Original Coverage & Source Attribution: www.mercurynews.com
From a spooky (sort of) classical concert to a popular art expo and classic album from a distinctive rock star, there is a lot of music, theater and more to catch this weekend and beyond.
Here is a partial rundown.
Classical picks: Spooktacular, Festival Opera, Chan weighs in
The fall season and Halloween continue to offer an enticing range of music events. Here are three performances Bay Area classical fans should know about.
Halloween treats: Symphony San Jose celebrates the season with its annual “Symphonic Spooktacular,” a family-friendly program that celebrates 13 composers, including Danny Elfman, Rossini, Richard Wagner, and John Williams. Peter Jaffe, who encourages attendees to come in costume, conducts the program, which ranges from classics to fan features.
Details: 7:30 p.m. Oct. 24 and 2:30 p.m. Oct. 25; California Theatre, San Jose; $17.50-$125; symphonysanjose.org.
At the salon: Festival Opera is returning to its 2026 Salon Series, which includes resident artists performing works by Handel, Mozart, and Leonard Bernstein among others. The October program on Oct. 25 Sunday joins resident artists in “Operatic Mad Scenes,” performing excerpts of six operas. On Nov. 22, the festival welcomes the excellent baritone Efrain Solis in the world premiere of “Borders of Dreaming,” along with well-known works.
Details: 4 p.m. Oct. 25 and Nov. 22, Piedmont Center for the Arts, Piedmont; $40 per concert; festivalopera.org.
Chan leads the way: Now that conductor Elim Chan has been named the San Francisco Symphony’s new music director, she’s now the 13th to take up the honor — and claimed it with terrific enthusiasm. She’s already made her mark, and among the works she’ll conduct this fall is a three-evening program drawn from John Adams’ “Doctor Atomic” Symphony, along with works by Brahms and Mendelssohn.
Details: 7:30 p.m. Oct. 29-31, Davies Symphony Hall, San Francisco; $45-$159; www.sfsymphony.org.
— Georgia Rowe, Correspondent
40th Emeryville Art Expo runs through Sunday
Ever want to cram a whole lot of art into a single day? You still have that chance, with the Emeryville Art Exhibition in its final weekend. The event features works by more than 100 artists inspired by the so-called “rottenest city on the Pacific Coast.”
Of course, visitors to Emeryville’s small-town environs know it’s come far from the days when that moniker applied (it was given due to Prohibition-related bootlegging and gambling). Part of the reason for that is because it’s become a hive of activity for artists, who have studios or live in the city. The Emeryville Art Exhibition this year marks its 40th anniversary, and it’s celebrating in a major way with 200-plus artworks spanning painting, sculpture, textiles, craft furniture and more.
“The Emeryville Art Exhibition is what art has always been meant to be: accessible, inclusive, affordable and engaging,” says John Bauters, director of the Emeryville Celebration of the Arts (and former city mayor). “Art is the medium through which ideas, perspectives, questions and emotions take form, and our exhibition is the forum where the community gathers to receive, discuss, embrace and share in them.”
Details: Open daily 11 a.m.-6 p.m. until Oct. 25; 5905 Shellmound St., Emeryville; free; emeryarts.org.
— John Metcalfe, Staff
Hop into Hole re-releases
At the very top of their game, Courtney Love and Hole were every bit as great as any rock band in the ’90s.
The proof can be heard, in quite dramatic and abundant fashion, on the group’s three classic ’90s discs — 1991’s “Pretty on the Inside,” 1994’s “Live Through This” and 1998’s ” Celebrity Skin” — all of which have been newly reissued and are now available on vinyl.
Big fans will want to get revisit Hole’s powerful debut — “Pretty on the Inside” — via the limited 35th edition 2-LP “Starbelly Splatter” vinyl edition with new gatefold artwork, a lithograph of a rare band photo and more. “Pretty on the Inside” is also being offered as a newly remastered 180g black vinyl LP as well as on CD.
“Live Through This,” the album in which Love really makes a case for being one of the most powerful rock ‘n’ roll singers of the decade, has been newly mastered for vinyl. It’s being offered as a single 180g black vinyl LP as well as a 1-LP Zoetrope vinyl, delivering animated loops of old music videos as well as previously unseen band footage.
The same vinyl formats are in place for the excellent “Celebrity Skin,” an album that sounds just as vibrant now as it did when it was first released nearly 30 years ago.
Details: $30 each; holerock.com.
— Jim Harrington, Staff
SF Opera looks at vagaries of love
She is a young ingenue — pretty, charming and unschooled in the ways of the world. Entranced by the handsome Chevalier, she runs away with him, but later abandons him when wealth and power become, for a time, more attractive propositions. Ah, but then there’s that dramatic reunion in the church when she comes to her senses and wants to win him back before he consigns himself to life in a monastery! That’s what unfolds in Jules Massenet’s “Manon,” now playing on stage at War Memorial in San Francisco Opera’s production of the composer’s most popular work. And if soprano Amina Edris as Manon and tenor Pene Pati as the Chevalier des Grieux seem utterly convincing as a romantic pair, offstage they are in fact husband and wife.
Four performances of the classic French opera’s run remain.
Details: 7:30 p.m. Oct. 24, 27 and 30, 2 p.m. Nov. 1; $30-$447, sfopera.com.
— Bay City News Foundation
Here’s your freebie of the week
San Francisco’s War Memorial and Performing Arts Center, with its three separate venues on three separate floors, plays host on Oct. 25 to an eclectic, intriguing parade of musicians playing for free throughout the afternoon. Beginning at noon, what organizers are calling SF Music Day 2026 presents entertainment in genres as diverse as jazz, classical, traditional, contemporary and world music. The lineup in the ground floor Herbst Theatre kicks off at noon with drummer Jordan Glenn’s BEAK ensemble bringing its blend of improvisational percussion pizzazz to listeners’ ears. One floor up in the lovely Green Room, the flute and percussion combo Nippon Kobo plays contemporary music from Japan at 12:30 p.m. The third-floor Taube Atrium Theater gets things rolling at 12:15 p.m. with a performance by The Sampaguitas, an effervescent girl trio well-versed in Filipino folk music, delivered in three-part harmony. The San Francisco Chamber Orchestra is booked to play, as are the well-known Rova Saxophone Quartet, Quinteto Latino and an ensemble with the curious name Ian Carey and Wood Metal Plastic. The final acts in all three performance spaces begin at 5 p.m.
Details: Find more information, including links to RSVP, at sfmusicday.com.
— Bay City News Foundation
And another freebie
We’re not quite sure what has gotten into those nice folks over at Opera San Jose, but they’re promising to turn a section of their home city into a “Tunnel of Terror” on Saturday. No, that doesn’t mean opera company members are going to gather and bellow out “Muskrat Love” or anything — although, with or without the keyboard solo, that would be pretty darned terrifying. What Opera San Jose, in tandem with the City of San Jose, has planned is a family-friendly Halloween celebration running 5 to 9 p.m. Oct. 24 at the city’s Sonic Runway — that iconic light/art installation that looks like someone stretched a Slinky across San Jose’s City Hall Plaza. Opera San Jose resident artists Nicole Koh, Courtney Miller and Micah Perry, along with emeritus artist-in-residence Eugene Brancoveanu, will join members of Children’s Musical Theater of San Jose and other entertainers in performing a wide range of classical and popular numbers including selections of “Phantom of the Opera,” Michael Jackson’s “Thriller,” the Bobby “Boris” Pickett hit “Monster Mash,” and Tame Impala’s “Dracula.” Community trick-or-treating, an interactive light show, street performers, arts and crafts vendors, lowrider culture displays, a light show and a costume contest with prizes are also part of the festivities.
Details: The event is free; more information is at operasj.org.
— Bay City News Foundation
Mariachi that’s old and new
Contemporary performers of art, music, theater or any other art form rooted in tradition face a common challenge these days. If they stick to the traditional style, they’re accused of simply regurgitating what has come before. If they stray too far from the norm, they risk losing support of art form’s most fervent and loyal fans. It’s a dilemma that has only become more pronounced as the explosion of digital communication has made access to all kinds of art and information that much easier and faster. The 13-member band Mariachi Herencia de Mexico — which performs in UC Berkeley on Oct. 23, as part of the Cal Performances arts series — is one of the outfits credited with getting it right. The group was founded in 2016 in Chicago by César Maldonado, a successful entrepreneur who loved mariachi but was concerned that too few young people in America were being exposed to it. He founded the Mariachi Heritage Foundation in 2016 and Mariachi Herencia de Mexico was an outgrowth of that. Blending traditional mariachi — which is some three centuries old — with a modern sound also informed by salsa, bolero, bossa nova, cumbia and more styles, the band has known success pretty much from the start. Its first album, “Nuestra Herencia” topped the Latin music streaming charts and earned the outfit its first of the Grammy nominations. The band’s 2025 release, “Viva la Musica” was heralded as a groundbreaking effort that maximized the band’s reputation for merging genres and traditions to create a thoroughly modern sound that was still unmistakably mariachi.
Details: Mariachi Herencia de Mexico performs a Dia de los Muertos-themed concert at 7:30 p.m. Oct. 23; UC Berkeley Zellerbach Hall; 23-$54; calperformances.org.
— Bay City News Foundation
SFJAZZ’S in-house stars
The SFJAZZ Center is best known for its packed schedule of first-rate touring jazz musicians and bands that never fails to amaze in an age where some markets struggle to sustain a functioning jazz scene at all. The center also has its own band, the SFJAZZ Collective, with an impressive lineup that includes saxophonists Chris Potter and David Sanchez, trumpeter Mike Rodriguez, vibraphonist Warren Wolf, pianist Edward Simon, bassist Matt Brewer and drummer Kendrick Scott. SFJAZZ is this week launching a series of concerts focusing on its Collective, with members headlining their own shows. First up is the Venezuela-born Simon, a first-rate pianist, who will be performing with a quintet featuring vocalist Magos Herrera on Friday. The show will spotlight Simon’s 2023 album “Femeninas,” which, as he describes it “spotlights the contributions of Latin American women songwriters, living and past, well-known and unknown, such as Violeta Parra (Chile), Marta Valdes (Cuba), Chabuca Granda (Peru), Elizabeth Morris (Argentina), and Joyce [Moreno] (Brazil). These incredible songwriters have created beautiful songs that should be internationally known.”
Details: Simon and his band perform at 7:30 p.m. Oct. 23 at SFJAZZ Center’s Miner Auditorium. Tickets are $35-$85; go to www.sfjazz.org
— Bay City News Foundation
