Written by Mary Dan Eades on March 28, 2018
Two for One
Montecito Journal/Montecito Miscellany, Richard Mineards
March 2018
Santa Barbara Choral Society has plenty to sing about as the tony troupe celebrates its 70th anniversary and the 25th anniversary of its director JoAnne Wasserman.
To mark the double-header, long-time supporters Gary and Kate Rees hosted a sunset soirée for premier Canto donors at their charming mountainside home before next month’s anniversary concert at the First Presbyterian Church with tickets selling for, appropriately enough, $70 in the VIP section and $25 for open seats.
To celebrate its septuagenarian status, JoAnne plans to invite all choral society alumni to join the chorus in concert to sing one selection from the last of composer Ralph Vaughan Williams’s Five Mystical Songs. The program will also include Haydn’s Missa in Angustiis – “Mass for Troubled Times”, better known as the “Lord Nelson Mass” – especially poignant in light of the recent catastrophes we have suffered.
(from left) Santa Barbara Choral Society Board Secretary Claudia Scott with Marilyn Gilbert, Diane Dodds Reichert, Masterworks Concert sponsor; honoree, JoAnne Wasserman, Conductor and Artistic Director; Brooks and Kate Firestone, SBCS Board President, Karen Williams; KarenBrill, SBCS Director EricaDiBartolomeo, DonJeske, SBCS Past President Debra Stewart, hostess Kate Rees, SBCS Board VP, Mary Dan Eades, Michael Eades, Bob Lally, and Mikki Caparrelli Lally (photo by Priscilla)
In the garden and Santa Barbara wind are Linda Shobe, Jeanne Warlick, Debra Stewart, SBCS Board Directors, Jeffery Warlick and Deb Rosique, Jody Dolan Holehouse, Ross Williams, honoree JoAnne Wasserman and her husband, Gary. (photo by Priscilla)
Chef Phillipe Sautot with hosts Kate and Gary Rees and honoree SBCS artistic director and conductor JoAnne Wasserman (photo by Priscilla)
Among those turning out for the boffo bash were Barbara Burger and Paul Munch, Brooks and Kate Firestone, Steve and Debra Stewart, Dick and Marilyn Mazess, Ross and Karen Williams, Marilyn Gilbert, Bob and Mikki Lally, Michael and Mary Dan Eades, Robert and Joan Renehan, Erica DiBartolomeo, and Gary Wasserman.
American baritone, Ralph Cato has travelled the world extensively, telling stories in song with his warm, clarion baritone voice.
Tenor, Benjamin Brecher has performed over fifty operatic roles with many of the world’s most prestigious opera companies, specializing in the high lying lyric tenor repertoire. He has performed 16 roles with New York City Opera alone. Career highlights include performances with Opera Orchestra of New York, L’Opera de Nice, Rossini Opera Festival in Pesaro, L’Opera de Montreal, Santa Fe Opera, Opera Theatre of St. Louis, among many others. His orchestral solo repertoire includes Mozart, Handel, Orff, Bach, Haydn, as well as many performances of Britten. In 2000 he began performing the great Irish Tenor songs in a concert produced for him entitled A Celtic Celebration, Twenty years later, the show has become a North American hit with performances with 45 Symphonies in North America. Ben continues his discography having added his twelfth recording in 2016 Forgotten Liszt, with pianist Robert Koenig, and will record a new release in 2022 entitled “Three Centuries of Thomas Moore” including the music of Britten, Berlioz, and Sarah Gibson on MSR Classics. He is a Professor of Voice at University of California Santa Barbara, where he has served as the Head of Voice.
Tracy Van Fleet is pleased to return to the Santa Barbara Choral Society. As a soloist, she has performed with the Los Angeles Master Chorale, Lüneburg Symphony in Germany, Orquesta Filarmónica de Boca del Río in Mexico, Pasadena Symphony, Naples Philharmonic, Los Angeles Bach Festival, San Diego Chamber Orchestra, Colorado Philharmonic, USC Symphony and Chorus, and others. She has had many appearances with the Los Angeles Opera, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Pacific Symphony, Hollywood Bowl Orchestra, Opera Pacific, San Diego Opera and Opera Colorado.
Born and raised in Southern California, April Amante is a versatile soprano with expertise and facility in repertoire spanning from early music to contemporary musical theater.