Choose artist...

Top 10 for Dec

Yo Yo Ma | Kathryn Stott play Arc of Life Suite@Davies Hall / The Berkeley Daily Planet review

In an eclectic program, cellist Yo Yo Ma and pianist Kathryn Stott gave a concert Thursday evening, May 12, at Davies Hall. Longtime collaborators in both live performances and recordings, Yo Yo Ma and Kathryn Stott have a wonderful feel for each other's musicianship. They opened this program with five pieces from something they term the "Arc of Life Suite," which they recorded in 2015. However, as with many of Yo Yo Ma's themed projects, this grouping seems a bit arbitrary and forced, though he sees it "as an invitation to our audience to remember and imagine what the soundtracks of their lives might be…. Childhood, adolescence, young adulthood, middle age, old age: what do they sound like?" Personally, I can't imagine anyone's life having this group of works as its soundtrack; but, oh well, there's beautiful music here, and, anyway, Yo Yo Ma often stretches the point of his themed projects way out of proportion.  

READ THE FULL Berkeley Daily Planet REVIEW