Evento

San Francisco Saxophone Quartet

Founded in 1977, and playing on the streets of San Francisco since 1989 (where their "uniform" is white tie and tails - and baseball caps), The San Francisco Saxophone Quartet has now gone international, with a recent concert tour of Japan and worldwide distribution of their "Tails of the City" album on Angel Records.

Playing from memory, the quartet uses transcriptions of classical music from all eras along with original compositions. Arrangements make use of the four saxophones, or three saxophones plus piano or harpsichord. As impressive as each member is in solo performance, it is the ensemble that is truly magnificent. Somehow these four saxophones manage to sound like a much larger assemblage, one including the sounds of oboes, trumpets, french horns, violins, and more. playing a repertoire of transcriptions of classical masters such as Bach, Handel and Mozart as well as contemporary pieces and arrangements of jazz and popular standards by Duke Ellington, Mel Torme, Sonny Rollins and others. They have been described as a "skilled quartet of the first order," by the Reno Gazette Journal; their sound often more like an orchestra than a quartet. The effect is magical and gloriously musical.