San Diego Spotlight : ‘Carmen,’ ‘Phantom’ Stars Join AIDS Benefit Concert

Music aficionados will get their money’s worth at Monday’s “Together Again for the First Time” concert at Civic Theatre. Among the headliners for the locally produced AIDS benefit are soprano Adria Firestone and baritone Davis Gaines.

Firestone, the sexy lead in San Diego Opera’s sold-out production of Bizet’s “Carmen,” will sing the famous first-act Seguidilla, and Gaines, who has just celebrated his first full year singing the lead in the Los Angeles production of Lloyd Webber’s unstoppable “Phantom of the Opera,” will sing “The Music of the Night.”

In contrast to the scarcity of tickets for the Los Angeles “Phantom,” and San Diego Opera’s “Carmen”--at this point the sole option is standing room Sunday and Wednesday--seats for Monday’s benefit concert are plentiful. Tickets range from $15 to $50, and all proceeds are earmarked for local AIDS assistance and AIDS prevention organizations.

Some of the other musical offerings will include the San Diego Men’s Chorus led by Assistant Director Chris Allen. The 75-voice chorus will sing three uplifting popular arrangements: “Take the A Train,” “Chattanooga Choo-Choo,” and “Never-Never Land” from the musical “Peter Pan.” The UC San Diego Gospel Choir, directed by Ken Anderson, will offer its customary inspirational gospel numbers, and the Latin American vocal ensemble “Las Voces,” under the baton of Xiomara DiMaio, will sing a trio of South American songs: “Viniendo de Chilecito” by Carlos Guastavino, “Endecha” by Antonio Liuro and the Venezuelan folk song “El Periquito.”

Pianist Cecil Lytle, a pair of dance ensembles and the quartet of crooners from “Forever Plaid” will round out the program.

Just a week before the San Diego Men’s Chorus was scheduled to sing at Monday’s Civic Theatre AIDS benefit, Artistic Director Gary Holt announced he was leaving his post. The ensemble, which was formed in 1985, is the city’s only gay male choral ensemble. Holt, who joined the chorus as a singer in 1986, has served as its artistic director for the past five years.

In Thursday’s press release, Holt cited personal reasons for leaving. (He is an attorney who has recently returned to private practice after a stint as the La Jolla Playhouse’s business manager.) In the same release, Men’s Chorus President Joe Zilvinskis praised Holt’s accomplishments as the group’s artistic director. But, despite the cordial wording of the release, some chorus members maintained that Holt left because the Men’s Chorus board of directors was unwilling to renew his contract, which expired April 30.

Assistant conductor-accompanist Chris Allen will lead the chorus until a search committee finds a new artistic director.

Kakhidze returns. Jansoug Kakhidze, San Diego’s favorite guest conductor after Robert Shaw, returns to the San Diego Symphony podium Thursday and Friday to lead the local orchestra in Dvorak’s Sixth Symphony and Bruch’s Scottish Fantasy with violinist Yuzuko Horigome.

The august Georgian will also conduct Rodion Shchedrin’s “Ozorniye Chastushki” (Naughty Limericks), a short concerto for orchestra composed in 1963.

Shchedrin is one of the leading Russian composers of the post-Shostakovich generation, and Kakhidze has always been a keen advocate of new music. Between his appearance here last month conducting the Moscow Philharmonic and his upcoming San Diego engagement, Kakhidze returned to his native Tbilisi to conduct the premiere of Giya Kancheli’s Viola Concerto with Yuri Bashmet as soloist.

“The new work by my good friend Kancheli is an engaging showpiece, a concerto called ‘Music for Viola and Symphony Orchestra.’ I will of course do other concerts to show my people that I am there,” Kakhidze said in an April phone interview. Although the peripatetic conductor is in great demand outside of Georgia as chief conductor of Georgia’s State Symphonic Orchestra and the Paliashvili Opera, his fellow countrymen become restless when he spends too much time away from home.

Unlike many successful musicians from the former Soviet Union, Kakhidze has never considered leaving his native country to settle in the West.

“Of course, if I were offered, say, the post of music director of the New York Philharmonic, I would consider relocating there. But still I would think of Georgia to be my home.”

Grace notes. The Mainly Mozart Festival will sponsor a four-hour marathon Friday at 7 p.m. on KFSD-FM (94.1) hosted by sportscaster Phil Stone and festival Music Director David Atherton. . . . San Diego Opera Associate Conductor Karen Keltner will conduct the 20th anniversary Zachary (vocal) Auditions at Pasadena’s Ambassador Auditorium at 2 p.m. Sunday. . . . San Diego favorite son Gustavo Romero returns to the San Diego Chamber Orchestra to play concertos by J. S. Bach and Joaquin Turina at 8 p.m. Monday in La Jolla’s Sherwood Auditorium. . . . Balboa Park’s House of Scotland Pipe Band and Dancers will sponsor an accredited piping competition at the Celtic Festival held 9 a.m. to 10 p.m. today in Balboa Park.

CRITIC’S CHOICE

RENAISSANCE MUSIC CONCERT

Paul Esswood, one of the world’s leading countertenors, will give a recital of Renaissance lute songs by John Dowland and Thomas Morley on Sunday at 4 p.m. in the La Jolla Athenaeum. The British singer has made more than 100 recordings, including the operas of Monteverdi directed by Nikolas Harnoncourt and Teldec’s series of the complete cantatas of J. S. Bach. Esswood will be accompanied by Jurgen Hubscher, noted Swiss lutanist. The duo’s La Jolla performance will be their only West Coast appearance this season.