Can David Gockley, new opera director, build on the string of successes he brought to Houston in his 33-year tenure there? "He exists at the extremes of the spectrum and nowhere in the middle," says conductor Patrick Summers. "

Joshua Kosman [SF Chronicle, 22 January 2006]

When David Gockley made his first local appearance in February after being named the new general director of the San Francisco Opera, he showed up for a news conference at the War Memorial Opera House wearing a San Francisco Giants cap. It was a lark, an offhand joke — but it was also a compact little symbol of everything San Franciscans needed to know about the new guy in town.