MELODY MOORE ~ O MAGNUM MYSTERIUM

I've just returned from treating myself to a New York steak dinner at The Liberties, an Irish pub a block away on Guerrero and 22nd Street. (That's where my brother Sherry and I had dinner the night after Dennis died.) I did save some steak for my Cavaliers dear Rose and Prince Rupert.

Because the Schola performed only in the second half of the program tonight, I was able to sing the third Christmas concert at Grace this afternoon, after all. Adam Cole, a guest bass in the Schola and regular at Grace, was able to give me a ride to Marin in the heavy rain after the Grace Cathedral concert.

I was in tears for much of tonight. Melody Moore, a vibrant and lusciously warm soprano, a 2007 Adler Fellow and former Merola Opera program participant, sang a solo version of Morten Lauridsen's O Magnum Mysterium. The Schola has sung an SATB version of it several times. I happen to like it; but a few "Scholites" have expressed their reservations, so we probably won't sing it again in the near future. Melody sang it with string accompaniment and it worked beautifully.

After the performance last night, I told Melody that about two years ago I lost my partner of more than twenty years and that her singing the Lauridsen caused me to weep. She looked me in the eyes and said: "Well then, tomorrow I will sing it for you."

Tonight before the second half, she made a point of finding me to ask Dennis' name and said that she would think of him as she sang. My eyes were watery through the entire piece. Later she sang several selections in a commissioned International Holiday Medley by Clarice Assad. I told Melody that I smiled through my tears during her singing "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas."

Melody Moore is a lovely, energetic, delightfully expressive, exceptionally gracious, and very talented soprano. She leaves for London on Boxing Day, December 26th, and will be singing Mimi in La Boheme with the English National Opera in March. She will be splendid!

The whole experience with the NCCO, New Century Chamber Orchestra, was a very positive one. The concerts were fun and very well received. Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg, a New Yorker from the upper West Side, is the the new principal violinist and music director. She wrote in her blog that she's now bi-coastal. Despite having the flu for most of this week, she's a real powerhouse. I particularly enjoyed singing the Buxtehude Das neugeborne Kindelein with the chamber orchestra, and hope we can work with them again sometime.

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Melody Moore, a 2007 Adler Fellow and former Merola Opera Program participant, is one of America’s exciting new talents. She has been engaged by both Los Angeles Opera and San Francisco Opera as the Countess Almaviva in Le Nozze di Figaro. She returned to Los Angeles this season for their productions of Der Zwerg, and Der Zerbrochene Krug and to San Francisco for La Rondine, and debuted with Opera Cleveland as Mimi in La Boheme This season will see her in San Francisco for La Boheme as Mimi, New Orleans Opera as Manon Lescaut, Orlando Opera in the title role in Suor Angelica, the Cincinnati Chamber Orchestra as Donna Anna, and a notable debut in London as Mimi in Jonathan Miller’s new production for the English National Opera.

Elsewhere, Ms. Moore has performed Donna Elvira in Don Giovanni at Lincoln Theatre in Napa Valley, the title role in Suor Angelica for the Opera Theatre and Musical Festival of Lucca, Italy, and the Governess in Britten's The Turn of the Screw in Napa Valley most notably.

A graduate of the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music, she performed for them the role of Candace Whitcomb in Stephen Paulus’s The Village Singer and received the Norman Treigle and Andrew White Awards.

Notable conductors with whom she has worked include Kent Nagano, Donald Runnicles, and Roy Goodman. Stage Directors for productions in which she has participated include Ian Judge, John Copley and Ron Daniels.