 3.2 inches of rain had accumulated in the rain gauge, bringing our total so far to 31.70 inches, but the rain is still coming down hard and it's expected to continue raining for the next two or three days.]

[Update: On the morning of February 5, there was another 0.90 inches in the rain gauge, although it cleared up by mid-morning and it has been sunny the rest of the day, a welcome change. More rain is forecast for tomorrow and into the weekend. Our total now is 32.60 inches – approaching our average annual rainfall of around 36 inches already in early February.]

[Update: More rain on February 6 but clear on the 7th and it's supposed to be sunny over the weekend of the 8th and 9th before another storm comes in next week. Since last reporting, we have had another 1.25 inches. That brings our total to 33.85 inches – already a full year's rain.]