John Coolidge Adams is an American composer and conductor whose music is rooted in minimalism. Among the most regularly performed composers of contemporary classical music, he is particularly noted for his operas, which are often centered around recent historical events. Apart from opera, his oeuvre includes orchestral, concertante, vocal, choral, chamber, electroacoustic and piano music.
Maxwell Lemuel Roach was an American jazz drummer and composer. A pioneer of bebop, he worked in many other styles of music, and is generally considered one of the most important drummers in history. He worked with many famous jazz musicians, including Clifford Brown, Coleman Hawkins, Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, Miles Davis, Duke Ellington, Thelonious Monk, Abbey Lincoln, Dinah Washington, Charles Mingus, Billy Eckstine, Stan Getz, Sonny Rollins, Eric Dolphy, and Booker Little. He also played with his daughter Maxine Roach, Grammy nominated Violist. He was inducted into the DownBeat Hall of Fame in 1980 and the Modern Drummer Hall of Fame in 1992.
Michael Tilson Thomas is an American conductor, pianist and composer. He is Artistic Director Laureate of the New World Symphony, an American orchestral academy based in Miami Beach, Florida, Music Director Laureate of the San Francisco Symphony, and Conductor Laureate of the London Symphony Orchestra.
Gunther Alexander Schuller was an American composer, conductor, horn player, author, historian, educator, publisher, and jazz musician.
John Luther Adams is an American composer whose music is inspired by nature, especially the landscapes of Alaska, where he lived from 1978 to 2014. His orchestral work Become Ocean was awarded the 2014 Pulitzer Prize for Music.
Mark Izu is an American jazz double bass player and composer. He is of Japanese ancestry and frequently combines jazz with Asian traditional musics in his compositions. He has performed with Anthony Brown and Jon Jang. Izu is a seminal leader in the Asian American Jazz movement. His compositions include symphony, film, theater, dance and jazz. The principal curator of the original Asian American Jazz Festival held at the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park for nearly two decades, he helped establish the genre. In addition to the double bass, he also plays the Japanese shō and Chinese sheng.
William Joseph Russo was an American composer, arranger, and musician from Chicago, Illinois, United States.
Based in San Jose, California, The Choral Project is a mixed-voice choir founded in 1996 by artistic director and conductor Daniel D. Hughes. The group's vision is "to heal our world through music and words," while their mission is "to connect to one another through choral theater, education and musical excellence."
William Marcel "Buddy" Collette was an American jazz flutist, saxophonist, and clarinetist. He was a founding member of the Chico Hamilton Quintet.
Wayne Peterson was an American composer, pianist, and educator. He won the Pulitzer Prize for Music for The Face of the Night, the Heart of the Dark in 1992, when its board overturned the jury's unanimous selection of Concerto Fantastique by Ralph Shapey.
Luciano Chessa is a musician, performance/visual/installation artist, and musicologist.
Mary Stallings is an American jazz vocalist and mother of soul singer Adriana Evans.
Mark Grey is an American classical music composer, sound designer and sound engineer.
Nino Marcelli was an Italian composer and conductor who revived the San Diego Symphony orchestra. Marcelli wrote compositions for musical theatre and oratorio including one for the Bohemian Club.
The Jazz Mafia is a young American musical collective that incorporates smaller ensembles into a larger family. The collective is based in the Mission District of San Francisco, California where it writes, plays, and arranges jazz music while incorporating genres such as electronica, soul, funk, big band, symphonic, and hip-hop. Its founder and leader, trombonist and bass guitarist Adam Theis, participates in at least ten bands, including Realistic Orchestra, Shotgun Wedding Quintet, Shotgun Wedding Hip-Hop Symphony, Jazz Mafia Horns, Supertaster, and the Joe Bagale Band.
Nolan Ira Gasser is an American composer, pianist, and musicologist. He was the chief musicologist for Pandora Media, Inc. and the architect of the Music Genome Project, the proprietary musical analysis system that underlies the popular Internet radio service. His classical compositions have been performed by orchestras, chamber ensembles, and soloists around the world, in such venues as Carnegie Hall, the Kennedy Center, and the Rose Bowl.
Giedrius Antanas Kuprevičius is a Lithuanian composer and music educator.
Naomie Kremer is an Israeli born American artist living and working in Berkeley, CA, and Paris, France. Kremer works in paint, video, photography, digital projection, and stage design.
The Saxophone Concerto is a composition for alto saxophone and orchestra by the American composer John Adams. The work was jointly commissioned by the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, the St. Louis Symphony, the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, and Orquestra Sinfônica do Estado de São Paulo Foundation. It was given its world premiere in Sydney, Australia on August 22, 2013 by the saxophonist Timothy McAllister and Sydney Symphony Orchestra under the direction of Adams.
Yerba Buena Gardens Festival is an admission-free performing arts festival held in San Francisco, California. During the summer months, May to October, Yerba Buena Gardens Festival produces concerts and performances including music, dance, theater, circus and children's programs. All programs take place in the outdoor spaces of Yerba Buena Gardens in the South of Market, San Francisco district.
