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Opera Guild of San Antonio

History of the Guild

 

 

History & Projects of the Opera Guild

The Opera Guild of San Antonio was founded in 1974 as a non-profit educational and charitable association under the auspices of the Women’s Committee of the San Antonio Symphony, now known as the Symphony League. Ginger Karren was the founder of the Guild and Margaret King Stanley the President of the Symphony Women’s Committee. Together they established an organization to support the Symphony’s annual opera season. The Guild’s original name was the Opera Guild of the Symphony Society. The work of the Guild included student performances, opera previews, an opera talent search and an "Opera in the Schools" project. Fund raising was one of the Guild’s major efforts.

After the Symphony announced that it would no longer produce opera, the Guild changed its name to Opera Guild of San Antonio and began to focus on opera projects in the local community. Fundraisers helped the Guild support a multitude of opera-related activities.

The acquisition and sale of the Anne Walker house created an endowment for the Guild that allowed the organization to increase its support of opera-related community activities and to establish an endowed scholarship in opera at the Department of Music, UTSA.

Today the Guild’s over 400 volunteers continue to raise and distribute funds in support of opera, develop education materials and liaison with the UTSA teaching staff in a growing Opera in the Schools program, give lectures on opera to adult community centers, bring nationally recognized lecturers on opera to San Antonio, and offer video courses on opera appreciation and history to adult groups. In addition the Guild supports the regional Metropolitan Opera Auditions, and makes donations to the Southwest area opera production companies in support of their work.

Since 2002 the Guild’s Opera in the Schools program has reached thousands of San Antonio students each year with specially produced opera performances. The operas are performed at local venues, small operas are brought out to school auditoriums or cafetoriums, and students are brought to dress rehearsals of locally professionally produced operas. Performances are free of charge to the students, many of whom have never had an opera experience before in their lives. This highly successful program recently received national recognition from Opera Volunteers International. While it reached less than 1000 students in its first year, today we reach over 16,000 students per year and we continue to grow. Operas which have been performed in the schools include: Hansel and Gretel, Little Red Riding Hood, La Serva Padrona and Brundibar. Operas which have been performed at local venues for the students include: The Mikado, The Marriage of Figaro, HMS Pinafore, the world premier of Gods of Mischief, South Pacific, Die Fledermaus, The Old Maid and the Thief, and The Medium. The Guild was particularly proud to commission, fund, and support with volunteers the world premiere of Seymour Barab’s Gods of Mischief, and to introduce local school children into the chorus for Hans Krasa’s Brundibar performances in the schools. Several of the Brundibar performances in 2006 were attended by Ela Stein Weissberger, who played the Cat in the original production in the prison camp in WWII where it was performed. Ela gave talks on the historical circumstances of the opera.  In 2008, we were asked to bring our touring company of Hansel and Gretel to Austin by the Austin Lyric Opera Guild.  This performance in May of 2008 was a great success.   This season the program will tour The Pied Piper of Hamelin by Seymour Barab to elementary schools with our students participating in roles as rats and chorus members.  We will provide our middle and high school students with a dress rehearsal opportunity at the San Antonio Opera’s production of The Mikado.  The UTSA Lyric Theatre will perform Cosi fan Tutti at the Buena Vista Theatre for middle and high school students

The Guild’s Opera in the Schools program is not just a provider of entertainment but also a provider of arts education. The Guild designs, commissions, purchases, and produces opera-related educational materials and supplies them to the teaching staff of local schools through our volunteer liaisons, many of whom are former teachers or have otherwise been professionally associated with local school districts. The students are prepared for their opera experience before attending a performance and are always excited and, “into,” the opera by the time they get there. The teachers and students have embraced this program with great enthusiasm which justifies the Opera Guild’s efforts to encourage this form of arts education and development of future audiences for opera in San Antonio.

Schoolchildren enjoy performance of Little Red Riding Hood at UTSA
School children enjoy a UTSA Lyric Theatre performance of Little Red Riding Hood, supported by the Opera Guild Education Program

Opera Enhancement Evenings featuring prominent opera-related speakers are one of the Guild’s adult education efforts. Previous speakers have included: Santa Fe Opera General Director Richard Gaddes, Ft. Worth Opera General Director Emeritus William Walker, Kansas City Lyric Opera Conductor Laureate Russell Patterson, Washington Opera's Martin Feinstein, Austin Lyric Opera's Richard Buckley, Metropolitan Opera Soprano (ret.) Gilda Cruz-Romo, composer of the operas Gods of Mischief and Little Red Riding Hood Seymour Barab, and the Armstrong Community Music School’s Director Margaret Perry. In addition to the speakers, these evenings regularly include arias from famous operas sung by regional talent.  This year the Guild looks forward to a performance by Annamaria Delperdang a mezzo soprano from UTSA’s Lyric Theatre.

The Guild’s Opera Study Course continues to provide a video series on opera history and appreciation for groups of adults interested in learning more about opera.  In 2008-2009, the Guild will study the Opera of Mozart  on 12 Monday afternoons in the fall and winter.  This program has gained such popularity that it is RESERVATIONS ONLY.  With the acquisition of special audiovisual equipment, the Guild sponsors special Matinees at the Opera in which videos of entire operas are projected on large screen format.  Last year we also added showings at the Village of Incarnate Word in their Christus Heritage Hall.   The Guild also provides a bus trip to the Austin Lyric Opera for our members.  This continues to be a very successful part of our adult education.   We continue to reach out into the community through adult education centers and provide speakers and opera.

The Guild has a long history of outstanding social events and fundraisers. The Guild’s premier event in recent years has been the opera themed Fashion Show and Luncheon at the San Antonio Country Club which is attended by hundreds of members and their friends and brings in thousands of dollars to support the Guild’s educational programs.  Other fundraisers, wine tastings, holiday and membership parties are also a part of the annual social events.

The Opera Guild of San Antonio in existence now for more than three decades has had a significant impact on the opera scene in San Antonio.  Opera Guild members are justifiably proud of the history and social relevance of this organization.

 

 

Web Site of Composer Seymour Barab

 

 

page updated September 2008