The Adler Fellows Concert 2024

The annual Adler Fellows concert on Friday featured nine singers in San Francisco Opera's elite apprenticeship program, and some of the voices were so huge in the small Herbst Theater that it became a bit overwhelming. Following are a few of my favorite things from the evening. (All but one of the photos by Kristen Loken.)

First off, the young conductor Benjamin Manis did a wonderful job leading the SF Opera Orchestra in a wide range of music, from Handel to Rachmaninoff, while being very attentive to his young vocalists. Manis is currently leading the orchestra in the current production of Carmen next door at the War Memorial Opera House. Secondly, stage director Omer Ben Seadia kept it simple and clean, without silly props or gimmicks. She concentrated on the singers' acting to convey the meaning of their arias since there were no surtitles, which was sort of refreshing.

Manis's conducting was particularly good in the selections by Mozart. The program started out with a lively performance of The Marriage of Figaro Overture followed by the first scene from the opera with soprano Arianna Rodriguez as Susanna and bass-baritone Jongwon Han as Figaro. They were delightful, vocally and theatrically, and Jongwon Han's rendition of the aria Se vuol volare was expert.

Mezzo-soprano Nikola Printz knows how to command a stage, and they were thrilling in the mad aria Where shall I fly? from Handel's oratorio Hercules. (Photo by Michael Strickland.)

They were also a sympathetic mezzo friend to soprano Caroline Corrales in Sorgi, o padre from Bellini's Bianca e Fernando. Corrales was a knockout earlier this year as Moira, the lesbian rebel in The Handmaid's Tale. Though I thought she was forcing her voice in the challenging Ernani, involami from Verdi's Ernani, a nearby friend who knows much more about voices than me predicted Corrales was going to be a serious star of the future.

Speaking of challenging arias, tenor Thomas Kinch sang Gott, welch Dunkel hier! from Beethoven's Fidelio with a huge voice and remarkably accurate pitch. He later sang Mamma, quel vino e generoso" from Mascagni's Cavalleria Rusticana with soprano Georgiana Adams as Mamma Lucia.

Samuel Kidd has a bright, clear baritone and an innate musicality. When he appeared in a small role this fall as Christian the Sailor in Verdi's Un Ballo in Maschera, I secretly wished he was singing the lead role of Renato instead. On Friday, he sang two obscure French arias, O Nadir, tendre ami de mon jeune age from Bizet's The Pearl Fishers and O vin, dissipe la tristesse from Thomas's Hamlet. Somehow, Kidd made them both interesting.

I also loved baritone Jongwon Han, returning for the little-known aria O tu, Palermo from Verdi's I Vespri Siciliani. He's another person who knows how to marry text and music with intelligence, and his voice is a joy to hear.

Though it was not the final piece of the evening, All along? from Puts's The Hours should have been. The finale to that recently composed opera is a lightweight nod to the female trio in Strauss's Der Rosenkavalier, and Nikola Printz, Arianna Rodriguez and Olivia Smith did a lovely job with it.