There are a lot of great shows, concerts and exhibits to catch in the Bay Area this weekend and beyond from Oakland Interfaith Gospel Choir’s beloved holiday concert to a new take on “The Jungle Book.”
Here’s a partial roundup.
You’ve gotta have ‘Faith
Among the Bay Area’s many holiday traditions, the Oakland Interfaith Gospel Choir’s annual concert at the Paramount Theatre in Oakland is one of the most cherished. There’s something about the world-renowned choir led by Terrance Kelly performing in the classic Art Deco concert hall that just seems like a special way to usher in the holiday season.
The event returns for its 38th installment on Saturday after a three-year hiatus due to COVID-related scheduling difficulties. Titled “Living in Harmony,” the concert will be hosted by ABC7 News Bay Area anchor Kumasi Aaron and features guest artists Jackie Tolbert and Rev. Reginal Finley, both renowned singers and evangelists. Also on hand will be ASL performance duo Half-N-Half, featuring Sherry Hicks and Michael Velez, who have elevated sign language interpretations to a fine art.
Founded in 1986 as an outgrowth of gospel music workshop led by Kelly, the Oakland Interfaith Gospel Choir has as its stated goals the performance and preservation of Black gospel and spiritual music and promotion of peace and unity among all peoples. An acclaimed 2018 documentary about the group, “One Voice: The Story of the Oakland Interfaith Gospel Choir,” premiered at the Mill Valley Film Festival.
Details: 7 p.m. Saturday; Paramount Theatre, Oakland; $15-$80, with limited number of VIP tickets at $100; www.paramountoakland.org
— Randy McMullen, Staff
Focus on a photography icon
“Everything I see is a potential subject,” German photographer Wolfgang Tillmans said as he recently led visitors through an exhibit of his works –spanning more than three decades — at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. The show’s wall text lauds his “irrepressible curiosity” and “deep care for his subjects.”
In what’s described as the most comprehensive exhibit ever mounted of the influential photographer’s works, “Wolfgang Tillmans: To look without fear” features images ranging from snapshot-style portraits of friends to a view of the planet Venus traversing the sun. There are postcards of Caravaggio’s paintings propped on a windowsill — and a weed rising gracefully between London cobblestones. Tillmans sees what others might ignore: a nondescript stretch of San Francisco’s California Street or the after-broadcast static on a TV screen in a Russian hotel.
It’s an exhibit filled with compassion. The painter Jochen Klein and a deer seem to be conversing on Fire Island in one breathtaking image. Tillmans’ most famous photo, from 2002, shows two men kissing passionately, their faces nearly merging, at a London dance club. It’s been used to counteract hate crimes over the years. Tillmans said it still has impact, “in 2023 when basic LGBT rights are questioned.”
Details: Through March 3;SFMOMA; hours are 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Friday through Tuesday; 1-8 p.m. Thursday; $23-$30, free 18 and younger; sfmoma.org.
— Robert Taylor, Correspondent
Meet the artists, and their art
The Bay Area has such a staggeringly rich community of artists in all manner of mediums – painting, sculpture, video, collages, mixed-media, found-art assemblage, and on and on – and such a wealth of museums, galleries and other display sites (restaurants, bars, beauty salons, public buildings and more are among the places that display local artists’ works) that it can a little overwhelming getting a handle on what’s out there. Sometimes, it’s easier to go where the artists are.
That’s the idea behind such events as the annual East Bay Open Studios, which returns this weekend. For nearly 50 years, the twice-annual event organized by Oakland Art Murmur has brought art appreciators in touch with artists in Alameda and Contra Costa counties with a design-your-own-tour format. The format is easy, go to the EBOS website, eastbayopenstudios.com, and check out the directory of 179 participating artists and their studios. The site also has a rundown of several events and receptions involving artists and organizers.
Details: 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Dec. 2-3; eastbayopenstudios.com
— Bay City News Service
Symphony San Jose salutes America
It’s not every classical music concert that a featured composer and primary guest soloist are one in the same person. And it’s not every classical music concert that the instrument in the spotlight is the mandolin.
But both those things will be in effect this weekend when Symphony San Jose, led by conductor Christopher Rountree, presents a program titled “American Portraits,” featuring five works devoted to the beauty and diversity that is our country. The program is topped by composer Jeff Midkiff’s “Mandolin Concerto (From the Blue Ridge),” featuring Midkiff himself on mandolin. Midkiff composed the work, inspired by the beauty of the Blue Ridge Mountains, in 2011 and it has since been performed by more than a dozen orchestras.
Also on the program is Charles Ives’ “Variations on “America”; William Grant Still’s “Darker America”; Caroline Shaw’s “Valencia”; and Aaron Copland’s famed “Rodeo,” a work he nearly abandoned for fears that would become known as the “cowboy composer.”
Los Angele-based conductor Rountree is likely best known as the founder of the Wild Up chamber group, which has won acclaim for its adventurous sound blending new music, classical repertoire, performance art and pop.
Details: 7:30 p.m. Saturday, 2:30 p.m. Sunday; California Theatre, San Jose; $55-$115; www.symphonysanjose.org.
— Randy McMullen, Staff
More classical gems in the offing
Celebrate at SF Symphony: The orchestra is offering a mix of classic scores, movies with live accompaniment, special guests and more. In all, the December calendar boasts four weeks of highlights, ranging from traditional works such as Handel’s “Messiah” and “Peter and the Wolf,” to a “Cirque Nutcracker,” “A Merry-Achi Christmas,” “The Colors of Christmas,” and “Charlie Brown — Live.”
Details: Nov. 30-Dec. 23, Davies Symphony Hall, San Francisco; $25-$200; www.sfsymphony.org.
“Sustenance”: Now in its 44th season, Kitka — the acclaimed all-women chorus, specializing in music of Eastern Europe and Eurasia — returns with its annual “Wintersongs” event, this year with stops in Davis, Belvedere, Santa Cruz, Menlo Park, San Francisco and three concerts in Oakland, including a special Community Sing on Dec. 9.
Details: Dec. 2-17, $25-$50; kitka.org.
SFO’s Intimate concerts: Even as the San Francisco Opera has Donizetti’s delectable “Elixir of Love” running through Dec. 9 as the final opera of its fall mainstage season, the company is presenting two concerts. First is a showcase for this year’s Adler Fellows, conducted by Ramón Tebar; then, a concert featuring the San Francisco Opera Chorus led by its director, John Keene.
Details: Adlers, 7:30 Dec. 2 at Herbst Theatre, San Francisco; $34-$69; Chorus concert, 7:30 Dec. 8 at Taube Atrium Theater, San Francisco; $42; sfopera.com.
“Holiday Roulette”: Music at Kohl Mansion is celebrating with a concert featuring two mezzo-sopranos — Nikola Printz, who just finished singing the role of Rosina in “The Barber of Seville” at Opera San Jose, and Gabrielle Beteag, in her second year as a San Francisco Opera Adler fellow. Call it “a mezzo mashup.” Accompanied by pianist Ronny Michael Greenberg, the program includes seasonal works, opera excerpts, and Broadway hits.
Details: 7 p.m. Dec. 3; Kohl Mansion, Burlingame; $55-$75, 18 and under free; musicatkohl.org.
— Georgia Rowe, Correspondent
Rudyard Kipling vs. Global Warming
Given that he wrote “The Jungle Book” nearly 130 years ago, one can forgive Rudyard Kipling for not anticipating the ravages of climate change in his series of stories about a boy being raised by wolves in an Indian jungle (heck, some people still aren’t recognizing climate change). But a new adaptation of the classic stories making the rounds brings to bear 21st-century climate patterns and the drastic impact they are having on our world. “Jungle Book Reimagined,” a touring show stopping at Stanford University Saturday and Sunday, posits the stories’ protagonist Mowgli as a climate-change orphan and refugee, whose family has been lost to a natural disaster and who finds himself in the ruins of a battered city, where he befriends a group of resourceful animals who have weathered the catastrophe.
The work was designed by Akram Khan, a London-based, Kathak dance-trained choreographer and storyteller. Blending a variety of dance genres, theater and high-tech videos and imagery, Khan and his dance/theater company serve up a contemporary retelling of the “Jungle Book” story.
Details: Presented by Stanford Live; 7:30 p.m. Dec. 2-3; Memorial Auditorium, Stanford University; $15-$95; live.stanford.edu.
— Bay City News Service
