Fall Concert 2024: Antonín Dvořák: The Sacred and Secular
Join us for an evening of expressive, poetic compositions by Antonin Dvořák! Director Paul Flight will introduce you to three blissful Moravian melodies, and Dvorak’s renowned Stabat Mater.
Sunday, November 10th - 4 - 6 pm • First Congregational Church of Berkeley - 2345 Channing Way, Berkeley, CA 94704
Tickets: $25 – $20 – $10 • Available at the door or online at: EVENTBRITE
Meet Our Soloists!
Jennifer Paulino, soprano
Soprano Jennifer Paulino’s voice has been praised as “graceful yet powerful” and “sensitive and clear” by San Francisco Classical Voice. Her singing career has taken her to Australia, Europe, and across the U.S, singing recitals, oratorios, and chamber music. Jennifer appears regularly with local period ensembles, singing a wide range of early music from viol consort songs to Bach cantatas. More frequently, she is performing the major oratorio works of Bach, Handel, Mozart, Haydn, Mendelssohn, Vaughn Williams, and Poulenc, both regionally and nationally. Jennifer is also passionate about collaborating with living composers, and has premiered works by Stacy Garrop, Lansing McLoskey, Shawn Kirchner, and Preben Antonsen, among others.
When she’s not performing classical music, she’s singing and songwriting with her husband’s band Noam Dagger, and taking care of her young son.
Celeste Winant, alto
Celeste Winant performs regularly as an ensemble member with American Bach Soloists (Director: Jeffrey Thomas), Bach Collegium San Diego (Director: Ruben Valenzuela), Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra & Chorale (since 2010; Directors: Nicholas McGegan/Richard Egarr), Vajra Voices (since 2010), and Volti (since 2007). Her voice has been described by San Francisco Classical Voice as “attractive”; “a true, rich alto.” Recent solo highlights include touring with San Francisco Lyric Opera's critically acclaimed production of David Lang's Pulitzer Prize-winning the Little Match Girl Passion in Odense, Denmark, and serving as a member of the vocal octet for Luciano Berio’s rarely-performed Sinfonia with the UC Davis Symphony Orchestra. Other ensembles with whom she has recently appeared as oratorio soloist include the Grace Cathedral Choir of Men & Boys, the Stanford University Singers, the UC Berkeley Chamber Chorus, and the UC Davis Choral Ensembles. She also was a Church musician at St. Ignatius Catholic Church of San Francisco (March 2010-December 2012). She currently lives in Berkeley, California.
Chad Somers, tenor
SF Chronicle recognizes tenor Chad Somers as among the “who’s who of Bay Area operatic luminaries”, known for his “supremely confident and clarion tenor” (SF Classical Voice). Most recently, he created the roles of Boy in Bulrusher (Stookey/Davis, West Edge Opera) and Sherlock Holmes in Sherlock Holmes and the Case of the Fallen Giant (Meier, Opera Modesto). In the concert hall, Chad has appeared as the tenor soloists in Finzi’s Intimations of Immortality (Stockton Chorale and Orchestra), Britten’s Saint Nicolas in (MBU, St. Louis), Mendelssohn’s Symphony No. 2 Lobgesang (Sacramento Chorale Society and Orchestra), Puccini’s Messa di Gloria (Symphony San Jose), and premiered Laitman’s orchestrated song cycle Becoming a Redwood (Sonoma County Philharmonic.
Chad is a winner of the Philadelphia Classical Singer Competition, and previously an Artist in Residence at Opera Saratoga. He received a Doctor of Musical Arts from the Eastman School of Music.
@chadsingsthings
Robert Stafford, bass
Bass-baritone Robert Stafford completed an Associate Artist-in-Residency at Opera San Jose in 1995, where he performed leading roles for two years (the San Jose Mercury News described a performance sung “with a supremely seductive swagger and flourish”). Stafford has sung with many of the country’s leading period-instrument orchestras. The LA Times called his singing of Bach’s solo cantata Ich habe genug with the American Bach Soloists “communicative and glowing,” and lauded his “uncommonly suave” Polyphemus in Handel’s Acis and Galatea with Musica Angelica at the Getty Center.
