■ Season-opening concert to feature Mozart, Mendelssohn; quartet brings the Megadeth

By Keri Luiz
Assistant Editor

As fall approaches, so does the 81st season of the Vallejo Symphony Orchestra. And that’s good news for local music lovers.

But those music lovers won’t have to wait until the curtain rises on the symphony’s season-opening fall concert to get a taste of VSO magic.

This month the symphony will present a performance by Squid Inc! at the Bay Terrace Theater, also known as the Mira Theater.

Squid Inc! is a traditional string quartet: lead violin, second violin, viola and cello. But they do not play Mozart.

“They play Sting and The Police. They play Megadeth … but through a string quartet filter,” VSO publicist Tim Zumwalt said of Squid Inc!, whose Sept. 30 performance will also serve as a CD release event and a benefit for the symphony’s Music in the Schools program.

“Any extra money from the show will be given to our Music in the Schools program,” Zumwalt said. The program features a Vallejo Symphony trio performing for 10,000 school children in Vallejo and Benicia this year.

“Music in the Schools affects Benicia, because we play in all four of the elementary schools,” Zumwalt said, adding that show dates for Music in the Schools have not yet been finalized.

Squid Inc! cellist Beth Vandervennet has been a part of the Music in the Schools program for five years, Zumwalt said. She is also the principal cellist for the Vallejo symphony.

Squid Inc! gets things started. Then the season really kicks off.

After going from four to two shows annually in 2011, VSO will stick with the format — for now.

“It’s still a recession season, we’re only going to do two big shows,” Zumwalt said. “These shows are expensive. We still haven’t convinced the public that everybody on stage is paid.”

Zumwalt said to put on one performance costs around $30,000.

“And we’re cutting a lot of corners to do that,” he said.

The fall concert, “Mondo Tango,” opens the symphony’s season Oct. 30 with performances of Mozart’s Overture to “The Impresario,” Astor Piazolla’s “Tango Suite” featuring Anna Maria Mendieta on the harp, and Mendolssohn’s Symphony No. 4 in A major “Italian.”

Mendieta has a busy career as a soloist, orchestral musician, recording artist and teacher, Zumwalt said.

She has worked with Josh Groban, Barry Manilow and Frank Sinatra Jr., and has also done a lot of television work, he said. “She tours Europe. She played for the King and Queen of Spain … and the Pope!”

In April, “Storms and Passions” will feature music by Schumann (“Overture to ‘Manfred’”), Fauré’s “Fantasie for Flute & Orchestra,” featuring Melanie Keller on the flute, and Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 4 in F minor.

Keller is the personnel manager for the Vallejo Symphony. “She’s also very talented,” Zumwalt said.

He explained that in regional orchestras like the Vallejo Symphony, many of the players have other jobs. “They’ll be a librarian and a violist or something,” he said.

Keller’s job is to make sure all of the seats for the performances are filled with musicians.

“There are 15 principals in the orchestra; then there’s the section players. Sometimes a lot of them stick around. Sometimes, maybe they’re on vacation or they got sick that week. So she has a large substitute list, and she knows who to call.

“To have a good personnel manager is to have some gold in your pocket,” Zumwalt said. “We never say ‘Oops! There’s an empty chair, how can we start today?’”

The VSO’s 81st is also music director David Ramadanoff’s 30th season. The symphony will mark the occasion after the spring show, Zumwalt said.

Ramadanoff has been busy, too. “He just did a European tour,” Zumwalt said. “He has a youth orchestra, and they toured and in Prague and Vienna. In very famous concert halls. The one in Prague was the same concert hall that Dvořák worked in.”

The Vallejo Symphony has had its hand in other projects too, like the Requiem benefit concert for Arts Benicia in June.

And overall, Zumwalt said, things are looking up for the symphony after it was forced to cut its 79th season in half because of a severe budget shortfall, and financing for last season was questionable at times, doubtful at others.

The 81st season may still be operating as a recession season, but the future is no longer so doubtful, Zumwalt said.

“One thing we are going to be doing this year is planning the year after as a three-concert season. We are gaining ground back,” he said.

“The public has been very generous this summer.”

If You Go
Squid Inc! will perform at the Bay Terrace Theater, 51 Daniels Ave., Vallejo, on Sept. 30 at 3 p.m. For more information on Vallejo Symphony performances, visit vallejosymphony.org.