In Sunday’s (8/23) Sacramento Bee (California), Edward Ortiz writes, “A sea change is under way in classical music. Nowhere is that more evident than at the UC Davis Symphony Orchestra. The orchestra enters a new era this season with incoming music director and conductor Christian Baldini replacing conductor D. Kern Holoman, who led the group for three decades. … With the Argentina-born Baldini, 30, the University of California, Davis, gains a conductor grounded in the bedrock classical repertoire. But it also gains a conductor who is no stranger to tango music or the works of the many Latin American composers who have toiled in obscurity. … For the opening concert of the 2009-10 season on Oct. 4, Baldini put Piazzolla’s ‘Oblivion’ on the program. For a Nov. 22 concert, he picked Ginastera’s ‘Estancia.’ That work is a dynamic ballet suite by the first Argentine composer to have his work absorbed into the classical repertoire. … Baldini comes to Davis from a three-year post as music director and conductor of the symphony orchestra of the State University of New York at Buffalo.”
Posted August 24, 2009
