It's News to Me

Janos Gereben on September 27, 2016
Isaiah Musik-Ayala is Figaro, Stacey Stofferahn is the Countess, and Maya Kherani is Susanna in West Bay Opera’s upcoming production of The Marriage of Figaro | Credit: Otak Jump

West Bay Opera Offers Mozart’s Nozze di Figaro

Always surprising and by now “ancient” West Bay Opera opens its 61st season on Oct. 14 with a new production of Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro. WBO General Director José Luis Moscovich conducts the crackerjack orchestra, just the right size in the chamber-opera-sized Lucie Stern Theater.

“The music is sublime, of course. But what’s really astounding are the recitatives,” Moscovich says. “Nobody, not even the Italians, ever wrote more effective, more precise or funnier recitatives than the German-speaking Mozart. We’ve learned so much exploring this score ...”

Known in his younger days from Rossini’s The Barber of Seville, Count Almaviva is a changed man by the time the second of Pierre Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais plays — on which the 1786 Nozze’s libretto is based — tells the story. Tired of Rosina (the Countess here), the Count is a skirt-chasing bully, who wants to exercise his “feudal rights of the first night” when his servants, Figaro and Susanna, plan to get married.

Considered by many to be among the best operas ever written — a cornerstone of the repertoire and one of the most frequently performed operas — Nozze is presented by WBO in a production directed by Igor Vieira, and with newly translated English titles.

Moscovich assembled a cast that includes bass-baritone Isaiah Musik-Ayala in the title role; soprano Stacey Stofferahn as the Countess; soprano Maya Kherani as Susanna; baritone Krassen Karagiozov as Count Almaviva; bass Silas Elash as Bartolo. Making her company debut, mezzo- soprano Veronica Jensen sings Cherubino.

Period costumes are designed by Abra Berman, Jean-Francois Revon is responsible for the sets, video projections are by Frédéric Boulay.

How ambitious is Moscovich and West Bay Opera? Consider the rest of the season, which opens with Nozze: Puccini’s complete Il Trittico (February 2017) and Richard Strauss’ Salome (May–June 2017). In welcome contrast with most opera companies (in an admittedly expensive business), WBO tickets are priced between $35 to $83, and there are group discounts available. 

Return to Top


Chamber Music Society of San Francisco | Credit: Bowerbird Photography

A Free Community Concert to Raise Funds for Neighborhood Project

Following a privately organized all-volunteer concert in January to benefit Syrian and other refugees in the Notre Dame des Victoires Church, Camellia Rodriguez-SackByrne once again swings into action to raise funds with music for a good cause. 

Sponsored by the Intersection for the Arts, the Neighborhood Performance Project will present the concert at 5:30 p.m. Oct. 2, in a.Muse Gallery. (The Facebook event page has additional information and can be shared.)

“Some songs will address being an immigrant and crossing borders,” says Rodriguez-SackByrne, “a crucial human rights issue at the forefront of our minds and in political debates right now leading up to the elections. Music gives voice to these issues and highlights the stories of families fleeing conflict and hardship and seeking a better life.”

Diana Gameros will be featured at the concert.

Participating artists are singer-songwriter Diana Gameros and the Chamber Music Society of San Francisco quartet of violinists Jory Fankuchen and Natasha Makhijani, violist Clio Tilton, and cellist Samsun van Loon. Gameros sings about the immigrant experience and migration, love, and longing. The quartet will also perform various classical pieces at the program consisting of original pieces and classical compositions, including movements from string quartets by Haydn, Shostakovich, and Mendelssohn.

Rodriguez-SackByrne calls attention to the significance of the venue: “a.Muse Gallery is a beautiful community loft arts space in Potrero Hill/Mission that, sadly, will be closing soon because of rising costs for art spaces in the city, struggling to keep open and thriving in San Francisco.”

CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story mistakenly identified refugees as the beneficiaries of this event.

Return to Top


Dudamel conducts youth orchestra in Berkeley | Credit: UC Berkeley

Gustavo Dudamel’s Plea for Regarding the Arts as “Essential”

Last week, at the awarding of National Medals of Arts and National Humanities Medals in Washington, DC, Los Angeles Philharmonic Music Director Gustavo Dudamel spoke before the President’s Committee on the Arts and Humanities, and he said arts and arts education are essential and define the future.

Among Medal of Arts winners were Philip Glass, Mel Brooks, Morgan Freeman, Santiago Jiménez Jr. (conjunto music master), choreographer Ralph Lemon, Audra McDonald, Luis Valdez, and abstract artist Jack Whitten. Dudamel said:

My mentor, Maestro José Antonio Abreu, said once that the worst crime committed in the modern world has been to take away from children the access to beauty and inspiration. Obviously, we live in difficult times. After any financial crisis that shakes the whole world, schools have smaller budgets. The first programs to get cut are art and music, because they are not considered “essential.” I believe that is wrong.

Some people think that art is a luxury and must be cut back in times of crisis. These people must understand that precisely during times of crisis the unforgivable sin is to cut access to art. In my beloved home of Venezuela such a crisis is happening right now. People are spending their days looking for food, medicine and the necessities of life. The same arguments exist — how can we fund music, the arts — when basic needs are not being met?

Art is the nourishment of the soul. Our children will learn architecture to design the bridges that will connect us with our future, they will excel in math to calculate their foundations. Many of our children will better humanity through science, and all must strengthen themselves, learning the limits of their bodies through sports. The arts are equally vital. Those who cut back art programs must understand that without art, the human spirit dulls.

We want to prepare our children for the future, but here’s the problem — in this fast-paced world we live in, we don’t know exactly what the future will bring. We assume it will involve math — there is always math! And yes, we must educate the mind. But a child is not just a mind — she is a soul. And we must also nourish the soul as well.

We, everybody in this room, must find a way to create and support art in our future, so I invite you to invest in the dreams and spirits of kids ... searching for a glimpse of hope and beauty. I invite you to listen to the words of Schiller, who said that beauty is the only form of communication that can unite society “since it relates to that which is common to all.”

Since we became human and started painting on cave walls, we are hardwired for expression. I don’t know what technologies we still will be using in the future, what changes will confront us. I don’t know what Facebook, Pokémon Go, or Twitter will be like. I don’t know if computers will disappear or if they will become something completely different. Anything and everything is possible. But no matter what the future brings — we will have to express what we feel: and that is art. Art is future. Let’s make sure we create an environment that cultivates, embraces and empowers the arts. It’s up to us to make sure our children are ready.

Return to Top