She seems able to do it all, is what I’m saying, and her gift for molding orchestral sonorities in music by Scriabin and Kaija Saariaho only added a new and unsurprising entry to the ledger of her talents.

San Francisco Chronicle

Joshua Kosman

With 100 or so orchestral musicians playing in different combinations, the palette of possible instrumental colors is well-nigh infinite. One of the many things a conductor has to do is to blend and polish those colors to a perfect sheen.

And that was the particular reward of Susanna Mälkki’s guest stint with the San Francisco Symphony, which got under way on Thursday, June 7. To be in Davies Symphony Hall for this concert was like touring a painter’s studio, and marveling at the many different ways the same basic chromatic ingredients can be put to use.

Mälkki’s previous visits have almost seemed calculated to show off the various aspects of her artistic portfolio. In her appearance with the Symphony last year, she led a performance of Stravinsky’s “Rite of Spring” notable for its crisp, rhythmically precise demeanor; during a dazzling two-week engagement in 2015, she displayed a mastery of a range of repertory from Russia and her native Finland.

She seems able to do it all, is what I’m saying, and her gift for molding orchestral sonorities in music by Scriabin and Kaija Saariaho only added a new and unsurprising entry to the ledger of her talents.