Bring your lusty voice to Big Sing Berkeley
With the summer seasons of San Francisco’s Merola Opera Program and the South Bay’s own Music@Menlo up and running, there’s a wealth of opera and chamber music to choose from this week. First, though, if you’d like to do a little singing of your own, check out the Los Angeles Master Chorale’s Big Sing this weekend at Zellerbach Hall in Berkeley. The SoCal ensemble is looking for a few good voices for an event set to be livestreamed around the world.
If you’ve been attending concerts for any length of time, you’ve probably experienced this: Just as the chorus launches into a familiar number, you get a powerful urge to sing along. Now you can. This weekend, thousands of Bay Area singers can hear the Los Angeles Master Chorale — and many of them will sing with the 100-voice ensemble, too.
Saturday in Los Angeles, the Master Chorale’s concert will feature audience members singing along on selected works. Bay Area singers can join at Zellerbach Hall on the UC Berkeley campus, which will show the concert on a big screen. Zellerbach is one of five halls in the state that will host live audiences, and the event will be livestreamed on its website to listeners around the world. More than 1,000 Bay Area singers have registered to participate, but spaces are still available in Zellerbach’s 1,978-seat auditorium.
Billed as one of the largest free group singing events in the state’s history, Big Sing California will be conducted in Los Angeles by Master Chorale artistic director Grant Gershon, composer Eric Whitacre, and guest conductors Moira Smiley and Rollo Dilworth. Elena Sharkova, artistic director of the Bay Area’s Cantabile Youth Singers, will serve as the local hub leader and conductor in Zellerbach Hall.
The Master Chorale is estimating that 10,000 singers will participate statewide. The largest community project ever produced by the ensemble,
Big Sing California is sponsored by a $450,000 grant from the James Irvine Foundation.
The program includes popular songs such as “Hey Jude” as well as choral works by Whitacre and Morten Lauridsen. Bay Area singers can rehearse at 7 tonight at First United Methodist Church in Palo Alto; registration is required. Music scores, tutorial videos and more information are available on the Big Sing California website.
DETAILS >> 2 p.m. Saturday; Zellerbach Hall, UC Berkeley; free, registration required at LAMasterChorale.org.
MOZART AT MEROLA >> The Merola Opera Program’s 2018 summer festival got off to a great start earlier this month with the annual Schwabacher Summer Concert. In scenes from Barber’s “Vanessa,” Puccini’s “Il Tabarro,” Bizet’s “The Pearl Fishers” and Mozart’s “Don Giovanni” — all stylishly staged by director Aria Umezawa — the singers of this year’s program demonstrated why they really are the opera stars of tomorrow.
Merola continues its 61st season this weekend with Mozart’s “Il Re Pastore” (The Shepherd King). This beguiling 1775 score,
composed when Mozart was just 19, isn’t often performed and usually comes as a surprise to opera lovers who have only seen Mozart’s greatest hits. Written for a visit to Salzburg by Archduke Maximilian, it’s a “serenata” — a work that is part opera, part oratorio.
The plot centers on the shepherd Aminta, who loves the nymph Elisa; Agenore, a nobleman, loves Tamiri, daughter of the tyrant Strato. Mistaken identities, missed opportunities and anguished declarations drive the plot until Agenore reveals Aminta’s true identity (surprise — he’s not really a shepherd), and the opera resolves in a happy ending. Along the way, the big numbers include Aminta’s “L’amero, saro costante” (I shall love her and be faithful) and Agenore’s lament, “Sol puo dir come si trova” (The only one who can say).
Look for the Merola artists to give “Il Re Pastore” a dynamic production. Directed by Tara Faircloth and conducted by early music specialist Stephen Stubbs, the cast features tenors Zhengyi Bai and Charles Sy, sopranos Cheyanne Coss and Patricia Westley and mezzo-soprano Simone McIntosh.
DETAILS >> 7:30 tonight and 2 p.m. Saturday, San Francisco Conservatory of Music; $55-$80; 415-8643330; merola.org.
CALIDORE QUARTET AT MENLO >> One of the highlights on this week’s Music@Menlo schedule is the appearance by the Calidore String Quartet. Featured artists at this year’s chamber music festival and institute, they’ll perform a Carte Blanche concert tonight, give a master class Friday, and join a roster of artists on mainstage concert programs 5 (“Berlin”) on July 2829, and 6 (“Budapest”) on July 31.
Proteges of the Emerson String Quartet, the Calidores are recent recipients of an Avery Fisher Career Grant; at Menlo, audiences can hear them in a range of works, from Mozart, Beethoven and Haydn to 20th-century Hungarian works. For a complete festival schedule, running through Aug. 4, go to www.musicatmenlo.org.