SFO Plans for Opening Weekend of 104th Season

Design for the SFO Web page for Simon Boccanegra

This week began with the announcement of the opening weekend festivities for the 104th season of the San Francisco Opera (SFO). As was reported last month, the season will begin, once again, with an opera by Giuseppe Verdi, Simon Boccanegra. The conductor will be Caroline H. Hume Music Director Eun Sun Kim, and this will mark the latest stage in the journey she has planned to account of the works of both Verdi and Richard Wagner.

From a personal point of view, I believe that my first encounter with the opera came from the soundtrack album of the film Carnegie Hall. Bass Ezio Pinza played a major role in that film, which included his singing “Il lacerato spirito” (the tortured soul) from the Prologue for Giuseppe Verdi’s score. Unless I am mistaken, SFO last presented the opera in the fall of 2008 with the title role taken by the Russian baritone Dmitri Hvorostovsky, performing with soprano Barbara Frittoli in the role of Boccanegra’s daughter Amelia. About a decade later, I visited the opera again through a Delos recording with those roles taken by Dmitri Hvorostovsky and Nadine Sierra.

The original staging for this opera at SFO was conceived by Claus Guth, and Katherine M. Carter will be the Revival Director. The title role will be sung by Mongolian baritone Amartuvshin Enkhbat, and soprano Eleonora Buratto will take the role of Amelia. Following the opening festivities on Saturday, September 12, there will be five more performances at 7:30 p.m. on Wednesday, September 16, Tuesday, September 22, and Friday, September 25, and at 2 p.m. on Saturday, September 19, and Sunday, September 27.

As has been the case for some time, the first performance will be both preceded and followed by the annual Opera Ball. This will take place in City Hall, which is on the other side of Van Ness from the Opera House. Festivities will begin with a cocktail reception at 5 p.m., followed by a buffet soiree at 6 p.m. After the conclusion of Simon Boccanegra, City Hall will host an After-Party beginning at 11 p.m. As usual, a Web page has been created for attending all of the opening night festivities (including the opera performance).

Finally, the weekend will conclude with the 51st anniversary celebration of Opera in the Park. The SFO orchestra will again be led by Kim. The “usual plan” is that the program will begin with an opera overture, after which it will accompany vocalists that will be performing during the fall season. The “Park” is, of course, Golden Gate Park. This is a vast expanse, and the venue for the concert will be the bandshell in Robin Williams Meadow. The performance will begin at 1:30 p.m. on Sunday, September 13. As always, no tickets will be required.

Davies Hosts Bay Area Youth Orchestra Festival

Once again, the San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra (SFSYO), led by Radu Paponiu, hosted the annual Bay Area Youth Orchestra Festival in Davies Symphony Hall. They shared the stage with four other Bay Area ensembles:

1. Marin Symphony Youth Orchestra with Music Director Jim Stopher
2. Santa Rosa Symphony Youth Orchestra with Music Director Jaco Wong
3. Young People’s Symphony Orchestra with Music Director David Ramadanoff
4. California Youth Symphony with Music Director Leo Eylar

Newscaster Wendy Tokuda served as Master of Ceremonies.

Marin began the program with the overture to Giuseppe Verdi’s opera Nabucco. This could not have been a better opening, putting the full ensemble to good use. Stopher conducted without a score, keeping his full attention focused on all of the performers.

Wong took a smooth segue from Gabriela Lena Frank (the “Pinkillo Serrano” movement from Apu: Tone Poem for Orchestra) to Sergei Prokofiev, his Opus 100 (fifth) symphony in B-flat major. The latter was limited to its last (Allegro giocoso) movement. This involved a fair amount of cello work, which came across as weak. This may have been just as well since there were major problems with the overall balance of the ensemble. Far more confident was the SFSYO approach to Johannes Brahms’ Opus 80, his “Academic Festival” overture with an “encore” of Martin Schmeling’s orchestration of the fifth of the Brahms “Hungarian Dance” compositions.

Antonín Dvořák’s summer residence, where he composed his Opus 88 (photographer not identified, from Wikimedia Commons, licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license)

The second half of the program began with David Ramadanoff leading the Young People’s Symphony Orchestra in the first movement of Antonín Dvořák’s Opus 88 (eighth) symphony in G major. Sadly, the conductor did not appear to be particularly connected to his score, but the ensemble seemed quite capable of maintaining the necessary inertia. More problematic was Leo Eylar’s approach to Paul Dukas’ “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice,” which never seemed to find the right balance across the composer’s engaging instrumental diversity. The program then concluded with an “all hands on deck” performance of the final movement of Dmitri Shostakovich’s Opus 93 (tenth) symphony in E minor.

Since I made my move to the Bay Area, I have tried to keep up with this annual gathering of youth orchestras. I like to think of them as forecasting what to expect in future concert performances. As can be seen from the above account, this year’s forecast was a mixed one. On the other hand, forecasts can only be speculative; so all I can do is wait to see if I ever encounter any of yesterday afternoon’s performers in the future!

Halloween in the Green Room: the Fifth Season

Last night in the Green Room of the War Memorial Veterans Building, pianist Ronny Michael Greenberg presented the fifth installment of his annual Halloween-themed concert, Death by Aria. In addition to serving as Master of Ceremonies, Greenberg accompanied four vocalists at the piano: soprano Maria Valdes, mezzo Nikola Printz, and tenors Christopher Oglesby and Jesse Rex Barrett, who also gave an oboe performance with Greenberg of the third movement of Camille Saint-Saëns’ oboe sonata, preceded by a somewhat loopy account of Johann Sebastian Bach’s BWV 565 toccata in D minor (without the following fugue).

The Majestic Theatre in New York showing the mask associated with The Phantom of the Opera (photograph by ajay_suresh, licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license)

Two other Baroque selections framed the evening. Valdes began the program singing Cleopatra’s aria “Piangerò la sorte mia” from George Frideric Handel’s HWV 17 opera Giulio Cesare, while “Dido’s Lament” at the conclusion of Henry Purcell’s Z. 626 opera Dido and Aeneas was given an “all hands” performance. Printz, on the other hand, delivered the most diverse repertoire, taking on one of Lady Macbeth’s arias from Giuseppe Verdi’s Macbeth, “Pirate Jenny,” Kurt Weill’s The Threepenny Opera, and “Loathing” from Stephen Schwartz’ musical Wicked. The Halloween spirit was also honored by “Point of no Return” from Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musical The Phantom of the Opera, sung by Valdes and Oglesby (complete with mask).

Taken as a whole, this was a something-for-everyone entertainment. However, Greenberg is a first-rate accompanist; and his chemistry with all of the vocalists was consistently engaging. Death by Aria is becoming an annual tradition to poke a bit of fun at the more serious art song recitals. Nevertheless, all of the vocalists delivered solid and convincing accounts of their selections, always blending with the astute support of their accompanist. Death by Aria is well worth repeating annually.

Halloween to Return to the Green Room

Photograph of past Death by Aria performers

Once again, this month will conclude with the fifth annual Halloween-themed concert, Death by Aria. As in the past, pianist Ronny Michael Greenberg will serve as Master of Ceremonies. The “aria” vocalists will be mezzo Nikola Printz, soprano Maria Valdes, tenor Christopher Oglesby, and tenor Jesse Rex Barrett, doubling on oboe.

“Death by Aria” is also a song composed by Greenberg, which will be given its world premiere performance. Other selections will include “Dido’s Lament” from Henry Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas and “Pirate Jenny” from Kurt Weill’s The Threepenny Opera, along with excerpts from George Frideric Handel’s HWV 17 opera Giulio Cesare, Giuseppe Verdi’s Macbeth, and Ruggero Leoncavallo’s Pagliacci. The more contemporary side of the program will include excerpts from both Phantom of the Opera and Wicked.

The performance will again begin at 7 p.m. on Thursday, October 30. The venue will be The Green Room, which is on the second floor of the Veterans Building at 401 Van Ness Avenue. The entire event is expected to last three and one-half hours. Tickets are being sold through an Eventbrite Web page. General admission will be $100, and the price for young professionals under 30 will be $60.

Brownlee Shares New Album with Erin Morley

Lawrence Brownlee and Erin Morley on the cover of their new album (from the Amazon.com Web page for this album)

Tenor Lawrence Brownlee is likely to be familiar to many San Francisco music lovers. He made his debut in a performance of Gaetano Donizetti’s comic opera Don Pasquale presented by San Francisco Opera (SFO) in the fall of 2016, followed by his recital debut with San Francisco Performances in March of 2018. One week from today, Pentatone will release Golden Age, an album of bel canto duets that Brownlee will share with soprano Erin Morley. They perform with the Münchner Rundfunkorchester led by its chief conductor, Ivan Repušić.

It should be no surprise that the album will begin with Donizetti, who commands three tracks for the operas La fille du régiment, Marino Faliero, and Don Pasquale. Indeed, he is the only composer to be allocated more than one selection. Nevertheless, all of the other composers as just as familiar: Gioachino Rossini (Le comte Ory), Georges Bizet (Les pêcheurs de perles and La jolie fille de Perth), Léo Delibes (Lakmé), and Giuseppe Verdi (Rigoletto).

I have to confess that I have come to enjoy Brownlee’s voice, first through his SFO appearance and then through his recordings. One way of putting it is that he knows how to find the “bel” in bel canto. He has a gift for delivering high-pitch climaxes without ever making them sound forced. One might almost say that he knows how to prioritize the music over the musician! As a result, while bel canto is far from my favorite genre when I attend my SFO subscription performances, I have to say that both Brownlee and Morley deliver thoroughly engaging tracks on this new album in both their solo and duet performances.

Revisiting Verdi at the Opera House

Yesterday afternoon my wife and I returned to the War Memorial Opera House for a second encounter with the San Francisco Opera (SFO) production of Giuseppe Verdi’s Rigoletto, this time on our subscription tickets. We were subscribers long before I began this writing gig. Our box seats are so satisfying that we have never wanted to lose them.

One of the things I like about the vantage point is that my view of the conductor leading the orchestra is as satisfying as that of the stage. I particularly enjoy watching Music Director Eun Sun Kim on the podium with her command of both the vocalists and the musicians. Indeed, there was much to enjoy just off the podium with a rapturous solo by Principal Cello Sunny Yang at the beginning of the second act and the engaging flute performance for “Caro Nome” by Susan Kang in the first. After all, opera is not just about how the narrative is staged; it is also about how the music informs the listener of what is happening!

Both the narrative and the staging have become more than familiar over the course of my visits to the Opera House. Many readers probably know by now that Verdi is far from my favorite composer. Nevertheless, I appreciate his impact on opera: In the context of his predecessors, he knew how to transform flimsy melodrama into dramatic narratives in which the music and text drive the attentive listener to anticipate how the plot will reveal itself. Mind you, Richard Wagner would subsequently endow his narratives with even further substance; but it would probably be fair to say that Verdi started the wheels rolling in the right direction! (After all, that direction eventually led to operatic settings of the plays of William Shakespeare!)

Tenor Yongzhao Yu as the Duke of Mantua looking forward to his tryst with Maddalena (photograph by Cory Weaver, courtesy of SFO)

At this point readers may wonder that the only names I have called out have been musicians. The fact is that there was too much of a sense of the routine in the staging of the narrative. The climax comes in the quartet in which the Duke of Mantua (tenor Yongzhao Yu) is embarking on his latest conquest, Maddalena (mezzo J’Nai Bridges), while Rigoletto (baritone Amartuvshin Enkhbat) is showing his daughter Gilda (soprano Adela Zaharia) the Duke’s “true colors.” The musical delivery could not have been better, but the staging never quite captured the tension that Verdi expressed so eloquently in his counterpoint.

Mind you, this is a narrative that never ascends beyond melodrama; so perhaps it is just as well that the music communicates more than the staging!

SFO Begins 2025–26 Season with Verdi Favorite

Amartuvshin Enkhbat in the title role of Rigoletto (photograph by Cory Weaver, courtesy of SFO)

Last night in the War Memorial Opera House, San Francisco Opera (SFO) followed up on its opening weekend festivities by getting back down to business with the remaining seven performances of the first opera in the current season, Giuseppe Verdi’s Rigoletto, staged by Jose Maria Condemi. The title role was sung by Mongolian baritone Amartuvshin Enkhbat joined by Romanian soprano Adela Zaharia in the role of Gilda. Tenor Yongzhao Yu made his SFO debut in the role of the Duke of Mantua.

SFO performances of this opera go all the way back to the days of founder Gaetano Merola, who first conducted it in 1923 with one of the leading tenors in history, Beniamino Gigli, singing the Duke of Mantua. This is a challenging undertaking, since, for all of his polish, the Duke is little more than a hedonistic scoundrel. Rigoletto is keenly aware of this in his role as the Duke’s jester. He is consistently belittled by the Duke and the cronies in his court; but, as they say, “It’s a living” and the only means he has to support his daughter Gilda, whose mother is no longer alive.

The Duke is Verdi’s version of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s Don Giovanni. He views women as “conquests” and is always on the lookout for the next one. When he first sees Gilda in church, he knows who “the next one” will be. He disguises himself as a poor student named Gaultier Maldè, and Gilda falls for him. Meanwhile, those cronies encounter her on the street and abduct her (assisted, unknowingly, by Rigoletto), assuming she will make a nice “present” for the Duke. Ironically, even after she finds out who the Duke really is, she still loves him. (That is the way narratives unfold in opera. Ask Anna Russell about it!) Needless to say, she does not last long, leaving her father distraught over her death at the end of the opera.

All this, of course, is melodrama unto an extreme. It took a composer like Verdi to breathe life into these cardboard characters. It would be fair to say that every gesture in his music plays its own significant role in fleshing out the traits of each of the diverse personalities in the narrative. All of those personalities came to life in last night’s performance. The production was conducted by Music Director Eun Sun Kim, and she knew exactly how to shape the performance in the orchestra pit around the diversity of those character traits and the narrative episodes they confront. Thus, however familiar this opera may have been to many (most?) in the audience, this was a vibrant performance in which every gesture of the music was complemented by advancing the flow of the narrative on the stage.

Nadine Sierra’s Verdi at the Met

This morning I had the opportunity to catch up on a Great Performances at the Met program, which had first been broadcast by PBS on April 2, 2023. The offering was the first opera by Giuseppe Verdi that I came to know in its entirety, La Traviata. The encounter was due to the fact that I was preparing a series of programs for the campus radio station at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology devoted entirely to recordings of the conductor Arturo Toscanini. Before he moved to the United States, Toscanini had been Music Director at La Scala in Milan; so the recordings of Italian opera that he made in the United States could not have been informed by better experience.

One of the operas he recorded during his tenure as Music Director of the NBC Symphony Orchestra was La Traviata. When I first listened to that album, I was already familiar with tenor Jan Peerce and baritone Robert Merrill in the roles of Alfredo Germont and his father Giorgio, respectively. However, the “title role” of Violetta Valery provided me with my first encounter with soprano Licia Albanese. Now that I have the complete Arturo Toscanini Collection on CDs, Traviata remains one of the most-visited albums in the set.

Since my student days, I have had several opportunities to see this opera performed on the stage. Nevertheless, I wanted to view the PBS offering because the “title role” of Violetta Valery was sung by soprano Nadine Sierra. Like many of the “rising talent” that I encountered through San Francisco Opera, Nadine Sierra was an alumna of the Merola Opera Program, performing Adina in Gaetano Donizetti’s L’elisir d’ amore in the summer of 2010. She then became an Adler Fellow of the San Francisco Opera and was the beneficiary of an extended solo in the San Francisco Opera world premiere of Christopher Theofanidis’ Heart of a Soldier.

Nadine Sierra and Stephen Costello on one of Violetta and Alfredo’s more romantic moments (from the preview video on the PBS Great Performances Web page for this production)

It goes without saying that Traviata is a significant departure from the operas cited in that last paragraph. Nevertheless, the role of Violetta fit Sierra like a glove. Furthermore, the staging of her relationships with the Germont family could not have been better. This was particularly evident in how she handled her encounters with Giorgio (baritone Luca Salsi). Alfredo was sung by tenor Stephen Costello, who found just the right rhetorical devices for dealing with both Violetta and his father Giorgio.

Given that I have been both listening to and watching this opera since my undergraduate days, some might wonder why I have not had an “enough is enough” moment. The fact is that every director must choose his own approach to the personality traits for each of the three leading characters. Michael Mayer was particularly astute in establishing how Giorgio’s traits evolve as the plot unfolds. Each of the three principal characters has a “learning curve;” but, by the time the narrative is in its final stages, it is clear that Giorgio’s journey has the most to communicate to the audience! Salsi clearly seems to have appreciated this asset. We knew what to expect from Sierra and Costello, but Salsi’s interpretation of his role was the one that reverberated in memory!

“Abandon All Logic, Ye Who Enter!”

It may strike some as frivolous to distort the Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri to make a point about the recent broadcast of a performance of Giuseppe Verdi’s Aida in the Great Performances at the Met series. However, as I watched the narrative unfold, I found it hard to resist an often-invoked fable in which logic takes it on the chin. It involves an encounter between a frog and a scorpion trying to cross the Nile River. Ironically, one of the better versions of this tale was quoted by Shai Baitel in an article he wrote for The Jerusalem Post back in February of 2011. Here is his version of the text:

A frog and the scorpion, met one day on the bank of the River Nile, which they both wanted to cross. The frog offered to carry the scorpion over on his back provided the scorpion promised not to sting him. The scorpion agreed so long as the frog would promise not to drown him. They mutually agreed to the deal and started to cross the river. Half-way to the other bank the scorpion stung the frog with his venom. "Why did you do that?" gasped the frog, as it was dying. "Why?" replied the scorpion, "I couldn’t help it. This is the Middle East.”

Screen shot of Radamès leading his troops to report to the King of Egypt on their latest victory

Where Aida is concerned, one could modify this story with a punch line about grand opera, rather than the Middle East. With apologies to William Shakespeare, Aida (soprano Angel Blue) and Radamès (tenor Piotr Beczała) are “star-crossed lovers” from the very first scene of the very first act when Radamès sings “Celeste Aida” (heavenly Aida). After that, it is downhill for both of them, culminating in slow death in a sealed-up vault. However, one of the more interesting elements of the staging by Gary Halvorson is that Amneris (mezzo Judit Kutasi), daughter of the King of Egypt (who planned her marriage to Radamès), reconciles herself to the fate of her own wedding that would never happen.

To be fair, most opera-lovers go to Aida for the spectacle. In that context, Halvorson definitely knew how to dish it out to the fans. More often than not, the stage is filled with not only the principal characters but also a plethora of both dancers and choral singers. The good news is that, working with conductor Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Halvorson could establish just the right pace at which each episode would lead seamlessly into the next. As a result, what could have been a here-we-go-again performance emerged at a pace through which attention could be maintained without boredom ever overtaking it.

Would I save the video I recorded for future viewing? Probably not. Once is enough, but at least I was not overtaken by restlessness!

SFO Plans for Opening Weekend of 103rd Season

Yesterday San Francisco Opera (SFO) announced the plans for the festive opening weekend of its 103rd season. As was reported about a month ago, the first opera of that season will be Giuseppe Verdi’s Rigoletto. Caroline H. Hume Music Director Eun Sun Kim will conduct this latest stage in the journey she has planned to account of the works of both Verdi and Richard Wagner. Tenor Yongzhao Yu will make his SFO debut in the role of the Duke of Mantua. The title role will be sung by Mongolian baritone Amartuvshin Enkhbat, and Romanian soprano Adela Zaharia will take the role of Gilda. The production will be directed by Jose Maria Condemi. The performance will begin at 8 p.m. on Friday, September 5, in the War Memorial Opera House at 301 Van Ness Avenue. A Web page has been created for purchasing all available tickets.

Festive opera lovers in the lobby of City Hall for last year’s Opera Ball (from the SFO Web page for this year’s event)

That performance will be both preceded and followed by the annual Opera Ball. This will take place in City Hall, which is on the other side of Van Ness from the Opera House. Festivities will begin with a cocktail reception at 5 p.m., followed by a full formal dinner at 6 p.m. After the conclusion of Rigoletto, City Hall will host an After-Party beginning at 11 p.m. As usual, a Web page has been created with all necessary information for those interested in attending.

Finally, the weekend will conclude with the 50th anniversary celebration of Opera in the Park. The SFO orchestra will again be led by Kim. The “usual plan” is that the program will begin with an opera overture, after which it will accompany vocalists that will be performing during the fall season. The “Park” is, of course, Golden Gate Park. This is a vast expanse, and the venue for the concert will be the bandshell in Robin Williams Meadow. The performance will begin at 1:30 p.m. on Sunday, September 7. As always, no tickets will be required.

SFS to Conclude Season with Verdi and Getty

Most readers probably know by now that Esa-Pekka Salonen will give his final performance as Music Director in the San Francisco Symphony (SFS) Orchestral Series Concerts on Saturday evening, June 14, with the last of the three performances of Gustav Mahler’s second symphony, given the title “Resurrection.” However, the season will conclude the following week with two performances on Friday, June 20, at 7:30 p.m. and Sunday, June 22, at 2 p.m. This concluding program of the season will also be the last to include the SFS Chorus, directed by Jenny Wong.

James Gaffigan, conductor of the final Orchestral Series Concerts program (photograph courtesy of SFS)

There has been a slight change in plans since this program was announced on this site about two weeks ago. The performance of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s K. 618, the “Ave verum corpus” is no longer on the program. Instead, the first half of the program will be devoted entirely to premiere performances of three compositions by Gordon Getty:  the concert premiere of the intermezzo from his Goodbye, Mr. Chips opera, the world premiere of “St. Christopher,” and the first SFS performances of “The Old Man in the Snow.” The second half of the program will still consist entirely to Giuseppe Verdi’s setting of the Latin Requiem text. The conductor for this program will be James Gaffigan; and the vocal soloists will be soprano Rachel Willis-Sørensen, mezzo Jamie Barton, tenor Maria Chang, and bass Morris Robinson.

Schwabacher Series to Conclude with Crocetto

Next month will see the conclusion of the annual Schwabacher Recital Series, presented jointly by the San Francisco Opera (SFO) Center and the Merola Opera Program. The final recitalist will be soprano Leah Crocetto, who will be accompanied at the piano by Carrie-Ann Matheson. Some readers may recall her involvement with the Momenti trio, performing with bass-baritone Christian Pursell and pianist Ronny Michael Greenberg. A little over a year ago, this site reported the release of their Momenti album.

Leah Crocetto (photograph by Jiyang Chen, from a Classical Post Web page)

Crocetto has prepared an impressively diverse program for her Schwabacher performance. She has compiled a diverse assortment of art song selections by Clara Schumann, Richard Strauss, and Sergei Rachmaninoff. She will also be joined by baritone Lester Lynch to sing “Ciel! mio padre” from Giuseppe Verdi’s opera Aida. On the more popular side, she will sing “Losing my mind” from Stephen Sondheim’s musical Follies and wrap up with Sammy Fain’s “I’ll be seeing you,” setting lyrics by Irving Kahal.

This performance will take place in the Dianne and Tad Taube Atrium Theater on Thursday, April 10, beginning at 7:30 p.m. This venue is on the fourth (top) floor of the Veterans Building, which is located at 401 Van Ness Avenue on the southwest corner of McAllister Street. General admission will be $30. Tickets may be purchased online through an event page on the San Francisco Opera Web site. Note that wheelchair accessible seating is an option. The telephone number for the Box Office is 864-3330. In addition, subject to availability, student rush tickets will go on sale at 7 p.m. at the reduced rate of $15. There is a limit of two tickets per person, and valid identification must be shown.

Greenberg to Present Valentine’s Day Program

One week from today Ronny Michael Greenberg will take a break from his JIVE (Jewish Innovative Voices and Experiences) programming to present a more secular (and seasonal) offering. The title of his next program is OPERALOHA With Love. This will be a celebration of Valentine’s Day in which, as Greenberg has put it (with appropriate punctuation) “Opera meets Aloha!”

Poster for the event being discussed showing pianist Ronny Michael Greenberg with the vocalists he will accompany (left to right): Christopher Oglesby, Maria Valdes, Aivale Cole, and Jongwon Han (from the Eventbrite Web page for this performance)

The former will be highlighted by the popular quartet “Bella figlia dell'amore” from Giuseppe Verdi’s opera Rigoletto. Selections for the latter will include “Honolulu City Lights,” “Hanalei Moon,” and “Maui Girl,” along with some standards, such as “My Funny Valentine” and “Besame Mucho” (both appropriate for the season). Greenberg will provide piano accompaniment for four vocalists with international backgrounds: sopranos Maria Valdes (Cuban-American) and Aivale Cole (Samoan-New Zealand), American tenor Christopher Oglesby, and Korean bass-baritone Jongwon Han. Flamenco guitarist Freddy Clarke and Lenny San Jose on ukulele will also contribute to the instrumental accompaniment.

This show will begin at 7:30 p.m. on Wednesday, February 5, beginning at 7:30 p.m. General admission will be $85; but, in honor of Valentine’s Day, a couple will be admitted with a pair of “Lovebird Tickets” for $120. Eventbrite has created a Web page through which these payments can take place. The performance will take place at St. Mark’s Lutheran Church, which is located at 1111 O’Farrell Street, just to the west of Franklin Street.

Stage Director Versus Verdi’s Librettist

Yesterday afternoon I returned to the War Memorial Opera House for a second encounter with the San Francisco Opera (SFO) production of Leo Muscato’s staging of Giuseppe Verdi’s Un ballo in maschera (a masked ball). Readers may recall that my previous account of this production observed that this staging “left much to be desired.” Yesterday afternoon I realized how much of an understatement this was; and, by the time of the conclusion, it was clear to me that Muscato’s poetic license needed to be revoked.

As I had already observed, this opera had been given two settings. The narrative was about the assassination in 1792 of King Gustav III of Sweden, but the political tenor of the nineteenth century led Verdi’s librettist, Antonio Somma, to relocate the setting to Boston during the period prior to the American Revolution. This involved renaming the king to Riccardo; and his two primary aides, the Counts Ribbing and Horn, were given names associated with the Revolution, Samuel and Tom. Muscato decided to jumble up these two sets of names in his casting. He even tried to explain his motives in his note for the program book, but that text was as much of an incoherent muddle as was staging of the opera.

Amelia (soprano Lianna Haroutounian) singing about the gallows that are not there in Act II of Un ballo in maschera (photograph by Cory Weaver, courtesy of SFO)

The bottom line is that Muscato never missed an opportunity to make a radical departure from Somma’s libretto. This was most blatantly evident at the beginning of Act II, when the first words from Amelia (soprano Lianna Haroutounian) as she enters the stage call attention to the gallows. Clearly, this was Somma’s way of letting the audience know that this was where the narrative would begin to descend; and that descent would lead all the way up to Gustav’s assassination. Sadly, there was no gallows in sight. There was only a starkly bare stage on which the performers would sing to each other, doing their best to bring a modicum of urgency to the narrative.

To be fair, Muscato does not deserve all of the blame for dramatic shortcomings. There seems to be a tradition of prolonged death scenes in the opera repertoire. This goes back at least as far as the lengthy passacaglia for the last words of Queen Dido in Henry Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas. However, Gustav’s death makes the passing of Dido seem like a walk in the park. Every time it seems as if he has taken his last breath, it turns out that he has something more to sing! Tenor Michael Fabiano did his best to negotiate the absurdity of this situation, but he was fighting a losing battle.

So Un ballo in maschera was certainly not Verdi’s “finest hour” in the history of his repertoire. Nevertheless, as I previously observed, Jose Maria Condemi managed to give it a passingly credible account when he staged it for SFO in 2014. He went “by the book.” When Amelia sang about the gallows, you saw the gallows. Hopefully, I shall not have to put up with Muscato running roughshod over another opera libretto.

SFO: New Verdi Production Misses the Mark

Now that the annual opening season festivities of the San Francisco Opera (SFO) have concluded, the War Memorial Opera House can “get down to business” with this season’s round of productions. Things began last night with Giuseppe Verdi’s Un ballo in maschera (a masked ball), which was given its first performance this past Friday in conjunction with (appropriately enough) the opening-night Opera Ball. Staging was directed by Leo Muscato, his first production in the United Stated reviving a version that originated in Sweden ten years ago.

I fear that Muscato’s approach for this occasion was a muddled one, with the first warning signs to be found in the program book. Those familiar with the opera know that it is about the assassination in 1792 of King Gustav III of Sweden (Gustavo in the libretto), who was, indeed, fatally shot during a masked ball. Sadly, this story did not go down well with censors in both Naples and Rome, leading Verdi to “transplant” the venue to Boston during the period prior to the American Revolution. This involved changing the names of most of the main characters.

This often leads to a cast listing which, for the principal characters, coupled the name from one version with a parenthesized account of the name from the other. This was the case in the program for the current production. However, in the cast listing, some of the names in parentheses are Swedish, while others are English. My initial thought was that this was a blundered misprint; but, when I read Muscato’s essay in the program book, I came away with the impression that this was intentional. Sadly, the note never explained the reason for this jumble. Little did I know that this would be a sign of things to come during the performance!

SFO last performed this opera in 2014, when it was staged by Jose Maria Condemi. This was back in my days with Examiner.com, and I was so enthusiastic about the production that I wrote two articles about two different performances! Last night, on the other hand, felt like an interminable slog. The entire affair was as muddled as Muscato’s essay, even with a cast of vocalists that tried as nobly as possible to give it their all.

Tom (Jongwon Han), Samuel (Adam Lau), and Renato (Amartuvshin Enkhbat) plotting the assassination of Gustavo (photograph by Cory Weaver, courtesy of SFO)

At the head of that list was tenor Michael Fabiano, doing his best to deliver a multidimensional account of Gustavo’s character. The same could be said for the return of soprano Lianna Haroutounian as Amelia, Gustavo’s latest love interest. Amelia, of course, was married to Renato, sung by baritone Amartuvshin Enkhbat in his SFO debut. He is the one to assassinate the king after having joined forces with the rebels Samuel (bass Adam Lau) and Tom (bass-baritone Jongwon Han), the latter an Adler Fellow. The other returning vocalist was mezzo Judit Kutasi in the role of the sorceress Ulrica.

Listening to all of these voices was consistently a pleasure, but watching them negotiate the pitfalls in Muscato’s staging left much to be desired. Fortunately, the musicians in the orchestra pit, led by Music Director Eun Sun Kim, gave Verdi’s score all of the attention it deserved. That included Evan Kahn, leader of the cello section, who delivered a rapturous solo accompaniment to Amelia’s aria at the beginning of the final act.

SFO Opens 102nd Season at End of Next Week

The climax of the masked ball in Verdi’s opera (photograph by Yasuko Kageyama, taken during a performance of this production at the Teatro dell’Opera di Roma during the 2015–16 season)

As is usually the case, San Francisco Opera (SFO) is “first out of the gate” to launch the new concert season. This will be the company’s 102nd season, and it will begin with a festive opening weekend. The opera will be Giuseppe Verdi’s three-act Un ballo in maschera (a masked ball). The title is based on the event at which King Gustav III of Sweden was fatally shot. This was a controversial narrative, which eventually led to shifting the venue to colonial Boston. However, SFO will present the opera as Verdi’s librettist, Antonio Somma, initially conceived it.

The role of the King will be sung by tenor Michael Fabiano. The narrative has him in a romance with Amelia (Armenian soprano Lianna Haroutounian), who is married to Renato (Mongolian baritone Amartuvshin Enkhbat, making his SFO debut). The other major role is that of the King’s page Oscar, who will be sung by coloratura soprano and Merola alumna Mei Gui Zhang; this will be her debut performance in that role, having already sung the role of Eurydice in Christoph Willibald Gluck’s Orpheus and Eurydice with SFO in the fall of 2022. Music Director Eun Sun Kim will conduct; and the program will be staged by Leo Muscato, who will be making his SFO debut.

This opera will be given seven performances. Opening night will take place on Friday, September 6; and the performance will begin at 8 p.m. Five performances will take place at 7:30 p.m. on September 11, 18, 21, 24, and 27, and the 2 p.m. performance will take place on September 15. Ticket prices range from $28 to $426; and, depending on location, there is a facility fee of either $2 or $3 per ticket. All tickets may be purchased in the outer lobby of the War Memorial Opera House at 301 Van Ness Avenue or by calling the Box Office at 415-864-3330. Box Office hours are 10 a.m.–5 p.m. on Monday and 10 a.m.– 6 p.m. on Tuesday through Saturday. There is also a Web page with hyperlinks for purchasing tickets for all seven of the performances. Readers should be aware that there is a high demand for tickets for this production. As of this writing, that Web page identifies those dates with either limited or best availability. In addition, there will be a livestream beginning at 2 p.m. on September 15. The charge will be $27.50, and it may be purchased through a separate Web page.

The opening night performance will be followed by the annual Opera Ball. Proceeds benefit education programs, which reach thousands of students in K-12 classrooms, as well as afterschool programs. A Web page has been created with all necessary information for those interested in attending. There will also be a special Cocktail Celebration at 6 p.m. on opening night for BRAVO! Club, the community of young professionals that happen to be opera lovers. Those attending will be entitled to discounted tickets for seats in the Dress Circle and Orchestra. Further information is available through the above hyperlink.

Kim will also conduct the free annual concert showcase San Francisco Chronicle Presents Opera in the Park. The SFO orchestra will star vocalists, who will be performing during the fall season. Golden Gate Park is, of course, a vast expanse; and the venue for the concert will be the bandshell in Robin Williams Meadow. The performances will begin at 1 p.m. on Sunday, September 8.

Lawrence Brownlee’s Engaging Return to SFP

Tenor Lawrence Brownlee (photograph by Shervin Lainez, courtesy of SFP)

Last night in Herbst Theatre, San Francisco Performances (SFP) presented the third of the four recitals in its Art of Song series. The vocalist was tenor Lawrence Brownlee, returning for his third SFP appearance, following up his SFP debut in March of 2018 with a Summer Music Sessions performance in July of 2021. His San Francisco debut took place in the fall of 2016 at the War Memorial Opera House of the San Francisco Opera (SFO), where he sang the role of Ernesto in Gaetano Donizetti’s comic opera Don Pasquale. His accounts of two arias from that opera showed up in his second album, Allegro io son, which was discussed on this site shortly before that SFO production began its run.

The title of last night’s program was Rising, which was the title of the album that Warner Classics released in April of 2023; and six of the recital selections were taken from that album. There was also a seventh selection, “Vocalise III” by Carlos Simon, meaning that the first half of the recital provided a generous survey of the efforts of the latest generation of young composers. By way of contrast, the program began with five songs by Joseph Marx, a leading Austrian composers during the transition from the nineteenth to the twentieth century. I am not sure If I had encountered any of Marx’ music previously; but I have to confess that he seemed to devote more attention to the piano accompaniment (given a first-rate account by Kevin Miller) than to the vocalist.

The second half of the program was the result of Brownlee’s “pairing” approach to the four most prominent opera composers of the nineteenth century (in order of appearance on the program): Giuseppe Verdi, Gaetano Donizetti, Gioachino Rossini, and Vincenzo Bellini. Each selection consisted of an art song followed by an aria. As might be guessed, the Verdi aria was “La donna è mobile” from Rigoletto; and it was the undisputed scene-stealer of the evening!

As usual, Brownlee was at the top of his game in his chemistry with the audience. This involved his spoken introductions, as well as his performances. The same can be said of his interactions with Miller. The result was an impressively diverse account of repertoire, all of which was delivered with precise attention and engaging expressiveness.

SFO Announces 2024–25 Season Repertory

The announcement of plans for the next season of the San Francisco Opera (SFO) seems to have occurred about one month later than it did last year. The full subscription will account for six main-stage productions; and regular subscribers will quickly note that this is two fewer than those being produced during the current season. The first four operas will be performed during the fall and the remaining two in the summer. However, the season will consist of several concert/recital events, all of which will be given a single performance. In “order of appearance,” the operas to be presented are as follows:

Un ballo in maschera, Giuseppe Verdi: This opera was last performed by SFO in October of 2014, but it was one of the productions that was offered for free streaming during the pandemic. Caroline H. Hume Music Director Eun Sun Kim will conduct, continuing her commitment to present one opera by Verdi and one by Richard Wager during each SFO season. The production will staged by Leo Muscato, who created it for a performance by the Rome Opera. San Francisco will see two familiar faces in the leading roles, tenor Michael Fabiano as Gustavo, the King of Sweden, and soprano Lianna Haroutounian as Amelia, who is in love with Gustavo even though she is married to Count Anckarström. The third “side of the triangle,” Renato, will be sung by baritone Amartuvshin Enkhbat, making his SFO debut. Also of note will be the role debut of Gustavo’s page, Oscar, taken by Chinese soprano Meigui Zhang.

The Handmaid’s Tale, Poul Ruders: This will be the West Coast Premiere of an opera by Danish composer Ruders based on the novel of the same name by Margaret Atwood. It was co-produced by SFO and received its world premiere in Copenhagen in 2000. The libretto was written in English by Paul Bentley. Atwood wrote her novel in the first person, requiring Bentley to reframe the narrative with a third-person perspective. The premiere by the Danish Royal Opera was staged by Phyllida Lloyd, but staging in San Francisco will be by John Fulljames (another SFO debut), former head of the Danish Royal Opera. SFO had originally scheduled its performance for 2020, one of the productions that had to be postponed due to the pandemic. The title character will be sung by mezzo Irene Roberts, who will be making her role debut. The conductor will be Karen Kamensek, who made her SFO debut in 2014, when she conducted that season’s production of Carlisle Floyd’s Susannah.

Tristan und Isolde, Richard Wagner: This will be Kim’s Wagner selection for the season. I must confess that I never tire of this opera and have consistently enjoyed my past encounters with it in the Opera House! SFO has been presenting it since September of 1927; and it was last performed in October of 2006. I was just beginning to flex my muscles as a writer at that time, which is when SFO was still reviving the Los Angeles production with sets designed by David Hockney. This will be a new production by Paul Curran, which he originally staged for La Fenice in Venice. The Production Designer will be Robert Innes Hopkins, whose previous work was seen most recently in last season’s performance of Gaetano Donizetti’s L’elisir d’amore (the elixir of love). The title roles will be sung by Anja Kampe, who made her SFO debut during the 2010 Ring cycle in the role of Sieglinde, and Simon O’Neill, who sang the title role in Wagner’s Lohengrin, which was Kim’s selection for last season. SFO debuts will be taken by baritone Wolfgang Koch as Kurwenal and mezzo Annika Schlicht as Brangäne.

Carmen, Georges Bizet: This is a production shared with the Washington National Opera. Staging will be by Francesca Zambello, originally created by Opera Australia and based on a co-production shared by the Royal Opera House Covent Garden and the Norwegian National Opera. Mezzo Eve-Maud Hubeaux will be making her American debut in the title role. Also making her American debut will be soprano Louise Adler in the role of Micaëla. The ill-fated Don José will be sung by tenor Jonathan Tetelman, while bass-baritone Christian van Horn will take the role of the toreador Escamillo. The conductor will be Benjamin Manis, making his SFO debut.

La bohème, Giacomo Puccini: For those that really like this opera, the month of June will satisfy those pleasures and then some. There will be nine performances between June 3 and 21; and, if that were not enough, Pocket Opera will present its production on July 28 at the Gunn Theatre! Furthermore, in the SFO production, all four of the leading roles (Rodolfo, Mimi, Marcello, Musetta) will be double-cast. In addition, it will revive the staging by John Caird, making it another production that was selected for free streaming during the pandemic. The conductor at the Opera House will be Ramón Tebar.

Idomeneo, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: The only thing that Idomeneo, Re di Creta, Mozart’s K. 366 opera, has in common with La bohème is that both are sung in Italian. According to my records, this was last performed by SFO in the fall of 2008, back when Donald Runnicles was the Music Director. As a result, I am particularly interested in how Kim will conduct this score, given the insights she has brought to the music of Verdi and Wagner. The title role of the King of Crete will be sung by tenor Matthew Polenzani, while the role of his son, Idamante, will be taken by soprano (and alumna of both the Merola Opera Program and the Adler Fellowship) Daniela Mack. The other major roles are both princesses. Ilia is the daughter of King Priam of Troy; and her part will be sung by soprano Ying Fang, who will be making her SFO debut. The role of Elettra, the Princess of Argos, best known for her flamboyant “rage” aria in the final act, will be taken by Elza van den Heever (another graduate of both the Merola program and the Adler Fellowship).

All six of the operas will have a single performance that will also be available for live-stream with dates and times as follows:

• Un ballo in maschera: Sunday, September 15, 2 p.m.
• The Handmaid’s Tale: Friday, September 20, 7 p.m.
• Tristan und Isolde: Sunday, October 27, 1 p.m.
• Carmen, Tuesday, November 19, 7:30 p.m.
• La bohème, Tuesday, June 10, 7:30 p.m.
• Idomeneo, Friday, June 20, 7:30 p.m.

There will also be several additional SFO events, most of which will take place in venues other than the Opera House. Many of them will be familiar, while others will be “novel ventures.” Here a brief summary for those wishing to save the dates sooner, rather than later:

• Friday, September 6, 5 p.m.: The SFO Guild will join forces with SFO to host the annual Opera Ball, which will take place in City Hall both before and after the opening night performance of Un Ballo in Maschera.
• Sunday, September 8, 1:30 p.m.: The more “public” celebration of the new season will take place, as usual, in Robin Williams Meadow in Golden Gate Park. Kim will conduct the SFO Orchestra, and several of vocal artists from the Fall season will sing both arias and ensemble settings. Those in the audience tend to bring either picnic blankets or deck chairs; and, for many, picnicking is part of the fun.
• Saturday, October 26, 7:30 p.m.: Sets will be cleared from the Opera House stage to allow the SFO Orchestra to play on that stage. They will be conducted by Kim in a performance of Ludwig van Beethoven’s Opus 125, his ninth (sometimes known as the “Choral”) symphony in D minor. The vocal soloists will be soprano Jennifer Holloway, mezzo Annika Schlicht, tenor Russell Thomas, and bass Kwangchul Youn. The event will honor the 200th anniversary of the symphony’s composition.
• Thursday, November 21, 7:30 p.m.: Carmen Encounter will be an immersive evening of multi-sensory experiences inspired by the Bizet opera currently being performed on the Opera House stage. This event will involve not only the stage (where the first act of the opera will be performed) but also the lobby areas, which will serve as venues for dancing, interactive experiences, and a festive party. Last year the Encounter was structured around the ongoing performance of Gaetano Donizetti’s L’elisir d’amore (the elixir of love). SFO has created a Web page with photographs of that past event.
• Friday, November 15, 7:30 p.m.: The Future is Now is the final concert of the year for the 2024 class of Adler Fellows. The program will present both scenes and arias, accompanied by the SFO Orchestra. The performance will be held in Herbst Theatre, which is adjacent to the Opera House.
• Sunday, November 17, 2 p.m.: SFO Chorus Director John Keene will lead the members of his ensemble in the annual intimate choral event. The vocalists will be accompanied at the piano by SFO Associate Chorus Master Fabrizio Corona. The program is seldom limited to the opera repertoire.
• Friday, June, 27, 7:30 p.m.: This will be a special celebration of the LGBTQIA+ community. The performance will bring music together with immersive projections. The evening will include a special host, who has not yet been identified.

Further information can be found on the “exploration” Web page on the SFO Web site. Currently, only subscription orders are being processed. A Web page has been created that summarizes both subscriber benefits and the diversity of subscription plans.

SFP: Brownlee will be Next Art of Song Vocalist

Tenor Lawrence Brownlee (photograph by Zakiyah Caldwell Burroughs, courtesy of San Francisco Performances)

This month will conclude with the third of the four Art of Song programs prepared by San Francisco Performances (SFP). The recital will feature the return of tenor Lawrence Brownlee, whose last SFP recital was the last in the four programs entitled Summer Music Sessions 2021, which took place in July of that year. Those that regularly attend San Francisco Opera may recall his 2016 debut in Gaetano Donizetti’s Don Pasquale. For this coming recital he will be accompanied at the piano by Kevin Miller.

In preparing his program, Brownlee took a “pairing” approach to the four most prominent opera composers of the nineteenth century: Gioachino Rossini, Gaetano Donizetti, Vincenzo Bellini, and Giuseppe Verdi. Each of these composers will be represented by an opera aria preceded by an art song. In “order of appearance” these selections will be as follows:

• Verdi: “Ad una stella” followed by “La donna è mobile” from Rigoletto
• Donizetti: “Me voglio fa’na casa” followed by “Allegro io son” from Rita
• Rossini: “La lontanza” followed by “D’ogni più sacro impegno” from L’occasione fa il ladro
• Bellini: “La ricordanza” followed by “Nel furor delle tempeste” from Il pirata

The program will begin with a selection of six songs by the twentieth century Austrian composer Joseph Marx. However, much of the first half of the program will be devoted to selections from Brownlee’s Rising album composed by Jasmine Barnes, Brandon Spencer, Damien Sneed, Shawn Okpebholo, and Joel Thompson. The first half of the program will also include “Vocalise III” by Carlos Simon.

This performance will begin at 7:30 p.m. on Thursday, February 29. The venue will be Herbst Theatre, on the first two floors of the Veterans Building at 401 Van Ness Avenue on the southwest corner of McAllister Street. Tickets are being sold for $75 for premium seating in the Orchestra, the Side Boxes, and the front and center of the Dress Circle, $65 for the center rear of the Dress Circle and the remainder of the Orchestra, and $55 for the remainder of the Dress Circle and the Balcony. They may be purchased through an SFP secure Web page or by calling 415-392-2545.

De los Ángeles: Nineteenth-Century Opera

As has already been observed, the Victoria de los Ángeles: The Warner Classics Edition; Complete Recordings on His Master’s Voice & La Voix de son maître anthology offers a generous account of full-length opera performances. In dealing with the nineteenth-century repertoire, I decided that it might be appropriate to divide the “romantic” offerings from the early part of that century with more dramatic “post-romantic” operas that are more “at home” with operas from the early twentieth century. This article will focus on the earlier category, which is represented by only four composers: Gioachino Rossini (born in 1792), Giuseppe Verdi, (born in 1813), Charles Gounod (born in 1818), and Georges Bizet (born in 1838).

Rossini accounts for only one opera, The Barber of Seville; but de los Ángeles sang the role of Rosina for two recordings, the first made in June of 1952 and the second a little over ten years later in September of 1962. There are also two recordings of Gounod’s Faust, both of which involved longer recording sessions. The first was completed in June of 1953, having begun at the end of the preceding April. Recording of the second release began in September of 1958 and continued through early in the following month.  However, the “church scene,” which begins the fourth act, was actually recorded in a church, the Église Saint-Roch in Paris.

Verdi is represented by two operas, both of which were recorded only once. The earlier of these is the more (most?) familiar La traviata, which was first performed in 1853. The other is Simon Boccanegra, whose original version was composed in 1957. However, it was given a major overhaul in 1881, which is the version that is usually performed (to the extent that this opera is performed at all these days). As most readers will have guessed, the Bizet opera is Carmen in the version in which all of the text is sung.

The conductors associated with these recordings make for an interesting assortment. As some might guess, both versions of Faust were led by the same conductor, who was (of course) French: André Cluytens. Tullio Serafin is the only other conductor to lead two operas. The earlier of these is the first Barber of Seville recording, and the other is La Traviata. The most eyebrow-raising conductor is Thomas Beecham, who led the performance of Carmen.  That leaves two less-familiar conductors: Vittorio Gui for the second Barber of Seville and Gabriele Santini for Simon Boccanegra.

Unless I am mistaken, there is only one other vocalist with a major role in the collection. That is bass Boris Christoff; and his performance of Méphistophélès in Faust is definitely “worth the price of admission” (as they say). His other appearance is as Jacopo Fiesco in Boccanegra, and all I can say is that I wish I had been around to see him take this role on the stage.

This takes me to the more significant “punch line.” The conductors for all of these recordings tended to focus only on an interpretation of the score that is accurate but, in the absence of staging, not consistently expressive. Now, where an opera like Carmen is concerned, drama is critical; and the best the listener can do is reflect on a past encounter with particularly impressive staging. Given how little exposure it receives, Boccanegra is never quite up to snuff, particularly when led by a conductor who was best in his element when in an opera house.

By this time the reader is probably worrying that de los Ángeles is being treated like a “bit player.” I suspect that, had I the opportunity to see her on the stage, I might have had more to say about her. However, I fear that, over the course of my listening, I never really warmed up to any efforts she may have made to establish the nature of her character (had she made those efforts at all). The best I can say is that she made a dutiful effort to follow the conductor and do justice to the marks on paper, but I never encountered very much by way of dramatic intent.