Behind the Curtain - Fall 2011

Vo l u m e I I I • F a l l 2 0 1 1

Curtain S A N F R A NCI S C O O PERA

B E H I N D

T H E

A P U B L I C AT I O N E X C L U S I V E LY F O R SAN FRANCISCO OPERA CONTRIBUTORS

“On behalf of the entire Company, I want to express my enormous gratitude to Maria and Jan. Their generosity is driven by their love of opera and their enthusiasm for continuing this Company’s great legacy in the Italian repertoire at a world-class level.” – David Gockley

Letter from David Gockley on page two

Photo by Drew Altizer

In Support of Italian Repertory The Legacy Continues

After the show, Maria waited by the stage door, in the wind and rain, hoping to meet Scotto. “The doorman took pity on me and Nicola Luisotti, Jan Shrem, Maria Manetti Farrow and David Gockley. brought me to her dressing room. I held her hands and spoke to her in Italian—she didn’t Chairs of the Amici di Nicola of Camerata, Jan speak English then. I told her how much I enjoyed Shrem and Maria Manetti Farrow establish Great the performance and started crying, and she started Interpreters of Italian Opera Fund. crying with me! From that time, I became very good his September, Jan Shrem and Maria friends with her.” Manetti Farrow made a $3 million gift to Maria had the privilege of being involved in the San Francisco Opera and assumed the volearly discussions surrounding Nicola Luisotti’s apunteer leadership role of Chairs of the Amici di pointment as Music Director. “I am very pleased to Nicola of Camerata. Their generous contribution observe how he has taken Italian opera to new also establishes the Great Interpreters of Italian heights at the War Memorial Opera House,” she says. Opera Fund, an effort to bring today’s She smiles, “The first time I saw most compelling artists in Italian Luisotti conduct, I went backstage “We want to repertoire—singers, designers, and and it was love at first sight. Nicola directors—to San Francisco Opera. is from the same part of Italy as I am, motivate other “Every time that I help in fundraisViareggio, near Florence. There are ing, I only do, after first I do!” promany jokes and sayings that are very supporters.” claims Maria in her captivating Italian typical of the area, and he and I—we — Maria Manetti Farrow accent. The couple would like others were laughing like crazy!” to consider their gift an invitation. “We Jan Shrem was introduced to opera want to motivate other people to support great in 1948 at the University of Utah, where his houseinterpreters of German, Russian, English, and mates played opera continuously. “The music has alFrench opera. There must be this type of donor in ways enthralled me,” he says. During his first career the Bay Area!” in publishing and his second career as vintner-owner During her childhood in Florence, Maria fell of Clos Pegase winery, Jan founded and built multiple in love with opera at age 13 at a production of art galleries and a performance venue. La Bohème with Renata Tebaldi. She moved to the “Being that opera is an obsession for me, and ItalUnited States in 1973 and inaugurated her relaian opera is the primary part of it, it is a pleasure to tionship with the San Francisco Opera that same share my enthusiasm with Maria’s overwhelming enyear at Madama Butterfly, featuring Renata Scotto. thusiasm. That’s what brought us together. The artists “She was superb! She was so light—like a butterdo so much for us, it is important for us to do somefly. The singing was divine!” thing for them.”

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