Classical pianist dares to improvise

American music: Gabriela Montero will perform works by Gershwin, Bernstein as well as play audience suggestions at Davies Hall Thursday evening. (Courtesy Photo)

SAN FRANCISCO — When Gabriela Montero comes to Davies Hall this week, she’ll do something classical pianists are taught never to do: improvise. 

Montero, who makes her San Francisco Symphony debut Thursday in the opening offering of the “Summer and the Symphony” series, will join conductor James Gaffigan and the orchestra in Gershwin’s “Rhapsody in Blue.” 

Then she’ll take requests for themes from the audience, and elaborate on them in what has become her signature improvisational style.

In a recent phone call from her home near Boston, the classically trained Venezuelan pianist said she’s been improvising at the piano since she was a child.

“It’s always been part of me, and it’s very subconscious, so it doesn’t stem from any kind of formula or practice,” Montero says. “It’s my most connected and instinctive way to make music.”

Classical pianists from Mozart to Beethoven wooed audiences with their improvisational skills. In the 20th century, though, the
practice fell out of favor and improv became the province of jazz artists. 

Montero says her piano teacher so strictly forbid her from improvising, she almost gave up music altogether. She quit playing for a time and went back to school to study psychology.

Then, in 2001, she had a meeting with Martha Argerich. Montero played for the legendary Argentine pianist — some Schumann, some Beethoven, and an improvisation she describes as “a musical story of Martha’s life.” 

Argerich urged her to return to performing, and to keep improvising.  “She really pushed me out there,” Montero recalls. “She said, ‘You have to share this with the world.’ That gave me the courage to come out and be myself, 100 percent.”

When she asks audiences for themes, people respond with “everything from Mahler to the Beatles, Berlioz to the Beach Boys,”  Montero says. When someone played a cell phone’s ringtone, the pianist turned it into a seven-minute fugue.

Piano has always been Montero’s first love. She gave her first public performance when she was 5, and made her concert debut at age 8 with Venezuela’s Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra. 

The same ensemble launched another prodigy, Gustavo Dudamel, who has become one of classical music’s hottest young conductors. 
Montero says she and Dudamel are good friends: “He’s an amazing musician and a beautiful person, and he’s finally getting the career he deserves.”

Montero gained worldwide recognition in January of this year, when she performed with Yo-Yo Ma and Itzhak Perlman as part of President Barack Obama’s inauguration. It was a cold day in Washington, D.C., but Montero says the event was suffused with warmth.

“It was wonderful to be part of it,” she says.  “All the pride and hopefulness and happiness in Washington translated up there to the podium.”

IF YOU GO

Gabriela Montero

Presented by San Francisco Symphony

Where: Davies Symphony Hall, 201 Van Ness Ave., San Francisco
When: 6:30 p.m. Thursday
Tickets: $20 to $70
Contact: (415) 864-6000; www.sfsymphony.org