Program

All selections will be announced from the stage.

Artist Profile

Jack Van Geem has been the principal percussion and assistant timpanist of the San Francisco Symphony for 23 years. He has performed and recorded with the symphony as a mallet soloist, solo timpanist, snare drum soloist and featured solo percussionist. Before joining the Symphony in 1981, he performed for five years with the San Francisco Ballet Orchestra. He studied in Germany with Cristoph Caskel on a Hertz Fellowship and holds B.A. and M.A. degrees from California State University–Hayward, where he also taught. In addition to his work with the San Francisco Symphony, Van Geem has recorded and performed chamber music, music soundtracks and marimba and xylophone music. He recently finished recording a CD of marimba duets with Nancy Zeltsman and premiered Island Music, a work written especially for them by Michael Tilson Thomas.

Robert Wright is a classical and jazz bassist who freelances throughout the Bay Area. He composes and arranges in both idioms. Raised in the Bay Area, he studied bass with Ortiz Walton and Audrey Bush and composition with Glenn Glasow and Vladimir Ussachefsky. Classical music experience includes the Napa Valley Symphony and other regional Bay Area orchestras and several new music ensembles. He has played the Claude Bolling trumpet and flute suites with
members of the Russian National Orchestra. His jazz experience includes playing with Vince Wallace, Eddie Harris, Mose Allison, and others. He graduated from UC Berkeley in humanities and music and obtained an MS in Economics from 
University of Utah. He has a Ph.D. in Acupuncture and maintains a private practice in Chinese medicine, specializing in Orthopedic Acupuncture, and community health.

Raymond Froehlich joined the SFS as a percussionist in 1991. A graduate of the San Francisco Conservatory, he was previously a member of the San Francisco Opera Orchestra and a timpanist with the Berkeley Symphony. Mr. Froehlich has often been featured in the Symphony’s summer festivals in works by twentieth-century composers. He has also played with the Boston Symphony Orchestra at Tanglewood, the Los Angeles Philharmonic at the Hollywood Bowl and in 1998 was percussion soloist in the celebrated Salzburg Festival production of Messiaen’s opera Saint François d’Assise, conducted by Kent Nagano. Mr. Froehlich performs with several jazz ensembles in the Bay Area.