Many anthropologists believe music evolved out of our needs as primates to be touched, so perhaps music can be seen as “touching at a distance,” Anna Daniels suggested as she began her presentation at our recent “Meeting of the Minds” arts and culture event.
Daniels, a retired librarian and writer for San Diego Free Press, whirled us through some of her favorite concerts presented by the La Jolla Symphony and Chorus. The orchestra, led by widely acclaimed percussionist and conductor Steve Schick, brings the audience along and stretches musical sensibilities, Daniels said.
The ensemble kills the notion that contemporary music is “inaccessible at worst and sounds terrible at best,” she said. Daniels, one of our six speakers, displayed 20 slides for 20 seconds each to bring us into what she’s seen and heard. Watch it here:
Thanks to the Media Arts Center San Diego for producing these videos; we’re posting all six this week. Up already are Lauren Popp on San Diego’s artist-driven art spaces and Javier Velasco on women’s contribution in local dance and theater. Stay tuned this week for the rest.
Here’s a guide to the La Jolla Symphony and Chorus’s upcoming season, beginning with a concert themed “Hero/Anti-Hero” in November. And you can find more on the group’s website. Here’s a post I wrote last year when the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra tapped Schick at the last minute to conduct a challenging, four-hour work.
Tell us: Where have you found your musical sensibilities stretched in San Diego? Leave us a comment below.
I’m Kelly Bennett, Voice of San Diego arts editor. You can reach me directly at kelly.bennett@voiceofsandiego.org or 619.325.0531.
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