The conductor, who is suffering from the recurrence of a brain tumour, took his final bow on Sunday with the San Francisco Symphony that he led for half of his 51-year podium career.
From the San Francisco Chronicle:
…The two-act program was produced by (Joshua) Robison, general manager of MTT Inc., and featured new arrangements of works by Thomas as well as sentimental favorites from his long career, including Joseph Rumshinsky’s Overture from “Khantshe in Amerike” — which has a familial significance for Thomas, whose grandmother Bessie Thomashefsky played the title role in the yiddish play’s world premiere in New York — and the finale of his mentor Leonard Bernstein’s “Chichester Psalms.”
Thomas opened the program with Benjamin Britten’s majestic Variations and Fugue on a Theme of Henry Purcell, Opus 34. He conducted with confident but gentle gestures.
Then Thomas’ proteges, Teddy Abrams and Edwin Outwater, shared conducting duties with the maestro. Thomas, during much of the evening when he wasn’t at the podium, sat stage left, where he could be seen occasionally conducting from his chair and mouthing the lyrics to the pieces he knew so well.
Throughout the program, which also featured longtime collaborators mezzo-sopranos Sasha Cooke and Frederica von Stade, New York-based singer and comedian Ben Jones, Broadway singer Jessica Vosk and the San Francisco Symphony Chorus, several audience members could be seen wiping away tears with their blue MTT bandana before the evening concluded with a blue balloon drop.
From KQED:
When Michael Tilson Thomas walked on stage at Davies Symphony Hall Saturday night, two things were evident. One: the applause from both the orchestra and audience was unbridled. And two: the beloved maestro was moving slowly.
As if to acknowledge the crowd’s concern, Thomas cracked a wry smile and asked for a drumroll. Then, like he’d done thousands of times before, he climbed the steps to stand at the podium. Trouble-free.
You guessed it: the crowd went wild.
Image: SFS
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