Program:

• Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky — Romeo and Juliet Fantasy Overture

• David Conte — The Masque of the Red Death, Suite No. 1

• Claude Debussy — Petite Suite, orchestrated by Henri Büsser

• Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky — Nutcracker Ballet excerpts

About the artists

David Conte is an American composer and long-time faculty member at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. His works are performed widely, and he has been a central figure in the Bay Area’s musical community for decades. More about his work can be found at davidconte.net.

About the program

American writer Edgar Allan Poe wrote The Masque of the Red Death in 1842, partly inspired by a masque held in Paris in 1832 during a severe cholera epidemic. Suite No. 1 of David Conte’s Masque of the Red Death is based on music drawn from the first act of a projected two-act ballet. The work was commissioned in 1992 for the 75th anniversary of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. A revised version of the suite was commissioned by the Oakland Symphony, under conductor Michael Morgan, and premiered in 1994. The scenario for the ballet was written by Lawrence Pech, Founder and Artistic Director of Diablo Ballet and former Principal Dancer of the San Francisco Ballet.

Tchaikovsky’s Romeo and Juliet Overture-Fantasy, first composed in 1869 and later revised twice, was his breakthrough orchestral work. Suggested by composer Mily Balakirev, who also guided its form and key structure, the piece marks an early fusion of Tchaikovsky’s lyrical Romanticism with the Russian nationalist style. Although its premiere was poorly received, the later revisions refined its symphonic drama and introduced the soaring love theme now known worldwide. Beneath its Shakespearean program lies Tchaikovsky’s own struggle for artistic confidence and emotional expression, turning a mentor’s assignment into one of the most passionate and enduring works in the orchestral repertoire.

These excerpts from Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker highlight the composer’s imaginative orchestral writing at the height of his maturity. From the shimmering transition into the Waltz of the Snowflakes (Act I, Scene 6) to the radiant opening of the Kingdom of Sweets and the colorful national dances (Scenes 8–9), Tchaikovsky transforms simple stage moments into music of symphonic depth. Premiered in 1892, The Nutcracker was initially undervalued, yet its harmonic daring, rhythmic sparkle, and use of the newly invented celesta reveal a composer exploring new sonic possibilities.