by Erik Espe
It was about as far from an opera house as you could get. The first performance of what would become West Bay Opera took place in the cozy Palo Alto living room of Henry and Maria Holt.
The year was 1954, and pianist Henry Holt had been serving as a personal coach to voice and piano students. On a lark he decided to bring together his four best vocal students. While he manned the grand piano, the four students--soprano Betsy Van Wagoner, bass Raymond Hammett, tenor Arthur Hopgood and soprano Betty Apperson--performed a few famous opera scenes under an archway of roses hung on the dining room door.
"It was magical," remembers Apperson. Even then, Apperson says she could feel that the moment would shape the history of the Palo Alto music scene. "It inspired all of us. We didn't have anything like opera in Palo Alto at the time."
"It was absolutely beautiful," remembers Maria Holt, who still lives in that same home.
The couple had been in Palo Alto a little over a decade. Before moving to America, Henry Holt played with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra under Arturo Toscanini. The couple emigrated to the United States in 1937. Henry joined the U.S. Army, and joined Maria again in Palo Alto in the mid- 1940s, where she worked with a photographer friend.
There were no coffee shops or restaurants in downtown Palo Alto then. Stanford Shopping Center didn't exist. The city was mostly pastures. There was no opera. The only symphony was a small one conducted by Holt.
It was a different world than the one the Holts had spent most of their lives in. In Vienna, Maria Holt remembers going to the opera on a regular basis with her parents. "We grew up going to the opera," she says. "My parents played opera for us on the piano. There was no television for us."
But Maria Holt says that everyone who heard her husband's students perform in the living room that afternoon knew there was the potential to bring opera to Palo Alto. At the time, Holt had been asked to join the San Francisco Opera. After the living room experiment, he turned that down to bring together Apperson, Wagoner, Hammett, Hopgood and about half a dozen other singers in Palo Alto's first opera group: West Bay Opera.
The company's mission, according to Maria Holt, remains what it was then: "To start the careers of a lot of young artists and singers."
In October of 1955, they performed a selection of opera scenes at the Women's Club. A year later, the group performed operas at the Lucie Stern Theater. The group started with one piano, a few years later expanded to two pianos, and then a full orchestra. In 1985, the opera gained its own building: an office and rehearsal studio on Lambert Avenue.
This fall marks West Bay Opera's 40th anniversary. A champagne reception celebrating that milestone takes place Saturday, Sept. 23, from 5-7 p.m., at the Sabina Marble and granite Showroom, 333 Middlefield Road, Menlo Park. The Peninsula Women's Chorus will perform with soloists Wendy Hillhouse and Iris Fraser at the $40 affair.
Although his image still appears in West Bay Opera literature, Henry Holt won't be at the reception. He died in 1969, and his wife took over as director. Apperson says it was one of the darkest days in the opera's history. "I felt like my father died," she says.
Since then, Maria Holt has hired guest conductors to fill the role her husband held. "I gave up photography," says Holt, sitting beneath a giant photograph of her husband staring confidently from behind his grand piano. After four decades, she still works full-time for the company.
The same photograph of Henry Holt hangs in the West Bay Opera office, a constant reminder of the opera's mission: helping out young artists, and producing top-notch performances on a shoestring budget. Although the singers and staff that create the annual selection of four operas to Palo Alto audiences are almost all volunteer, the shows are remarkably professional and often sell out.
"They don't put up with anything amateurish," says Hillhouse, who performed with West Bay Opera from 1977-1980. "They hire professional directors and professional conductors, and they expect singers to be professional."
West Bay Opera helped launch Hillhouse's professional career as an opera singer. When she started with the Palo Alto company, she was a geologist debating whether or not to continue pursuing her "serious" profession, or to go to the Conservatory in San Francisco.
Her successful performances at West Bay Opera helped make up her mind: she chose music.
"I went to New York and got an agent," she says. Now she travels the world performing opera. She just returned from a performance of "The Ring" in Seattle, and is heading to New Orleans later this month to perform in another opera.
But first, Hillhouse is going to play one more time for West Bay Opera. The champagne reception concert this weekend marks the first time she has sung for the company in over a decade. "I started out with West Bay Opera," she says. "That is really their function. It's important to support that." This year's season of West Bay Opera opens on Oct. 13 with a double bill of "Suor Angelica" and "Gianni Schicchi." The Peninsula Women's Chorus portrays the sisters of a convent in "Suor Angelica," which will be sung in Italian with English supertitles. "Gianni Schicchi," a comedy of love triumphant over greed, is in English. The double feature will play Oct. 13-15 and Oct. 20-22 at the Lucie Stern Theatre, 1305 Middlefield Road, Palo Alto.
Verdi's "Rigoletti" will be presented Feb. 16-18 and 23-25, and Leonard Bernstein's "Candide" will be presented May 24-26 and May 31-June 2. All Friday and Saturday shows take place at 8:15 p.m., Sunday shows at 2 p.m.
Holt expects the shows to sell out--West Bay Opera shows almost always do. In addition to giving artists a place to start, the company is also giving Palo Alto an even greater gift: opera on a small local stage at an affordable price. San Francisco Opera performances cost at least $40-135; West Bay Opera shows are $29. They're also more intimate, Holt says.
"Our performances are closer and more loving in a way. It's amazing what we can put on stage with a small budget."
This year's crop of young performers are equally amazed. San Rafael music teacher Wendy Loder is starring in all four of West Bay's productions.
"It certainly is a showcase for young singers," says the 32-year-old graduate of Dominican College. Loder hopes to one day reach the level Hillhouse is at now: world-renowned opera singer.
For now, she's content doing what everyone else involved in West Bay Opera has done for 40 years: in her words, "a labor of love."
40th Season Champagne Reception
What: West Bay Opera
When: 5-7 p.m., Saturday, Sept. 23
Where: Sabina Marble and Granite Showroom, 333 Middlefield Road, Palo Alto
Price: $40
For more information: 424-9999
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