Bay Area Rainbow Symphony Tonight!

The banner of the Bay Area Rainbow Symphony (from its City Box Office Web page)

According to my records, the last time I wrote about the Bay Area Rainbow Symphony was in November of last year, and that involved their participation in California Festival: A Celebration of New Music. Late yesterday afternoon, I learned that Music Director Dawn Harms would be concluding her tenure with the performance taking place this evening, She will mark the occasion by leading the ensemble in a performance of Ludwig van Beethoven’s Opus 125, his ninth symphony in which orchestral resources are joined by vocalists (solo and choral) in the final movement’s setting of Friedrich Schiller’s poem “An die Freude,” usually known in English as the “Ode to Joy.”

The vocal soloists for this performance will be soprano Melody Moore, mezzo Nikola Printz, tenor Brian Thorsett, and baritone Hadleigh Adams. The choral resources will be provided by both the Berkeley Community Chorus, whose Music Director is Ming Luke, and the Masterworks Chorale, whose Artistic Director is Bryan Baker. Baker will provide the preparation for tonight’s performance.

The full program will put a twist on the usual overture-concerto-symphony structure. The overture will be by Ethel Smyth, composed for her one-act opera “The Boatswain’s Mate.” The “concerto,” on the other hand, will be for a narrator, rather than an instrumentalist. That narrator will be Curt Branom, reciting the text that Aaron Copland prepared for his “Lincoln Portrait.” This involves descriptive comments (presumably Copland’s) interleaved with Abraham Lincoln’s own words.

The performance of this program will take place tonight (June 22) at 7:30 p.m. The venue will be Herbst Theatre, whose entrance is on the ground floor of the Veterans Building at 401 Van Ness Avenue, on the southwest corner of McAllister Street. Tickets are still on sale through a City Box Office Web page. Including the necessary fee, General Admission tickets are sold for $44.75 with special rates of $34.75 for seniors aged 65 or older and $17.75 for students.