Calling all Cohen fans: Leonard Cohen was an enigmatic and brilliant songwriter who enchanted a legion of fans and other songwriters, including Bob Dylan. There’s a reason why Cohen, who died in 2016, remains one of the more covered songwriters in history. With probing, often wistful songs built on quiet, slow-building melodies and marvelous observations of love, life, sex, politics and pain, Cohen created a catalog built on classics such as “Dance Me to the End of Love,” “I’m Your Man” and “Hallelujah.” This weekend, Cohen’s music, poetry and spirit will be celebrated at the annual Leonard Cohen Festival, three days of readings and musical performances at the Swedish American Hall, 2174 Market St., in San Francisco. The event, from Friday through Sunday, is hosted and organized by the Conspiracy of Beards, a San Francisco men’s choir specializing in performing Cohen’s music. The Beards will perform, as will Americana singer-songwriter Ruby Lee Hill and the band Ismay. Also on the program are writers including San Francisco Poet Laureate Genny Lim. Performances start at 7:30 p.m. Nov. 8-10 and tickets range from $34.43 to $44.73. Go to sfleonardcohenfest.com.
Laughing matters: He makes a point of not disclosing his age, but there is a youthful look and demeanor to comedian Mike E. Winfield that suits him well onstage. This includes when he talks about his youth in a tough neighborhood in Baltimore, and recalls once finding a gun underneath his mother’s pillow (“I couldn’t wait for my teeth to fall out,” he cracks) or his uneasy indoctrination into parenthood when he married a much older woman with a son who’s roughly the same age as him. His relatable, gleefully delivered autobiographical humor made Winfield a hit on TV’s “America’s Got Talent,” where he was a finalist, and is fueling his fast-rising career as a standup comedian with two recorded comedy specials, a host of late-night appearances and an Emmy nomination to his credit. Winfield is coming to the Bay Area this week for performances at 7:30 p.m. Friday at Sebastiani Theatre in Sonoma ($25; events.sebastianitheatre.com) and 7 and 9 p.m. Saturday at Stanford University’s The Studio, presented by Stanford Live ($15-$50; live.stanford.edu)
A season kickoff: Music director Joseph Young and the Berkeley Symphony launch the orchestra’s 2024-25 season at 4 p.m. Sunday in Zellerbach Hall on the University of California, Berkeley campus with a program called “Stories From Home.” Appropriately enough, the pieces are indeed homegrown North American, beginning with Samuel Barber’s “Knoxville: Summer of 1915,” composed in 1947 for orchestra and voice, based on a short prose piece by James Agee. Soprano Lisa Delan, an interpreter of American art song, is the featured soloist. Also on the program is the Bay Area premiere of “For a Younger Self,” a concerto by Academy Award-winning composer Kris Bowers featuring Grammy-winning violinist Charles Yang in the spotlight. Leonard Bernstein’s jazz-inflected “Symphonic Dances” from “West Side Story” and the “Redes Suite” from Mexican composer Silvestre Revueltas, taken from his score for the movie, complete the concert. Tickets, $25-$85, are available at berkeleysymphony.org or (510) 841-2800.
Surround see-and-sound: Audiences in all-white outerwear that witnessed Opera Parallele’s amazing production of Joby Talbot and Gene Scheer’s graphic-novel style opera “Everest” at the Z Space Theatre in 2023 may want to prepare for an even more immersive experience. This weekend, Opera Parallele opens its new season with a 68-minute prerecorded production telling the story of the fateful 1996 mountain expedition in the California Academy of Science’s Morrison Planetarium, projecting it across and around its arched dome. Facial tracking technology captures the expressions of the animated figures representing the humans who made the climb, which was immortalized in Jon Krakauer’s fact-based thriller “Into Thin Air.” Patrons will hear the voices of well-known cast members, singing in English with titles: mezzo-soprano Sasha Cooke, tenor Nathan Granner, bass Kevin Burdette, baritone Hadleigh Adams, soprano Shawnette Sulker and more. “Everest: Opera in the Planetarium” opens at 6:30 p.m. Friday with a launch party reception following; tickets are $157. Remaining performances, priced from $30-$100, are at 6:30 and 8:30 p.m. Saturday and 6:30 p.m. Sunday, 7:30 p.m. Nov. 13 and 6:30 p.m. Nov. 17. Find them through operaparallele.org.
The post Best Bets: SF Downtown First Thursday, Leonard Cohen fest, Mike E. Winfield, Berkeley Symphony, ‘Opera in the Planetarium’ appeared first on Local News Matters.