Celebrating our 22nd Anniversary!
Transforming Opera and the Community Background:
HISTORY: In 1996, with little more than a vision, a handful of passionate and dedicated professional Bay Area opera singers and directors founded Golden Gate Opera (GGO) as a not-for-profit opera company led by Roberta Wain-Becker, resident of Mill Valley, CA. They wanted to put Marin County on the “opera map” at the same high level as Opera America, the national organization that is dedicated to supporting the creation, presentation and enjoyment of opera in America. But they also wanted to transform lives by making opera accessible to all—expanding and enriching the lives and imaginations of everyone in the community with the beauty and majesty of full-scale operatic performances and opera performed in unusual places.
Golden Gate Opera started out small, performing in the 300-seat California Palace of the Legion of Honor’s Florence Gould Theatre in San Francisco from 1997-2004 and in local schools. In 1998 GGO won a Marin Arts Council grant of $5,000 to bring an opera assembly to 5 elementary schools in Marin County. Then, in 2005, GGO launched the first resident opera production Marin County had seen in 20 years—debuting in the 2,000-seat Marin Veterans’ Memorial Auditorium—with a full orchestra in the pit. The curtain went up, and the audience gasped in amazement.
Since that time, Golden Gate Opera has thrilled audiences in Marin County with its theater performances in MVMA and Marin Center’s Showcase Theatre of Madama Butterfly, Carmen, Gianni Schicchi, Suor Angelica, Cavalleria Rusticana, I Pagliacci, Hansel & Gretel, The Medium, The Telephone, Der Apotheker, Die Walküre, Il Trovatore, “Opera’s Greatest Hits” Gala, Opera Café at The Belrose Theatre and more.
MISSION: Our mission is creating and performing work that transforms lives and enriches the community with professional, cutting-edge performances that fully engage and inspire people of all ages and all cultural and economic backgrounds. These operas should tell important stories through music and performance that convey empowering messages to adults and children alike, should be performed in places where the audience already is, and should make opera an exciting new experience.
EDUCATION: We bring opera to seniors in their communities, especially where they could not experience this art form unless we bring it to them. Some retirement communities in Marin that have benefited over the years are: Villa Marin, Aldersly Retirement Community, Alma Via, Drake Terrace and Nazareth House (San Rafael), The Tamalpais (Greenbrae), The Redwoods (Mill Valley).
Golden Gate Opera is dedicated to sharing the joys of opera with children in Marin County schools, reaching over 100,000 children over the years with its unique OPERA-tunities Programs. Each school program comes with a Teacher’s Guide containing suggested learning activities in core subjects and in the arts. Every opera has its “cause.” Hansel and Gretel’s message is that two children can make a difference. Schools have sent us hundreds of letters from students thanking Golden Gate Opera and noticing how our program affected their lives. We also have brought educational opera events to schools in other parts of the Bay Area, as requested.
Towards that end, GGO has in recent years concentrated on helping the community through Opera for Civic Engagement, staging contemporary operas that speak to difficult social issues. Bullying Education: We developed Gian Carlo Menotti’s bullying prevention one-act opera for young people called: The Boy Who Grew Too Fast. We created the Teachers Guide, adapted Menotti’s 1982 libretto - now accessible for children in today’s world and created a version that is a Bullying Education program for schools. Racial Equality education: A new Civil War opera, EMANCIPATION: Lincoln and the African American Connection about President Lincoln and three African American Friends who influenced him, is for 5 singers and Gospel Choir. A vehicle for troubled teens: BOUNCE! The Basketball Opera planned for late 2019, provides a healthy alternative activity to ending up in jail, broadening teens cultural awareness.
GGO’s performances combine art forms – vocal and instrumental music, drama, visual arts, and dance – to tell powerful stories and convey empowering messages to adults and children. We provide fully staged and semi-staged productions in the theatre, intimate aria parties in private homes, as well as in unusual locations such as schools and senior communities. We have performed in Dominican University and College of Marin in San Rafael for Osher Life Long Institute seniors; and San Anselmo Public Library. For Marin’s local Community Access TV Station, Channel 26 we created a TV show called Opera in Your Own Backyard for people of Marin County, to reach audiences and share our own volunteers, board members, performers and staff. CMCM has broadcast our productions to 99,000 Marin County citizens.
Among schools in Marin County that have benefitted over the years are: Marin City’s Bayside Martin Luther King Jr. Academy (k-8); Davidson Middle School (6-9), San Pedro Elementary, Bahia Vista Elementary and Laurel Dell Elementary (San Rafael); Pleasant Valley Elementary, Lu Sutton Elementary, Olive Elementary, Hamilton Elementary, Novato High School and San Marin High School (Novato); Park Elementary, Edna McGuire Elementary, Tamalpais Valley Elementary, Mill Valley Middle School and New Horizons Elementary (Mill Valley): Sunny Hills Services (in San Anselmo); Star Academy (Corte Madera).
Our focus is uplifting children and teachers in underfunded underserved schools in Marin County and giving the gift of culture to low-income groups like Big Brothers and Big Sisters, Marin Foster Family Association. GGO’s 2018 -19 plans fulfill this goal. They include:
1) Help stop bullying in schools with Menotti’s one act opera for young people, “The Boy Who Grew Too Fast.” (Oct 2018 and Feb 2019). 2) Youth education about racial equality and the US Civil War with “Emancipation: Lincoln’s African American Connections.” (a new work with professional singers as President Lincoln, Mary Todd Lincoln, Elizabeth Keckley, Frederick Douglass and Aunt Mary Dines, plus Gospel Choir (March/April2019); 3) Help teens stay out of jail with “BOUNCE: The Basketball Opera” (2019 - 2020)
Contact us about volunteering, or about being a sponsor. Share the behind the scenes magic! Call 415-370-1722 or email [email protected] Thank you!!!
