“Eric Kujawsky is the director, founder, and inspiration behind the Redwood Symphony, which he has recently nicknamed ‘the Bernie Sanders of Symphonies’ because of their steadfast commitment to a progressive approach that embraces ambitious and contemporary music,” writes Mark MacNamara in Tuesday’s (7/12) San Francisco Classical Voice. “The Symphony will perform Mahler’s Eighth Symphony in E-Flat Major, the ‘Symphony of a Thousand,’ on July 30, at 8 p.m. in the San Mateo Performing Arts Center.… Kujawsky has mustered a volunteer force totaling 300, including the orchestra and perhaps 200 singers.… Members have always included long-ago music majors, ex-ensemblists, professionals, retired or not, and a panoply of Silicon Valley types.… Asked the difference between the sound of his amateur orchestra and that of, let’s say, the San Francisco Symphony, Kujawsky replied … ‘I liken it to the difference between going to a professional restaurant where every dish is perfectly made every time, and going to a cafe where they serve lovingly made, home-cooked meals, which are delicious but not always perfectly composed.… For me, it’s a point of great pride that this is a truly amateur orchestra.… these are people doing this because they truly love it.’ ”
Posted July 13, 2016
