San Francisco Girls Chorus Level III – Terry Alvord, Director
Friday April 28, 2023 at 7:30 p.m.
Program: To be announced
Praised by Gramophone Magazine as a “remarkable tapestry of teenage voices,” the five-time GRAMMY Award-winning San Francisco Girls Chorus (SFGC) is recognized as one of the world’s leading youth vocal ensembles. Under the leadership of Artistic Director Valérie Sainte-Agathe, SFGC presents subscription performances throughout the Bay Area and regularly performs both nationally and internationally as a cultural ambassador for San Francisco. SFGC is a frequent collaborator with leading arts organizations such as Kronos Quartet, San Francisco Symphony and San Francisco Opera, as well as numerous world-renowned guest artists.
In addition to its Premier Ensemble, the San Francisco Chorus School is renowned as a regional center for choral music education and performance for girls and young women ages 4-18. Through its innovative Online Learning Program, SFGC has utilized technology to keep its hundreds of choristers engaged and advancing in their musical activities and performing live together from their own homes.
Level III of the San Francisco Girls Chorus School is an ensemble of singers generally between the ages of 10-13. Throughout each season, they learn and perform a varied repertoire of classical, contemporary, and multilingual folk songs from multiple musical eras. In recent years, Level III has performed with other local organizations such as the SF Opera and Opera Parallèle, as well as in the community at schools across San Francisco and the East Bay.
The Soloist Intensive program is a select cohort of soloists that are part of SFGC’s GRAMMY Award Winning Premier Ensemble. Singers strengthen their performance experience, vocal technique, stage presence, diction and language skills through an individualized program of private voice lessons; projects that build organization, communication, and professionalism; masterclasses; auditions; and performances, often in collaboration with world class professional singers. Many Soloists go on to pursue vocal performance in universities and conservatories, and all receive college prep and advising as a part of the program.
Terry Alvord, Level III Director
Terry Alvord, a mezzo soprano and conductor, has conducted the San Francisco Symphony Chorus in rehearsals of Brahms’ Requiem and Mahler’s Symphony No. 3, and has conducted the San Francisco Conservatory’s chamber vocal ensemble, assisting Maestro Ragnar Bohlin. She has also been one of four assistant conductors for the San Francisco Symphony’s Community of Music Makers “Sing Out Davies” program since its inception in 2011.
For the 2015-2016 season, Ms. Alvord was the interim artistic director for Resound Ensemble, a 50 member mixed voice choir based in San Francisco. Last summer, Ms. Alvord was a featured conductor in a program of sacred music in Sarteano, Italy. She is currently music director at Trinity United Methodist Church in Berkeley.
In addition to conducting, Ms. Alvord is an active soloist and choral singer. She has appeared as soloist in James MacMillan’s Seven Last Words from the Cross with the Berkeley Symphony and with many other groups in performances of Handel’s Messiah, Vivaldi’s Gloria, Haydn’s Lord Nelson Mass, Beethoven’s Choral Fantasy and Bach’s Magnificat. Ms. Alvord has sung with many Bay Area opera companies in roles such as Dorabella in Cosi fan tutte, Cherubino in Le Nozze di Figaro, Siebel in Faust, and Hansel in Hansel and Gretel. She has been a professional member of the San Francisco Symphony Chorus since 2000, and has also sung with San Francisco Opera Chorus and Philharmonia Baroque Chorale.