Jason Victor Serinus
Jason Victor Serinus writes about music for Opera News, Opera Now, American Record Guide, Stereophile, San Francisco Magazine, Muso, Carnegie Hall Playbill, East Bay Express, East Bay Monthly, San Francisco Examiner, Bay Area Reporter, hometheaterhifi.com, and other publications.
Articles by this Author
When word got out that Chanticleer was again seeking a music director, just a few years after Matthew Oltman took over for Joseph Jennings, many who love the singing of this prized male vocal ensemble expressed concern. Listening to Love Story, recorded live in September 2011 during two concerts at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, suggests that the ensemble remains in fine form under Interim Music Director Jace Wittig.
On May 17, when San Francisco–based Dolby Laboratories announced the availability of the first Blu-ray discs with sound quality noticeably improved by its 
A musical miracle is about to unfold in Berkeley. Eleven years after the death of one of America’s great, irrepressible iconoclasts, composer Lou Harrison, one of his long-forgotten early piano pieces is about to get what may amount to its second airing.
Having put himself on the map with Rhapsody in Blue (1924), the 26-year old George Gershwin set out to prove that he was anything but a one-note wonder. Over the next decade, he produced three other major works for piano and orchestra: Concerto in F (1925), Rhapsody No. 2 (aka “Second Rhapsody”) (1931), and I Got Rhythm Variations (1934).
The supreme question, for the millions who love the voice and artistry of Mexican tenor Rolando Villazón, now 40, is: How does he sound? The San Francisco Merola Opera program graduate, who withdrew from performing in 2008 due to a vocal crisis he initially attributed to emotional burnout and roles too heavy for his voice, has since returned to the
As proof of spring, as if proof were needed, Sandrine Piau came to Berkeley. Ably supported by Susan Manoff, the French soprano at last brought her exquisitely poised vocalism to Hertz Hall.
Oh, how I wish I could have taken you by the hand to Herbst Theatre on Monday night.
Is there a lover of Baroque vocal music who does not eagerly await Nicholas McGegan’s annual spring jaunt with Handel? What other conductor and Bay Area Baroque ensemble can invest the master’s operas, oratorios, and not so easily classifiable vocal creations with such an irresistible combination of rhythmic verve and sheer delight?
Almost 12 years have passed since composer Jake Heggie and librettist Terrence McNally left audiences in tears at the San Francisco Opera world premiere of their first opera, Dead Man Walking.
Although I long to hear Adler Fellow and Metropolitan Opera National Auditions winner Nadine Sierra in her Schwabacher Debut Recital, duty demands that I take in the recital of Sandrine Piau, who makes her long-overdue Bay Area recital debut in Berkeley two hours earlier. Those who have been waiting to hear this marvelous soprano live will finally get their wish.
One of those rare artists whose voice unfailingly bridges the space between his heart and ours is Matthias Goerne. This most intimate of baritones, unafraid to bare his soul, seems on a perpetual quest to explore new territory with some of our best accompanists.
You have to hand it to Renée Fleming. At a time in life when many a soprano would be content to rest on her laurels, she continues to take risks and explore new territory.
Are all the great baritone roles in Slavic opera about loving, suffering for, and losing women?
“He’s been under the weather,” I was informed before the recital began, “but he still sounds great.” And for the most part, Wolfgang Holzmair did indeed sound wonderful. Heard from the third row of Cal Performances’ Hertz Hall, the beguiling sweetness of his voice and the lightness of his touch remained remarkably intact for a baritone who turns 60 this year.
