San Francisco Opera (SFO) is an American opera company founded in 1923 by Gaetano Merola (1881–1953) based in San Francisco, California.
Stephen Lawrence Schwartz is an American musical theater lyricist and composer. In a career spanning over five decades, Schwartz has written such hit musicals as Godspell (1971), Pippin (1972), and Wicked (2003). He has contributed lyrics to a number of successful films, including Pocahontas (1995), The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996), The Prince of Egypt, and Enchanted (2007). Schwartz has won the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Lyrics, three Grammy Awards, three Academy Awards, and has been nominated for six Tony Awards. He received the 2015 Isabelle Stevenson Award, a special Tony Award, for his commitment to serving artists and fostering new talent.
Opera San José is a flagship arts organization of Silicon Valley. Maintaining a resident company of artists, Opera San José presents four mainstage productions annually in San Jose's beautifully restored, magnificent California Theatre. It also regularly broadcasts fully produced productions from its state-of-the-art Heiman Digital Media Studio. Now in its 38th season, Opera San José specializes in role debuts, serving as an artistic incubator for established and emerging artists and administrators, producing world-class operatic performances for diverse audiences throughout the Bay Area and around the globe.
The culture of San Francisco is major and diverse in terms of arts, music, cuisine, festivals, museums, and architecture but also is influenced heavily by Mexican culture due to its large Hispanic population, and its history as part of Spanish America and Mexico. San Francisco's diversity of cultures along with its eccentricities are so great that they have greatly influenced the country and the world at large over the years. In 2012, Bloomberg Businessweek voted San Francisco as America's Best City.
The Los Angeles Opera is an American opera company in Los Angeles, California. It is the fourth-largest opera company in the United States. The company's home base is the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, part of the Los Angeles Music Center.
The American Conservatory Theater (A.C.T.) is a major nonprofit theater company in San Francisco, California, United States, that offers the public both classical and contemporary theater productions. It also has an attached acting school.
San Francisco Ballet is a ballet company, founded in 1933 as the San Francisco Opera Ballet under the leadership of ballet master Adolph Bolm. The company is currently based in the War Memorial Opera House, San Francisco, under the direction of Helgi Tomasson. San Francisco Ballet was the first professional ballet company in the United States. It is among the world's leading dance companies, presenting more than 100 performances annually, with a repertoire that spans both classical and contemporary ballet. Along with American Ballet Theatre and the New York City Ballet, San Francisco Ballet has been described as part of the "triumvirate of great classical companies defining the American style on the world stage today".
The Washington National Opera (WNO) is an American opera company in Washington, D.C. Formerly the Opera Society of Washington and the Washington Opera, the company received Congressional designation as the National Opera Company in 2000. Performances are now given in the Opera House of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.
Donato Cabrera is an American conductor with an active international career. He is the Music Director of the California Symphony and the Las Vegas Philharmonic, and was the Resident Conductor of the San Francisco Symphony and Wattis Foundation Music Director of the San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra from 2009-2016.
Wiener Kammeroper is an opera theater and opera company in Vienna, Austria. Founded in 1948 by the conductor Hans Gabor, it was originally named "Vienna Opera Studio." In 1953 the company was renamed the Wiener Kammeroper. It is located at 24 Fleischmarkt Street in the center of the city.
Lamplighters Music Theatre is a semi-professional musical theatre company based in San Francisco, California. Founded in 1952 by Orva Hoskinson and Ann Pool MacNab, the Lamplighters specialize in light opera, particularly the works of Gilbert and Sullivan, as well as such works as The Merry Widow, Die Fledermaus, Of Thee I Sing, My Fair Lady, Candide, and A Little Night Music.
Grant Gershon is an American conductor and pianist. He is Artistic Director of the Los Angeles Master Chorale, Resident Conductor of the Los Angeles Opera, member of the Board of Councillors for the USC Thornton School of Music and a member of the Chorus America Board of Directors.
The Magnificat Baroque Ensemble, or Magnificat, is an early music ensemble of voices and instruments specializing in the Baroque music of the 17th century under the artistic direction of Baroque cellist Warren Stewart. Stewart founded the ensemble in San Francisco in 1989 with Baroque harpsichordist Susan Harvey. Harvey resigned in 2000, and the group has remained under the sole musical direction of Stewart since then. The group derives its name from the first word of the Latin translation of the Canticle of Mary in the Gospel of Luke, Magnificat anima mea, "My soul magnifies the Lord", which is sung during the Roman Catholic evening prayer or vespers service.
Goat Hall Productions is an opera company based in San Francisco, California, United States. Presenting programs under the names San Francisco Cabaret Opera, Fresh Voices Festival of New Works, and The Kurt Weill Project -- it was co-founded in 1997 by Harriet March Page and Dave Hurlbert, and is dedicated to the performance of opera and song, with a special interest in contemporary music, presenting works by Henry Purcell, John Pepusch, W.A. Mozart, Franz Schubert, Robert Schumann, Johann Strauss II, Gustav Mahler, Ralph Vaughan Williams, Igor Stravinsky, Francis Poulenc, Kurt Weill, Gian Carlo Menotti, Benjamin Britten, Leonard Bernstein, Stephen Sondheim, and living composers—particularly those of the San Francisco Bay Area.
The Pasadena Symphony and POPS is an American orchestra based in Pasadena, California. In 2010 it took up residence at the Ambassador Auditorium, where its Classics Series runs from October through April. Since 2012 it performs a summer series at the Los Angeles County Arboretum and Botanic Garden from June through September.
Donald Pippin was an American pianist, and founder of Pocket Opera.
The Cinnabar Theater, located in Petaluma, California, is a professional non-profit theater producing opera and musical theatre, drama and a chamber music series in a 120-seat venue, under the auspices of the Cinnabar Arts Corporation. The venue is also home to the Young Repertory Theater, the longest running and largest youth performing arts program in Sonoma County. The company's Music Director is Mary Chun.
Cal Performances is the performing arts presenting, commissioning and producing organization based at the University of California, Berkeley in Berkeley, California.
The African-American Shakespeare Company (AASC) is a 501(c)3 nonprofit professional regional theatre company in San Francisco, California. Since its founding in 1994 Sherri Young has been its Executive Director and in 2009 L. Peter Callender joined as its Artistic Director.
