From January 8 to 11, Michael Tilson Thomas conducts the San Francisco Symphony in Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony alongside Mason Bates’s The B-Sides, a work for orchestra and electronica. “I had often imagined a suite of concise, off-kilter symphonic pieces that would incorporate the grooves and theatrics of electronica in a highly focused manner,” says Bates. “So, like the forgotten bands from the flipside of an old piece of vinyl, The B-Sides offers brief landings on a variety of peculiar planets, unified by a focus on fluorescent orchestral sonorities and the morphing rhythms of electronica.”

As part of the concerts, MTT also conducts Beethoven’s Romances for Violin and Orchestra Nos. 1-2, featuring SFS Concertmaster Alexander Barantschik.