By Elizabeth Cloutman
Metropolitan Opera star Frederica von Stade is the featured performer in “Seasons of Song,” a benefit concert for Waldorf School of the Peninsula. The concert is scheduled for 8 p.m., Oct. 26, in the Spangenberg Theatre, Gunn High School, Palo Alto. A catered reception is slated to follow at 9:30 p.m.
Five other Bay Area artists will join von Stade in performing selections from opera, Broadway and jazz, as well as contemporary favorites. Jake Heggie, pianist and composer of the opera “Dead Man Walking,” baritone Curt Branom, lyric-soprano Kristin Clayton, mezzo-soprano Catherine Cook and von Stade’s daughter, Jenifer Elkus, are appearing pro bono for the benefit.
“This concert is unusual in two important ways,” said Mary Roscoe, Waldorf School administrator. “First, it’s rare to have artists of this caliber performing in such a small, intimate venue. And second, the audience will have a chance to join in the performance. The whole experience is a wonderful gift to the community. It’s especially meaningful to us at the Waldorf School because of the importance of the arts in Waldorf education.”
Waldorf School of the Peninsula is a private school for grades K-8. Located on Mora Drive in Los Altos, it currently has 244 students.
Waldorf education is based on the methods of Rudolph Steiner, an Austrian scientist and philosopher. Steiner believed children learn best through their imagination and by using all their senses. He established the first Waldorf School in 1919 in Stuttgart, Germany, as a school for children of Waldorf-Astoria cigarette factory workers. Movement, drama, music, poetry, discussion, drawing and painting and hands-on demonstration are integral to the academic curriculum. Students create their own books, filled with records of field trips and experiments, impressions of teachers’ regular oral presentations and, in more advanced classes, syntheses of what students read in primary sources.
A Waldorf School student has the same core teacher for the duration of his or her education. Instructors in special subjects, such as foreign languages, music, handwork such as knitting, crocheting and construction, nature study and physical education complement the core teachers’ lessons. The curriculum is based on the developmental stages of childhood.
Tickets for ‘Seasons of Song’are $100 for preferred seating and the reception with the artists immediately following the performance. Tickets for the performance only are $50 for adults, $25 for students, grades 3-college. (Students must present an ID at the door.) For tickets, call 948-8624 or (800) 362-2643.
Gunn High School is located at 780 Arastradero Road, Palo Alto.
