Leah Garchik:

At the Black and White Ball

Always spiffy, the Black and White Ball looks like some stylish retro snapshot. The duo-chromatic rules of attire include built-in protection from the garish; not a fuchsia boa nor turquoise eyelid in sight. Folks get dressed with wit ( Willie Brown said he and Sonya Molodetskaya embodied the theme) and crisp zippiness, and everyone sets out feeling sharp.

The meal (thank you, McCalls) was delicious, the organization (thank you, Patricia Sprincin) astounding, the decor (thanks to you, too, Blueprint) snappily chic. But at a party to support the Symphony’s musical education programs, the music is what it’s all about.

Conducting the Symphony in Aaron Copland’s “Hoedown,” then Leonard Bernstein’s “Times Square” and “Mambo,” Donato Cabrera jumped, pointed, tilted and hopped. The music took hold of him, and then — as a pleasure that’s personal and visceral, but also shareable — it took hold of us.

When Paul Simon sang, listeners’ heads bobbed, shoulders shimmied, bodies bounced in the seats. If most folks restrained themselves from dancing in the aisles, they danced in their seats, including the three musicians in the back of the orchestra — lower brass, I believe — who stayed onstage after their playing duties were over, pros turned to fans.

“Music education” is a pretty dry phrase, and sure, the Black and White Ball is a chance to get dressed up, strut one’s stuff, and compare and contrast finery. But it’s about very basic stuff: Making sure that every young person in San Francisco has a chance to share the primal pulse of music.

Professor Dan Hicks, erudite doppelganger of the swinging, fun-loving Dan Hicks and the hot Licks, gives Kollege of Musical Knowledge classes at Yoshi’s in Oakland on Wednesday and Thursday. These “sessions” pay particular homage to his favorite composers and performers.

Hot Licks Hicks is usually droll and deadpan, but when I talked with him about his ongoing musical education, he was pretty serious. Has he ever stopped learning about music? “I don’t think so,” he said. “I learned how to play, I learned how to sing. And I keep learning. … I sang the other night, and I sang stuff I never sang before. I hit certain notes and phrased things …” This was at a show in Colorado, he said, “and one of the girls said, ‘You sang your butt off tonight.’ ” This, he assured me, is a “four-star comment.”

As a major fan of yodeling, an art form at which Hicks excels, I asked the scholar whether his Kollege will include a demonstration of that skill. “There’ll be some scatting,” he said. “My scatting includes the yodeling. It’s a yodel-scat, that’s where I put the yodel, into the scat.”

At mention of that, on the telephone, he provided a free sample, which there’s no way to describe in print but might be likened to a corn dog, the corn being the scat and the sausage being the yodel. Or an Oreo, the chocolate being the scat and the cream being the yodel. Or, no matter what he says, a tasty conversation with Dan Hicks.

Here’s how colleagues, even new ones, felt about Kathi Kamen Goldmark, who died May 24:

In October, Goldmark had taken a job as director of arts and culture for the Oshman Family Jewish Community Center in Palo Alto. Her cancer, which was in remission then, came roaring back soon after she started that job, and in the months between then and her death, she needed a lot of time off to deal with her failing health.

Generous staff members treated their new colleague like an old friend. They donated their own sick and vacation days so she could continue to get paid, and more important, remain eligible for health insurance. At the time she died, chief Human Resources Officer Randi Brenowitz said, enough days had been donated to her “bank” that she could have remained on the books until October, at which time — a year after her hire — she would have been eligible for disability. The day after she died, the staff dedicated their weekly Shabbat Schmooze to her. They said Kaddish, lit a memorial candle covered with animal-print contact paper, and shared a challah whose ritual cloth covering was animal-printed.