This is Melodia Mariposa’s second Annual Holiday Concert.
Holiday Concert
Thursday • December 21
Doors open at 6 PM • Concert starts at 7 PM
Victorian Ballroom
Altadena Town & Country Club
2290 Country Club Dr, Altadena
This festive concert of winter-inspired holiday classics featured Melodia Mariposa’s All-Star Orchestra conducted by Larry Blank and highlighted the amazing vocal talents of Suzanna Guzmán.
This event was generously sponsored by:
PROGRAM
P. I. Tchaikovsky: Trepak, Nutcracker Ballet
A. Vivaldi: Winter, The Four Seasons, 1st mvt.
Roger Wilkie, violin
Bizet: Habanera, opera Carmen
Suzanna Guzmán, mezzo-soprano
L. Anderson: Sleigh Ride
Dr. Kenneth Hill, sleigh bells
Silent Night, orc. Larry Blank
Suzanna Guzmán, mezzo-soprano
S. Prokofiev: Troika, from Lieutenant Kije
W. A. Mozart: Concerto in Bb for bassoon, lst mvt.
Alistair Picken, bassoon
O Holy Night
Suzanna Guzmán, mezzo-soprano
Santa Claus Is Coming To Town,
arr. B. Manson and M. Valerio
Bevan Manson, piano
Michael Valerio, contrabass
E. Morricone: Gabriel’s Oboe, arr. Michael Valerio
Michele Forrest, oboe
J. Strauss: Pizzicato-Polka
The Prayer, arr. David Foster and William Ross
Suzanna Guzmán, mezzo-soprano
Michael Chipman, baritone
I. Berlin: White Christmas, arr. Larry Blank
Sing Along
Featuring Artists:
Conductor Larry Blank,
Three-time Tony Award Nominee
Larry Blank is one of the most prolific and sought after composers, conductors, and orchestrators in the entertainment business today. His work has been presented all over the world, including some of Broadway’s most successful musicals, Carnegie Hall, and top television and film projects.
He was the Music Director/Conductor and/or vocal arranger for many shows on Broadway and in Los Angeles including They’re Playing Our Song, Evita, Sugar Babies, La Cage Aux Folles, Phantom Of The Opera, Onward Victoria, Copperfield, Colette, A Chorus Line, and A Little Night Music. He has been nominated three times for both the Tony Award and the Drama Desk Award for his orchestrations in The Drowsy Chaperone, Irving Berlin’s White Christmas, and with Marc Shaiman for Catch Me If You Can. Larry received a Drama Desk Nomination for orchestrations for A Christmas Story and Honeymoon In Las Vegas.
Soloist Suzanna Guzmán,
Two-time Emmy Award winner, Grammy nominee
Two-time Emmy Award winner, Grammy nominee and named 2023 Hispanic Opera Legend by Los Angeles Opera, Suzanna Guzmán is an international soloist with orchestras and opera houses around the world. She rose to acclaim for her portrayal of Bizet’s Carmen (HGO, Kennedy Center, Opera de Nice: (“Fire-breathing, singing actress”..TIME ) and is dedicated to new opera works: notably the Duchess of Alba in Menotti’s GOYA, Paula in Catan’s FLORENCIA, Lucha in Yuval Sharon’s, HOPSCOTCH, Sheila in Eric Whitacre’s Gift of the Magi, The Banker in Nyman’s FACING GOYA, Luz in Benavides’ CARAVANA. A lifetime gem was as Marcellina in Ragnar Kjartansson’s epic12 hour performance of BLISS (3 minutes from Marriage of Figaro repeated in a loop for TWELVE hours straight) for the 2020 Fluxus Festival with LA Phil at Redcat. Also belting out Abuela Claudia in the 2022 production of In The Heights with The Rubicon. A national finalist in the Metropolitan Opera Competition, Guzmán is also a celebrated radio and PBS TV host, an arts education activist, garnering Mentor of the Year Award with Hispanic Scholarship Foundation and a Lifetime Achievement Award with the Nederlander Association for service to the arts and community. A member of the Los Angeles Music Center Education Division, she has performed her one-woman show, Don’t Be Afraid; It’s Just Opera! across the United States for over 500,000 inner-city students. More info? Visit www.suzannaguzman.com
Soloist Roger Wilkie
A native of Los Angeles, violinist Roger Wilkie began his violin studies at age 13. Eight years later, he joined the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra as one of its youngest members, eventually being appointed principal second violin. In 1990, Roger was appointed concertmaster of the Long Beach Symphony Orchestra, a position he holds to this day. He is also currently concertmaster of the Los Angeles Master Chorale Orchestra. A frequent soloist with the Long Beach Symphony, he has been featured in performances of the majority of the standard violin concerto repertoire.
Roger is a much sought after soloist and chamber musician. He was a founding member of the Angeles String Quartet, performing and touring from 1988-1993. He was solo violinist with the Santa Barbara based Camerata Pacifica, on whose series he played hundreds of concerts as recitalist and chamber musician. Roger has recorded and toured extensively as a member of the critically acclaimed Pacific Trio, including a performance at the Silver Lire International Festival of Chamber
Music in St. Petersburg, Russia. He has participated in the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, La Jolla Summerfest, and the Mainly Mozart Festival. He is a frequent performer with the Music Guild of Los Angeles, the South Bay Chamber Music Society, and many others. In January 2023, Roger was invited by L. A. Opera Music Director James Conlon to serve as guest associate concertmaster with the Baltimore Symphony for performances
of the Verdi Requiem.
In great demand as a concertmaster for the Hollywood studio orchestras, Roger has served in that capacity for many of Hollywood’s leading composers. Since 2005, he has had the honor of serving as concertmaster for the motion picture scores of legendary composer John Williams, including the last three episodes of the Star Wars franchise, The Fabelmans, and the soon to be released Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny.
Oboist Michele Forrest
Michele is thrilled to be playing a gorgeous music by Ennlo Morrlcone with her wonderfuI colleagues.
She is ordinarily found working around town in orchestras such as the Los Angeles Master Chorale Orchestra, Santa Barbara Symphony, New West Symphony, LA Opera Orchestra, and the Los Angeles Philharmonic. Recently, she has had the pleasure of playing shows at the Pantages such as Wicked, Les Misérables, and Miss Saigon.
Michele grew up in a small town in upstate New York, the great granddaughter of a bootlegger named Emma. She got a thrill from watching Ken Burns documentary special about prohibition and always feels as if she must have lived another life in New York City in the very early part of the twentieth century riding trolley cars and chasing ice trucks.
Her Covid project was learning about native plants and their often crucial role in protecting endangered insects such as our thousands of species of native bees. As a bonus this year, she has a swallowtail chrysalis in her yard waiting to become a butterfly.
Now she rescues all kinds of little critters mostly mixed breed mutts by fostering them until they can find forever homes. She lives in Altadena with her pup Mallie and her kitties Bobo and Smudge.
Soloist Alistair Picken
Rising star, Alistair Picken will join us again this year to play the first movement of the Mozart concerto for Bassoon. He received his High School diploma in June 2023 from the Pacific Academy in Irvine and a diploma from the Colburn Academy in June 2023.
Michael Chipman
Mr. Chipman’s performance interests range from art song to Baroque music, to musical theatre to contemporary opera. He recently sang Schubert’s masterpiece, Winterreise with pianist Kimi Kawashima on the NOVA Chamber Music Series, recorded the role of Roderick Usher in Gordon Getty’s new opera Usher House with the San Francisco Opera Orchestra and sang the baritone solo in Brahms’s Ein Deutsches Requiem with Utah Chamber Artists. In November 2005, he made his Carnegie Hall debut singing the baritone solo in Haydn’s Mass in Time of War with the New England Symphonic Ensemble.
Mr. Chipman has performed twice as a soloist at Carnegie Hall, and he has sung with Hawaii Opera Theatre, Cincinnati Opera, Lyric Opera Cleveland, Utah Opera, Lyric Opera of New York, Oberlin Opera Theater, Utah Festival Opera, and the Brevard Music Festival Opera. He has performed as a soloist with the Utah Symphony, Vancouver Symphony, Honolulu Symphony, National Chamber Orchestra, Oberlin Musical Union, and on seven international television and radio broadcasts with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. He was a regional finalist in the 2001 Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions and made his New York operatic debut in 2002–2003 performing the roles of Melchior in Amahl and the Night Visitors and Papageno in Die Zauberflöte with Lyric Opera of New York.
Bevan Manson, piano
Bevan Manson is a musical jack-of-all trades as a classical composer, arranger, and jazz pianist.
He has received composing commissions from Sierra Chamber Music, the Channel Islands Chamber Orchestra, the Pacific Philharmonic Foundation, the San Francisco Symphony, clarinetist Gary Gray, and L.A. Chamber Orchestra violist Victoria Miskolczy, among others.
His ‘California Concertino’ was premiered by Katherine Fink of the Brooklyn Philharmonic with Paul Dunkel conducting, and also performed by L.A. Chamber Orchestra flutist David Shostac with the Brentwood-Westwood Symphony. It has been recorded on Albany Records with soloist Sara Andon.
He has performed with George Garzone, Cecil McBee, Gunther Schuller, Bob Sheppard, Ron Jones L.A. Big Band, Ira Sullivan, and Jimmy Guiffre, among others, as a jazz pianist, with recordings on Iris Records and Meistero Music.
Bevan has written and conducted string charts for saxophonist Gary Smulyan at New York’s Blue Note jazz club, and wrote string arrangements for Manhattan Transfer singer Cheryl Bentyne’s new Sondheim album, of which JazzTimes Magazine commented that “ a kaleidoscopic, edge-of-sanity Comedy Tonight that, courtesy of arranger Bevan Manson, blends Baroque courtliness with Big Top buffoonery.”
“Manson’s composing is brilliant, inventive, witty but never self-consciously clever.”
-RafaelMusicNotes. com (Cincinnati)
