PC Music Dept. announces fall concert dates
The Porterville College Music Department has announced several dates for its 2019 fall concert series.
Benjamin Makino will be featured on piano in concert at 7:30 p.m. October 16 at the PC Choir Room, CA-2.
The PC Choir’s fall concert will be held at 6 p.m. November 22 at the PC Theater, CA-4. The PC Band concert will be held at 7 p.m. December 3 at the PC Theater.
The PC Student Piano Recital will be held at 7 p.m. December 4 at the PC Choir Room.
Finally from 5 to 7 p.m. December 12 the PC Choir will be caroling at Staffords Chocolates on Main Street.
Following the success of the first 30 Days of Opera festival, Makino was named Music Director of Opera Memphis, a position he held for four seasons. During his tenure the company rose to national and international prominence.
Beyond working with Memphis’ largest performing arts organizations, Makino was also deeply involved with the Memphis Slim Collaboratory, a membership-based community recording studio in the historic Soulsville Neighborhood, home of Stax Records and the Stax Music Academy. With Leni Stoeva of Community Lift, he managed a collaboration between Opera Memphis and the Slim House on a grant project that allowed the Memphis Slim House to expand its footprint, building a community stage on which Opera Memphis was one of the first arts partners to perform.
During his tenure Makino also became a regular collaborator with the Memphis Symphony Orchestra, leading numerous concerts. From 2014-2017 he appeared with Ballet Memphis, conducting its annual production of The Nutcracker. In 2015 he conducted the Memphis Symphony at the Levitt Shell in Memphis Renaissance, a program produced by the New Ballet Ensemble and School. Three Dream Portraits asked him to join the company in 2016 for its annual Nutremix and returned in 2017.
Makino programmed and conducted Young Person’s Concerts with the Memphis Symphony . He also led the Memphis Youth Symphony Orchestra in a side-by-side performance with the Memphis Symphony Orchestra in celebration of the Youth Symphony’s 50th anniversary season.
Prior to joining Opera Memphis he was the Assistant Conductor and Chorus Master at Long Beach Opera.
Makino served as the Music Director of the New Opera Workshop at the Writing the Rockies Conference in Gunnison, Colo. from 2016-18. This unique program complemented the Creative Writing graduate program in Poetry with an Emphasis on Versecraft at Western Colorado State University. The workshop produced performances of new operas sand provided the opportunity for composers and librettists to learn about the collaborative process from creation through production.
An active pianist, he has performed with members of the Memphis Symphony Orchestra under the auspices of the Memphis Chamber Music Society, collaborated in recitals for Opera Memphis and Rhodes College, and worked as a staff pianist at the Viola Workout in Crested Butte, Colo..
Makino holds a bachelor’s, summa cum laude, from Chapman University, where he was the recipient of a Presidential Scholarship and a master’s from UCLA. Following his university studies, he was a scholarship student in the orchestral conducting program at the Accademia Musicale Chigiana, and a recipient of a scholarship from the Italian Cultural Institute in Washington, D.C. for language studies in Naples.
He was hand selected by Plácido Domingo to participate in the Domingocafritz Young Artist Program at the Washington National Opera and was the only U.S. citizen selected to participate in the 50th Besançon International Competition for Young Conductors. In 2014 he was identified by Opera America as a future leader in the field of Opera in the United States. In 2015, in recognition of his contributions to the City of Memphis, he was named one of the Memphis Business Bureau’s 40 Under 40.
He currently lives in Porterville, with his wife, jazz musician Sarah Rector, who heads the music program at Porterville College.