Everything about San Francisco Opera totally explained
San Francisco Opera (SFO) is the second largest
opera company in
North America. It was founded in 1923 by
Gaetano Merola (1881-1953). The Opening Night Gala of the San Francisco Opera is widely considered to be one of the most memorable events of the year for opera patrons.
Founder/General Director Gaetano Merola (1923-1953)
While the first performance of the San Francisco Opera was
La bohème, with
Queena Mario and
Giovanni Martinelli, on
September 26,
1923, in the city's
Civic Auditorium and conducted by Merola, his involvement in opera in the San Francisco Bay Area had been ongoing since his first visit in 1906.
Merola launched the company in 1922, convinced that the city could support a full-time opera organization and not depend upon visiting companies, which had been coming to the City since Gold Rush days. In fact, Merola’s initial visits to the city were as conductor of some of these troupes, the first in 1909 with the
International Opera Company of Montreal. Continued visits for the next decade convinced him that a San Francisco company was viable, and in 1921 he returned to live in the city under the patronage of Mrs. Oliver Stine.
By the fall of 1921, he was planning his first season which was presented at
Stanford University's football stadium on 3 June 1922 with a star-studded group of singers such as
Giovanni Martinelli in
Pagliacci, followed by
Carmen and
Faust. While it was a popular and critical success, the five-day season wasn't a financial one. It was clear to Merola that a more solid financial base was needed, and so he set about fund raising for a season of opera to be presented at the Civic Auditorium in the fall of 1923. Appealing to more than the city’s elite, Merola raised 2441 contributions of $50 each from many “founding members”.
After the opening of
La boheme, the first 1923/24 season included productions of
Andrea Chenier (with
Benjamino Gigli),
Mefistofele (again with Gigli),
Tosca (with
Giuseppe de Luca and Martinelli, and
Verdi's
Rigoletto (with Queena Mario, de Luca and Gigli). An international opera season had been launched, and the ones which followed it covered a broad range of mostly Italian operas, many being presented only once or twice in seasons lasting no more than two months, sometimes only the month of September.
During the nine years following the opening season, the
War Memorial Opera House was conceived. The building was designed by Arthur Brown, Jr., the architect who also created San Francisco's
Coit Tower and City Hall.
The company inaugurated the new opera house with a performance of
Tosca on October 15, 1932 with
Claudia Muzio in the title role. Characteristic of the following thirty of Merola’s years as General Director was the fact (as noted by Chatfield-Taylor) that “the great singers of the world came regularly to San Francisco, often performing several roles in deference to the short season and long travel time across the country.”
Other characteristics of his tenure were the opportunities given to young American singers in spite of the absence of a formal training program at that time, and also regular tours by the SFO to Los Angeles between 1937 and 1965, which expanded the season into November. However, until well after Merola’s death, the main San Francisco season rarely extended beyond late October. He died while conducting an open-air concert at
Stern Grove on August 30, 1953.
Edwin MacArthur led the San Francisco Opera Orchestra in several 78-rpm recordings for
RCA Victor in the late 1930s, including performances by soprano
Kirsten Flagstad. Some of these were later reissued by RCA on LP and CD.
General Director Kurt Herbert Adler (1953-1981)
Kurt Herbert Adler (1905-1988) came to the United States in 1938 after early experience and training in many aspects of music and theatre in Austria, Germany, and Italy. For five years, he worked to build the chorus of the Chicago Opera Company. Merola heard of him and, over the telephone, invited him to San Francisco opera in 1943 as chorus director.
He took on more and more administrative details as Merola’s health and energy diminished, but Adler wasn't the Board’s natural choice to replace Merola at the time of his death in 1953. After three months of acting as Artistic Director, and with the assistance of its president, Robert Watt Miller, Adler was confirmed as General Director.
Adler’s aims in taking over the company were several. One was to expand the season, which even by the early 1960s was as limited as it was in Merola’s time, running from Labor Day to the opening of the
Metropolitan Opera in order to capitalize on the availability of singers by presenting up to fourteen operas with two or three performances each. Eventually, as seen in the 1969 SFO season, eleven operas were given five or six performances each on average while the season ran to late November.
Another aim was to present new talent and, for this, he was tireless in seeking out up-and-coming new singers, whether American or European, by attending performances in both major and minor opera houses. He heard
Leontyne Price on the radio, and offered her a role in
Dialogues of the Carmelites in 1957, thus providing her with her the first performance on a major operatic stage. A short time later in the same season, she was to step into the role of Aida at short notice to replace
Antonietta Stella, a role which gave her long-lived international acclaim.
Thirdly, a characteristic of the Adler years was his interest in developing stronger connections to opera stage directors in an attempt to strengthen the dramatic and theatrical elements of the works. In this, he was greatly supported by his long relationship with
Jean-Pierre Ponnelle, the often-controversial stage director who began his association with SFO in 1957.
Several innovations undertaken by Adler included the
Merola Opera Program (named after the first general director). It began during the 1954/55 Season and was given its current name in 1957. The program annually offers approximately 23 gifted singers, four apprentice coaches, and one apprentice stage director the rare opportunity of studying, coaching, and participating in master classes with established professionals for eleven weeks during the summer. Many went on to international careers, among them
Carol Vaness and
Thomas Hampson.
Another innovation was “Opera in the Park” which, since 1972, has been an annual free concert in Golden Gate Park on the Sunday following opening night of the Fall Season. It traditionally features artists from the opening weekend in full concert with the San Francisco Opera Orchestra. The event is open to the public and draws some 30,000 listeners. The concert is presented in conjunction with the non-profit San Francisco Parks Trust and the San Francisco Chronicle Charities.
Kurt Herbert Adler was often regarded as a difficult, sometimes tyrannical person to work for. However, as Chatfield-Taylor notes, “singers, conductors, directors, and designers came back season after season…. They came back because Adler made the SFO an internationally respected company that ran at a high level of professionalism and offered them interesting things to do in a warm and supportive atmosphere.”
One of Mansouri’s triumphs was the overseeing of the reconstruction and renovation of the opera house following the October 1989 earthquake. After closing at the end of the 1995 Fall season for "a 21-month, US$88.5 million renovation, San Francisco's
War Memorial Opera House reopened on Sept. 5 1997 with a gala concert celebrating this occasion, as well the 75th anniversary of the San Francisco Opera. Fittingly, the concert featured operatic greats of the past, present and future. The project included repairs of damage caused by the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, improvements for the audience and performers, seismic strengthening and a general cleanup that left the 65-year-old Opera House gleaming.”
Donald Runnicles was named Music Director and Principal Conductor of SFO in 1990, and assumed the posts in 1992.
In November 1992, Mansouri introduced “Pacific Visions”, an ambitious program designed to maintain the vitality of the opera repertoire through new commissions and the presentation of unusual repertoire. It was launched with the commissioning of the following operas:
Harvey Milk, composer Stewart Wallace to a libretto by Michael Korie. It was performed in 1996 as a joint commission and co-production of the SFO, Houston Grand Opera, and New York City Opera. The cast featured Raymond Very as Dan White, Robert Orth as Harvey Milk and Gidon Sachs as Mayor Moscone.
A Streetcar Named Desire, composed by André Previn to a libretto by Philip Littell, after the play by Tennessee Williams. The work had its premiere during the 1998–99 fall season. The cast ncluded Renée Fleming as Blanche DuBois and Elizabeth Futral as Stella, baritone Rod Gilfry as Stanley Kowalski and tenor Anthony Dean Griffey as Mitch.
Dead Man Walking, composed by Jake Heggie from a libretto by Terrence McNally after the book by Sister Helen Prejean, received its premiere in October 2000. The cast included Susan Graham as Sister Helen Prejean, John Packard as Joe; and Frederica von Stade as Mrs. Patrick de Rocher.
Other premieres at the SFO included:
The Death of Klinghoffer, composed by John Adams in 1992. The cast included Janice Felty in 3 roles, James Maddalena as The Captain, and Thomas Hammons as the First Officer.
Summing up his years at the SFO, the San Francisco Chronicle noted: "He's never been interested in the succès d'estime, the daring intellectual or theatrical coup that dazzles culture mavens but leaves the general public alienated or bewildered. For Mansouri, a success that doesn't put fannies in the seats is no success at all."
Towards the end of the 2001 season, Mansouri announced his retirement after fourteen seasons with SFO and 50 years in the world of opera.
General Director Pamela Rosenberg (2001-2005)
Pamela Rosenberg came from a background of operatic productions in Germany and, specifically, from the Stuttgart Opera.
In January of 2001, Pamela Rosenberg announced her first artistic initiative for San Francisco Opera, “Animating Opera”, a multi-year plan of interwoven themes and series. These included “Seminal Works of Modern Times”, “The Faust Project”, “Composer Portrait: Janacek/Berlioz”, “Women Outside of Society: Laws Unto Themselves”, “Metamorphosis: From Fairy Tales to Nightmares”, and “Outsiders or Pioneers?: The Nature of the Human Condition”.
Incorporated within the production programming of Animating Opera is the America staged premiere of Messiaen’s Saint-François d'Assise, the complete version of Berlioz’s Les Troyens, Virgil Thomson’s The Mother of Us All, as well as a commission for a new work by John Adams and Peter Sellars entitled Doctor Atomic, which premiered on October 1, 2005.
After much controversy surrounding her management of the SFO, which included deficits created after the “dot-com” collapse in 2000 and the effects of September 11 on Arts attendance, she announced in 2004 that she wouldn't renew her contract with the Company when it ended in late 2005.
As noted by Steven Winn in the San Francisco Chronicle in December 2005, "Productions were scuttled or postponed in the face of a US$7.7 million deficit. Ambitious programming initiatives and plans for a second, smaller performance venue went by the wayside. Company-wide cuts pared 14 percent from the company's US$67 million budget in 2003."
He continues: " Embattled by financial woes and trying labor negotiations, Rosenberg was routinely blamed for problems that were largely beyond her control. Her taste for new and unusual operas and a European-honed aesthetic that favored brash and even radical reinterpretations of the classics, the thinking went, drove away audiences and donors and ran up costs in the company's hour of greatest need."
Rosenberg has returned to Germany to work with Sir Simon Rattle and the Berlin Philharmonic as its Intendantin.
General Director David Gockley (2006-present)
After 33 years of directing the Houston Grand Opera, David Gockley became the SFO's General Director on 1 January 2006. As part of an announcement of the 2006/2007 season and the future of the company on 11th January, Gockley noted that "this season we debut a new visual identity and logo in keeping with a new artistic philosophy. I believe that it speaks of glamour, sophistication, tradition and innovation all things that infuse our plans for the future of San Francisco Opera."
Continuing with his future plans, Gockley stated "I want nothing less than to have the greatest stars of the opera world perform here regularly. You can expect in coming seasons to hear Renée Fleming, Anna Netrebko, Thomas Hampson, Dmitri Hvorostovsky, Marcello Giordani, Ramón Vargas, Marcelo Alvarez, Juan Diego Flórez, Ben Heppner, Natalie Dessay, and Angela Gheorghiu –among many others. We will have a world premiere for you in 2007, and the Wagner lovers among you'll be happy to hear that we expect to commence a Ring Cycle in 2008".
In September 2006, it was announced and reported that by mutual agreement with Gockley, Donald Runnicles would conclude his tenure as Music Director in 2009, and wouldn't renew his contract. However, he'll maintain an association with SFO and will conduct the 2010-11 production of Der Ring des Nibelungen (Ring Cycle).
Significant American debuts at the SFO
Since 1923, SFO has presented the American debut of numerous artists, including Vladimir Atlantov, Inge Borkh, Boris Christoff, Marie Collier, Geraint Evans, Mafalda Favero, Tito Gobbi, Sena Jurinac, Mario del Monaco, Birgit Nilsson, Leontyne Price, Margaret Price, Leonie Rysanek, Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, Giulietta Simionato, Ebe Stignani, Renata Tebaldi and Ingvar Wixell; conductors Gerd Albrecht, Valery Gergiev, Georg Solti and Silvio Varviso; and directors Francis Ford Coppola, Harry Kupfer and Jean-Pierre Ponnelle.
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