Lovers of love songs should have plenty to love next weekend. There will be two concerts in celebration of Valentine's Day, each presented by a different organization.
On Saturday, the Winston-Salem Symphony's Plugged-In Pops
series will continue with "Isn't It Romantic: Love Songs of Broadway" at Reynolds Auditorium. Jenn Raithel Newman and Joe Cassidy will sing love songs and love duets from such musicals as West Side Story, My Fair Lady, Oklahoma!, Cats and Phantom of the Opera. Robert Moody, the symphony's music director, will conduct.
And next Sunday, Piedmont Opera will present "An Afternoon of Love Songs and Arias" in Brendle Recital Hall at Wake Forest University. The singers in "Love Songs and Arias" will be sopranos Jodi Burns and Elizabeth Pacheco Rose, baritone Kyle Guglielmo and tenor James Allbritten, who is also Piedmont Opera's artistic director.
The concert, accompanied on piano, will devote its first half to such operatic selections as The Cherry Duet from Mascagni's L'amico Fritz and "Bei Maennern, welche Liebe fueh-len" from Mozart's The Magic Flute.
"Love Songs" can be seen as a replacement for Amahl and the Night Visitors, a mid-season Christmas show that was losing money. Frank Dickerson, Piedmont Opera's executive director, said that "Love Songs" is designed to "keep our name out there" between fall and spring productions in the Stevens Center and "provide the community some additional vocal entertainment" in the process.
Whether "Love Songs" continues beyond next weekend, of course, depends on audience support and the donations that go along with it. Allbritten said he's hoping to start small and eventually enlarge the show to include a chorus and an orchestra.
"I am a servant to my community," Allbritten said. "I can only plan as far as this community will support the plan. I'm hoping the community will be interested and will find it something worth doing."
As for the symphony's "Isn't It Romantic" program, Moody called it "a great show."
"It is selling well, and I hope it keeps doing so," he said. "It's the winner of date-night opportunities."
Moody plugged several assets, from the solo vocalists to the orchestra, which will also be beefed up a bit by members of the Greensboro Symphony Orchestra to accommodate what he described as "some pieces with a little bigger orchestration in the winds, brass and percussion."
As for the solo vocalists, Newman, a soprano, last sang with the symphony in 2007. She has appeared with orchestras all over the country. She excels in a wide range of repertoire, from oratorio to Broadway standards.
Cassidy, a tenor, will be making his Winston-Salem Symphony debut. He, too, has performed with numerous orchestras, and his stage credits include roles in such shows as Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, 1776, Les Miserables, Show Boat, A Christmas Carol and Listen to My Heart.
"Joe's really a pretty big Broadway name," Moody said. "He's a tremendous singer; we're lucky to get him."
kkeuffel@wsjournal.com.
727-7337
The Winston-Salem Symphony will present "Isn't It Romantic?" at 7:30 p.m. Saturday in Reynolds Auditorium. Tickets are $15-$55, with student-rush tickets $5 at the door. See www.wssymphony.org or call 464-0145. Piedmont Opera will present "An Afternoon of Love Songs and Arias" at 3 p.m. next Sunday in Brendle Recital Hall at Wake Forest University. Tickets are $35 or $25; see www.piedmontopera.org or call 725-7101, ext. 1.
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