Scheherazade

The Chinese-born New Zealand conductor Tianyi Lu makes her San Francisco Symphony debut with Rimsky-Korsakov’s cinematic orchestral showpiece Scheherazade, paired with the first Symphony performances of Iranian-American composer Iman Habibi’s Zhiân, dedicated to “the brave people of Iran, in the hope of better days ahead.” Erich Wolfgang Korngold’s side job as a film composer likely saved his life. In 1938, the Jewish former prodigy fled Vienna for Hollywood; five years later, he became a US citizen. His violin concerto, performed here by [...]