Now in its 16th year, the renowned music program has brought a number of distinguished artists of national and international stature to Malibu.
By Michael Aushenker / Special to the Malibu Times
Nationally renowned operatic singer Jessica Rivera will return to her alma mater, Pepperdine University, to deliver this year’s 16th annual SongFest master class and lecture on June 4, from 2 p.m.-4 p.m. The one-day tutelage will be one element of SongFest, a workshop for students of song that will run from June 1 through June 27 at the Malibu campus.
On Friday, when The Malibu Times caught up with Rivera, the soprano was preparing for a night performing Gorecki: Symphony No 3, Op. 36 “Symphony of Sorrowful Songs” at Walt Disney Concert Hall for the Los Angeles Philharmonic, led by conductor Gustavo Dudamel.
Rivera studied at Pepperdine from 1992-96, where she received her bachelor’s in Music.
“As an alumna of both Pepperdine and Songfest, it is important for me to give back to both of these organizations which helped shape me as a artist in my music education,” Rivera told the Times.
SongFest founder and Artistic Executive Rosemary Hyler Ritter, who also crossed paths with Rivera during Ritter’s days teaching at UC Irvine, said of Rivera, “She’s one of the premier opera singers in the world.”
SongFest is a summer festival for singers and collaborative pianists that covers all aspects of the art of song: musical interpretation, literary interpretation, historical perspective and effective public presentation. Master classes are taught to a limited number of selected singers and pianists by distinguished artists of national and international stature.
Among the faculty participating at this year’s SongFest: pianists Graham Johnson, Martin Katz and Roger Vignoles; composers Jake Heggie, Libby Larsen and John Musto; and singers Amy Burton, Lisa Saffer and William Sharp.
The 2011 summer song festival will include a series of six free and public recitals by students, to be performed at Pepperdine’s Raitt Recital Hall. The world premiere of “Three Poems of Pablo Neruda” and “Stone Soup” by Libby Larsen, based on the children’s book by Marcia Brown, are among this year’s highlights.
Brown, 93, who is on the SongFest Board of Directors, is being honored at this year’s SongFest.
Ritter has mounted SongFest every summer since 1996.
“We started it because every program is about opera and we are about art song,” Ritter said. “With a lot of the museum festivals, there’s an age limit. Our festival has no age limit. We have an intern program (16-18), we have a young artist [undergraduate college age 19-24] and a professional program [graduate level and older].”
This year’s SongFest theme is “Breaking the Song Barrier,” and it continues a tradition as one of the premier festival programs of art song in the United States. Ritter said she has worked hard to develop the program into a prestigious annual event. In the last five years, she has put the festivals together from Ohio, where Ritter moved from Southern California.
“SongFest is made up for master classes,” Ritter continued. “We bring in very distinguished faculty. That is one of the big draws. The teacher critiques them in front of an audience.”
More than 100 singers and 20 pianists from throughout North America, Europe and Asia attend each year. Participants pay roughly $3,600 in tuition and room and board (on the Pepperdine University campus) to take part in an intense daily study for four weeks. SongFest, a nonprofit organization, also “gives a great deal of scholarships,” Ritter said.
“We don’t have a lot of donors but we have one donor who lives in Malibu, Marc Stern [the chairman of Los Angeles Opera], and he funds 10 scholarships for the top level. [Technically, the Marc and Eva Stern Fellowship Program],” Ritter explained. “We call those singers the Stern Singers.”
What drew Stern into subsidizing SongFest’s core scholarship program was after John Harbison, “one of the most famous composers alive, gave us a song,” Ritter recalled. “We commissioned him.”
In addition to Rivera, another famous opera singer, Katie Van Kooten, taught SongFest’s master class in 2000. Michael Anthony McGee, a Metropolitan Opera winner, attended in 2009. Pianist Liza Stephnova, winner of the Coleman Chamber Music Competition, is coming back as faculty. McGee and Stephnova were both Stern Fellows.
“Devon Guthrie did the programs six times for six summers and she’s now at Juilliard,” Ritter said. “It’s not only the music, it’s the word.
“The idea of sitting in a class and hearing these people speak [is priceless],” Ritter said. “The faculty is so stimulating and dynamic.”
Rivera, who grew up in the San Fernando Valley, said, “I would often pass by the Pepperdine campus in my youth, usually on a trip to Zuma Beach during summer camp. Pepperdine was a natural choice for my university years and I really miss my time in Malibu.”
Rivera said she looks forward to returning to her college town for SongFest. “I am so honored to be returning to SongFest and Pepperdine,” she said. “I am eager to share what I have learned in my years post college with the students who are interested in pursuing a path similar to the one I have taken.”
At the June 4 master class Rivera will spend an hour listening to some of the SongFest participants perform the repertoire they are currently working on and give them constructive feedback on their performances.
“The rest of the time will be spent talking,” she said, “things I have learned along the way that one might not learn ‘in the classroom.’
“I hope the students will hear something they haven’t heard before as well as confirmation of things they have been working on to perfect in their performances.”
More information and a program schedule can be obtained www.SongFest.us