San Francisco Conservatory of Music

10/14/2026

Which Chopin etude is the hardest? SFCM students—and Professor Garrick Ohlsson—weigh in.

10/14/2026

"But I honestly look at my career as two different halves. Until I was 17, there was the classical half, and I was being trained for a symphony position. The majority of my training coming up was all based around classical music.

While I was doing all my classical stuff, I was also trying to figure out improvisation in jazz, because my dad was just adamant that I understood—not necessarily jazz—but how to improvise.

Sometimes my dad would bring me out to his gigs and say, 'Let my boy play.' But when I say that he had a jazz band, this wasn't like, Coltrane. They played stuff that was more of a party vibes, like Anita Baker, the Yellowjackets, Spyro Gyra—they never really dealt with swing feel, the whole broken-triplet thing.

Some of these club sets around Baltimore weren't starting until 1:00 in the morning, and then they'd play until 5:00. So I couldn't go out all the time, because I had school.

As I started to get better at playing jazz, I decided to leave classical alone, and that was pretty much it.

The only camp I've ever done in my life was something Christian McBride leads called the Jazz Aspen Snowmass Summer Sessions, and I played for him as a student. He heard me and said, 'Man, you sound really good. Give me your number.' But that phone call to join his band didn't happen for at least six years, when he called me to play a week at the Village Vanguard in New York.

I try to be very honest with the students and just tell them what I think they should do and what they should listen to. Students in general, I think they should listen a little bit more to a lot of older recordings—and I'm not saying they have to play like them—but for guidance, to take what they like and mold it into their playing. In improvisation, your ears are literally like your best friend."

— Warren Wolf, RJAM Professor of Jazz Vibraphone

10/13/2026

🎺 You know it when you hear it. But what makes bebop...bebop?

Professor of Jazz Trumpet Anthony Hervey breaks it down.

10/12/2026

Can music help us make sense of genetic mutations and aging?

On Wednesday, October 14, at 7 p.m., in Caroline H. Hume Concert Hall, SFCM and UCSF Fein Memory and Aging Center present "Art Reflects Life: Mutations, Variations, and Improvisation," an evening exploring variation and creativity through the lenses of genetics and music.

UCSF professors—including Aimee Kao, MD, PhD, a neurology professor in the Fein Center—will share the stage with Conservatory students and faculty for a multi-media presentation involving discussions, presentations and performances.

"What we do in the lab now," says Kao, "is think about how we can promote healthy longevity. Because it's not just about increasing our lifespan, it's about staying cognitively sharp, and resilient, and maintaining our overall health."

🎟️ Reserve your seat for "Art Reflects Life" at SFCM.

On Wednesday, October 14, we invite you to join the San Francisco Conservatory of Music and the UCSF Fein Memory and Aging Center for an evening exploring variation and creativity through the lenses of genetics and music.Featuring UCSF’s top minds in genetics and superstar musicians from SFCM, the...

10/12/2026

When it gets quiet and all that’s left to do is begin.

Grace Wahlen (‘27) seconds before conducting the SFCM Orchestra for the first time in Jennifer Higdon’s “blue cathedral.”

10/09/2026

Craig Terry’s Beyond the Aria showcase returned to SFCM in September with a program that featured composers from Cuba, Mexico, and Taiwan, alongside the Great American Songbook and commercial jingles.

The goal of the evening’s multi-genre approach, Voice Department Executive Chair Richard Cox says, was to “give students cross-training opportunities to broaden their artistry.”

“I actually really do consider myself a crossover artist,” soprano Jordan Riek (‘27) says. “I wouldn’t have said that to you when I came in here—but now I do.”

Riek now takes musical theater pieces to classical professional auditions. “If that’s how the industry is gonna change, then I’m gonna change with it,” she says.

🔗 Read more at the link in our bio about how Craig Terry challenged SFCM singers to step outside their comfort zones, from improvising with the piano to performing the Oscar Mayer jingle.

📸 Junhao Ma

10/08/2026

Inspiration, whimsy, and a Neapolitan Dance. 💃🎺

Dallas Brass stopped by for a masterclass on September 29—and we loved every second.

10/08/2026

Voice student Lily Bogas’ (‘27) band Seldon played San Francisco’s iconic Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival on Saturday, a free concert that draws up to 750,000 attendees to Golden Gate Park annually.

“I’m on this journey to an operatic career,” Bogas says of her future plans, “but I want to prioritize a career in making music that I feel connected to, above anything else.”

Seldon melds jazz, folk, and pop into a full band featuring a horn section, drawing from influences like Joni Mitchell and Lake Street Dive.

Bogas studies with Professor of Voice, Catherine Cook. Cook, she says, “is a great teacher because she really welcomes artistic creativity with her students and she never makes me feel held back from taking opportunities like Hardly Strictly.”

Up next, Bogas has planned a live session with Seldon in SFCM’s Studio G, collaborating with students from SFCM’s TAC department. She’s also taking the stage as part of Music of Remembrance’s “Journeys” performance at Seattle’s Benaroya Hall, singing songs from “We Go On, Oswego.”

🔗 Read more in the comments about Bogas’ roles in SFCM opera productions, singing with Grammy-winner Craig Terry in Beyond the Aria, and how “Garfield and Friends” played an important role in her musical upbringing.

10/07/2026

You never who’s going to attend—or drive-by—your recital in Cha.

🎹 Youmei Xia, piano, Second-Year Master’s Recital

🎵 Prelude from Ravel’s “Le Tombeau de Couperin,” M.55

📍 Cha Chi Ming Recital Hall at the Bowes Center

10/07/2026

SFCM students took a trip back in time for the San Francisco Silent Film Festival in September, playing the score to Buster Keaton’s masterpiece "The General."

The SFSFF maintains an ongoing relationship with the Conservatory and SFCM musicians are a regular feature at their annual showings—though this was a special one-off performance held to celebrate the centennial of Keaton's film, considered one of the best in the medium and preserved by the Library of Congress.

"Playing for a silent film originally released 100 years ago came with a whole set of challenges, from stylistic choices to precise and fluid tempo changes that we just don't get a lot of experience with in modern performance practice," bassist Ben Byham said of last year's performance, which celebrated the centennial of the Charlie Chaplin classic "The Gold Rush."