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The San Francisco Symphony has been placing its musicians in the solo spotlight this fall, and the results have been good enough to make you wonder if we couldn’t do without high-priced imports more often.

Sunday night’s concert by the Shanghai Quartet at Le Petit Trianon in San José opened the 25th season of the San José Chamber Music Society. It also served as the Society’s contribution to Shanghai Celebration 2010, a Bay Area–wide, yearlong festival commemorating San Francisco’s sister-city relationship with the Chinese city.

When I watched Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps, I waited to hear an iconic line to match the first film’s “Greed is good.” Gordon Gekko got teary, and I lost hope — until Bretton James (played by Josh Brolin) delivered the aphorism “Every man should have a mentor and a protégé.” Ironically, it is the completely well-intentioned San Francisco Academy Orchestra (SFAO) that acts on this fortune-cookie advice in its season-opening concert.

Lagging economy or not, some of the Bay Area’s local opera companies are taking risks. West Bay Opera is taking the lead and going for its whiskers with an upcoming production of Verdi’s La forza del destino . General Director José Luis Moscovich said of the undertaking, “This is not an opera for the faint of heart.”

Ever since arriving in the U.S. 20 years ago Wu Man — the indefatigable, conservatory-trained master of the Pudong School of classical pipa playing — has made it her mission to explore new and diverse avenues for pipa recognition. A one-woman evangelist for her instrument, she converses with natural grace and charm as she recounts milestones in her journey.

The Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra's Executive Director, Peter Pastreich, and Music Director Nicholas McGegan, are hatching big plans to bring PBO the national and international recognition it deserves.

The city of Utrecht, Netherlands, is gearing up for a huge celebration in 2013 to celebrate the 300th anniversary of the signing of the Treaty of Utrecht. The city and province of Utrecht is investing in a party that will rival the pan-European celebrations that followed the actual Treaty’s signing. One of the first anticipatory fruits of all this excitement is the Netherlands Bach Society’s recording of music written by Handel and William Croft.

Michael Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony have a long history of successful and seemingly idiomatic performances of French music, and thus Saturday’s program, advertised as “French Classics,” looked both appealing and promising.

Last week marked the first return of the Mark Morris Dance Group to UC Berkeley since Robert Cole’s retirement and Matías Tarnopolsky’s start as director of Cal Performances; Friday at Zellerbach Hall, it was good to see that not much has changed. The choreographer best known for illuminating complex scores and the dancers known for making virtuosity out of unaffected humanity were both doing just that — yet, in unexpected ways, Morris may have raised the bar.