Sarah Cahill in Berkeley See her; she is a wonder!

A glance at her spring calendar confirms her passion for contemporary music, and in a recent interview, Cahill said she's eager for audiences to hear the works she'll present on four upcoming programs.

Berkeley pianist Sarah Cahill. (CHRISTINE ALICINO)

The music begins on April 21, when she'll host "Full: Invent" at the new Berkeley Art Museum. Cahill, who curated a series at the old Berkeley Museum (guests included an eclectic mix, from Riley to the Residents), is assembling a similarly innovative lineup for the "Full" series, which presents events each month on the full moon.

"This one features invented instruments," she said. "Paul Dresher is bringing his Quadrachord."

Cahill's own performances begin on April 30, when she'll take the stage along with a group of hand-picked artists in "Luciano Chessa: a Retrospective," part of the New Frequencies Festival at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts. She'll join Chessa in four-hand pieces and revisit the composer's "Petrolio" with percussionist Chris Froh; she and Froh premiered the piece in 2004 at the American Academy in Rome.

The concert is a musical portrait of Chessa, who was born in Sardinia, is based in Oakland and teaches at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music.

"He's such an inventive composer," said Cahill. "I've known him for 20 years, and he's fascinating and original -- a music historian with an encyclopedic mind. He knows the piano so well because he's a really fine pianist himself. His music is whimsical and very theatrical in many ways. These pieces conjure up Italian folk song; at one point, he uses a small hand-held electric fan on the strings."

On May 4, Cahill returns to San Francisco Performances' Salons at the Rex series with a concert tracing the history of the chaconne, from the Baroque era to the present. Featured works include the 1962 "Chaconne" by Sofia Gubaidulina -- a piece Cahill calls "fierce, intense and really powerful." Additional 20th-century chaconnes by Carl Nielsen, Stefan Wolpe and one written for Cahill by Danny Clay, along with Baroque examples of the form by Handel, Couperin, Purcell and Elizabeth Jacquet de la Guerre, complete the program.

Experimental 20th-century works by American composers are featured in Cahill's final spring appearance, presented May 27 by San Francisco Friends of Chamber Music's Presidio Sessions. The free concert includes composers Cahill has championed throughout her career: Lou Harrison's "Range Song" and "Reel (For Henry Cowell)," Marc Blitzstein's "Scherzo (Bourgeois at Play)," and James Tenney's "Three Rags," along with works by Percy Grainger, Ann Southam, Johanna Beyer and Bunita Marcus.

Cahill is a superb pianist in whatever repertoire she chooses, but some of her most significant work has been done offstage. She founded the annual "Garden of Memory" event at Oakland's Chapel of the Chimes, which attracts new music artists and scores of attendees each June. She's written and lectured on contemporary music and organized performances at San Quentin. She hosted a radio program at Berkeley's KPFA-FM 94.1 from 1989-2001; her current broadcast, "Revolutions Per Minute," can be heard Sunday evenings on KALW-FM 91.7 FM in San Francisco.

"I love doing it," she says. "It's great to have composers and performers come in and talk about their work. In a world that's sort of marginalizing classical and contemporary music, it's more important than ever now to have that kind of forum."

Details: "Full: Invent," 7 p.m. April 21, Berkeley Art Museum, included with museum admission, www.bampfa.berkeley.edu; "Luciano Chessa Retrospective," 8 p.m. April 30, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco, $2-$30, www.ybca.org/luciano-chessa; "Salon at the Rex," 6:30 p.m. May 4, $25, www.sfperformances.org; "Presidio Sessions," 6 p.m. May 27, free, www.sffcm.org/presidio-sessions.