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The Redwood Symphony is going big for its next performance, bringing Gustav Mahler’s “Resurrection” symphony to the stage.
Everything about the work is on a grand scale, from its themes of redemption and resurrection to Mahler’s highly dramatic music itself.
It takes a lot of musicians to bring such a piece to life, and so in addition to more than 100 members of the symphony, this concert will feature over 170 guest singers.
The Redwood Symphony is a volunteer community orchestra based on the Peninsula. Dr. Eric Kujawsky, the group’s founder and music director, will conduct the orchestra in its Feb. 16 performance of the “Resurrection” symphony, which will also bring together a host of guest artists, with soloists Kindra Scharich, mezzo-soprano, and Raeeka Shehabi-Yaghmai, soprano, and the singers of Peninsula-based Schola Cantorum Silicon Valley, Cal State East Bay Singers and San Francisco Bay Area Chamber Choir.
The Feb. 16 “Resurrection” concert is part of the orchestra’s performance of a Mahler symphony cycle, playing all of the composer’s symphonies over the course of multiple seasons. Kujawsky said the group has played a Mahler symphony roughly every two years.
Also on the program is Aaron Copland’s “In the Beginning,” a choral work that will be conducted by Buddy James, who serves as the director of the three aforementioned choirs. The piece will feature the San Francisco Bay Area Chamber Choir and mezzo-soprano Christine Abraham as a soloist.
The Redwood Symphony will be marking its 40th anniversary this year — Kujawsky noted that many members of the orchestra have a long tenure with the group. A special anniversary concert in November will include special guests Mason Bates and Karen Bentley Pollick.
Next up this spring, the Redwood Symphony will perform a program on April 5 featuring a newer work, Mason Bates’ Sound Check in C Major; Olivier Messiaen’s Concert à quatre; and Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 6 (“Pathetique”).
We spoke with Kujawsky ahead of the symphony’s Feb. 16 concert. This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.
Embarcadero Media: What inspired the choice of Mahler’s “Resurrection” symphony?
Eric Kujawsky: We have made it a practice to do all the Mahler symphonies. This is actually our third complete Mahler cycle that we’re in the middle of. So this is our third time doing the Mahler “Resurrection,” and our second time with Schola Cantorum.
Embarcadero Media: What does performing a symphony cycle bring to the audience’s understanding of the composer’s works?
Eric Kujawsky: It’s a way of seeing the growth of the composer, his idiom from the early works to the later works. Mahler is such a popular composer, and because his works are so ambitious, they don’t get performed that often, other than by big symphonies like San Francisco Symphony. So I think this is a rare opportunity for audiences on the Peninsula to hear the Mahler symphonies played by us and at a less expensive price.
Embarcadero Media: What’s unique about the “Resurrection” symphony?
Eric Kujawsky: In some ways, it’s modeled after Beethoven’s Ninth because it brings a chorus in for the last movement. But this is a 90-minute work, and the chorus only comes in for about the last between five and 10 minutes. But like Beethoven’s Ninth, every other movement seems to foreshadow, and have premonitions of that of the final movement, where the chorus sings about the resurrection of souls. But I think that also like Beethoven’s Ninth, it’s not necessary to know the message of the work to just enjoy it as pure music. It’s an incredibly dramatic and exciting piece on its own terms.
Embarcadero Media: The piece requires so many vocalists. How did the collaboration with these vocal groups come about?
Eric Kujawsky: As I said, we have performed with Schola Cantorum before and many other local choral groups. They have a new music director now, Buddy James, and he is bringing along some groups that he also works with from the East Bay. So in total, (there are) about 170 chorus members, two vocal soloists, and about 110 musicians from the orchestra.
We will barely fit on the stage. The logistics have been difficult to work out, and they have to bring in extra risers from other locations to fit all the singers and musicians we have. And there’s also an organ.
It’s not (Mahler’s) biggest symphony. He wrote the Symphony No. 8, which is called the “Symphony of a Thousand,” which is even bigger. We’ve done that twice before as well. I’m looking forward to that at some point again.
Embarcadero Media: Given the scope of this piece, what are the challenges of conducting it?
Eric Kujawsky: One is keeping the concentration of the orchestra focused. A piece like this, which goes on for so long, and it’s so vast and so many musicians are not familiar with it yet, the way I am, it’s just a matter of making sure that everyone’s together, focused, that the tempos are going the right way. And there’s an awful lot of cueing, just bringing people in, because sometimes you have to count hundreds of rests before you come in to play a cymbal. The musicians like to have the reassurance of the director looking at them and giving them a gesture personally.
There are many, many transitions. Mahler loves to build up to something and then suddenly pull back to nothing. And so all these sudden changes need to be drilled until the musicians can do it naturally, and there are no mistakes. As it is with any piece, 90% of the work is in the rehearsal preparation, but then I’m out there on stage with them just to reinforce and remind them of what they’ve already been practicing.
Embarcadero Media: Performing with so many voices, does that bring in a different element for the musicians than working with a single vocal soloist would?
Eric Kujawsky: I have to remind them that, you know, they can’t just play as loud as they want when there are singers, and we have to support them — even if the composer says to play as loud as possible, we can’t do that if there are singers in the room as well.
Fortunately, I have a lot of choral conducting experience. I actually majored in choral conducting when I was at UCLA, and I do conduct the Ladera Community Church’s choir in Portola Valley. I’m the choir director there, so I like working with voices. It’s a lot of fun. We also have a lot of experience doing operas and musicals in concerts at the Redwood Symphony. For instance, we’ve done “Sweeney Todd” and “Follies” by Sondheim, and next season, we’re going to be doing “A Little Night Music” in a new orchestration.
Embarcadero Media: Are you a Sondheim fan?
Eric Kujawsky: I conducted “Sweeney Todd” when I was still a Stanford student. That was the first production in California since the Angela Lansbury road show had come through. After that, I conducted at TheatreWorks, where we did “Sunday in the Park with George.”
Embarcadero Media: What have you enjoyed most about the experience of conducting this piece?
Eric Kujawsky: I enjoy the experience of doing any piece of music with the orchestra. These are people that I love working with, in many cases, people that I’ve been working with for 40 years, since I founded the orchestra. So any experience, any chance to get in front of them and do a piece like this is just amazing. And I always look forward to it. I hope I can do another 20 or 30 years at it.
Redwood Symphony performs Mahler’s Resurrection Symphony Feb. 16, 2 p.m., at the San Mateo Performing Arts Center, 600 N. Delaware St., San Mateo. Tickets are $40 adults/$35 seniors/$15 students with ID and free to kids under 18 with an adult or senior. redwoodsymphony.org.
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