A good many, if by no means all, symphony conductors do well with opera.
"Switching" successfully the other way is less frequent. James Levine and
Donald Runnicles are prime examples. After tonight's Davies Hall concert,
I'd include Roberto Abbado among two-handed conductors. Apparently, the San
Francisco Symphony agrees because Abbado - who made his debut here in 1999
- is scheduled for return engagements of several weeks in upcoming seasons.

Strangely, between San Francisco premieres of the 186-year-old Cherubini
Symphony in D Major and the 114-year-old Richard Strauss "Aus Italien," it
was the 1984 Berio "Requies for Chamber Orchestra" that was performed here
before - George Benjamin conducted this memorial work for Berio's first
wife, Cathy Berberian, at the 1992 SFS Wet Ink Festival. In a way, however,
that makes sense: between the elegant and decorative Cherubini and the very
young Strauss' musical tour of Italy, it is the accessible and lyrical "
Requies" with the most substance, worthy of repetition. Still, all in all,
it was a concert of "nice music," nothing upsetting, challenging or even
excessively lush (a specialty of the older, better Strauss).

The immediately appealing thing about Cherubini and Abbado together was
their certainty: there was nothing loose about either the music or the
performance, they flowed inevitably, even if not leaving too much behind.
Still, there was no question about the outstanding quality of Abbado's and
the orchestra's performance. And, with its echoes of the old Haydn and the
young Beethoven, this is not "easy" music; nice, yes, easy, no.

Abbado's devotion to Berio's work and the San Francisco brass section's
bliss produced a wonderful partnership in casting the magic of this
grief-turned-into-acceptance over the hall. This "modern work" was received
was respect and a modicum of liking, if not wild enthusiasm. That's
sufficient onto the day in a hall where - until the arrival of MTT - people
used to walk out between Mahler movements.

The most operatic and "Italian" performance came at the end, with the
22-year-old Strauss' symphonic pictures of Roman ruins, the beach at
Sorrento, Neapolitan street scenes. Abbado handled this classy pop, ersatz
Italian outpouring with loving seriousness, not giving even a hint of
seeing the terrible scenario it had posed. What we have here, after all,
is a Strauss who might have easily become - perish the thought! - a German
Respighi. Come to think of it, Abbado may make a big deal of presenting
Respighi himself head-on as well. And yet, given the task of putting this
"all-Italian" program together, he opted for Berio at his best. Good for
him. and us.

Janos Gereben/SF, CA
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