Jason Victor Serinus

One of music’s greatest joys is watching young artists develop at home, then soar to success. For those who have nurtured and cheered soprano Elza van den Heever and tenor David Lomelí as they have blossomed in San Francisco, the joy is compounded by the fact that both are launching major international careers.

To celebrate the season, American Bach Soloists has remastered the American Bach Choir’s lovely 2002 Christmas CD, What Sweeter Music. The sweet purity of the female voices, the lovely clarity of the acoustic, and a careful selection whose tunes emphasize celebration over all else are self-recommending.

A rare opportunity approaches to hear the great mezzo-soprano Frederica von Stade endearingly up close.

In an ambitious, godsend of a program from Michael Morgan’s Oakland East Bay Symphony, not even the great Santana and Narada Michael Walden could transcend the acoustics of the historic Paramount Theatre.

A very special recording from Jake Heggie features works that address love and loss with beauty and care, assembling one of the finest collections of American singers ever to grace a contemporary song collection.

With a first-rate cast, world class conductor, and superb period instrument orchestra, the El Cerrito–based company reinvented as Berkeley West Edge Opera has taken another major step forward into the future with Xerxes.

When a veteran soprano, lauded for her lyrico-spinto portrayals, takes over as Puccini’s Madama Butterfly at San Francisco Opera, hopes are high for a late-season triumph.

This disc is a revelation. A revelation as much to initiates who think they know the beautiful, often ethereal choral music of Eric Whitacre, as to the millions who know him only from the YouTube Virtual Choir video of “Lux Aurumque,” and as to those who have yet to make his acquaintance.

Much has been made of soprano Measha Brueggergosman’s endearing idiosyncrasies: performing barefoot, sporting a nose ring, and, if you consider it such, practicing and teaching Bikram Yoga. What’s most important is that she is a major artist, blessed with a gorgeous voice, a fine command of language, and a true commitment to musical expression.

Meeting face-to-face after an intense, six-hour rehearsal at S.F. Opera for her role debut as Emilia Marty in Leoš Janáček’s The Makropulos Case, soprano Karita Mattila no doubt would have preferred to luxuriate in a bubble bath. Nonetheless, the great singer-actress, who recently showed her all onstage in Salome, slowly revealed herself. Speaking in the opera house, the diva shared thoughts on her imminent debut, ill-prepared conductors, and life at 50.