Saratoga News

Montalvo announces season featuring 120 performances

Something offered for varied tastes

By Shari Kaplan

Now entering its 43rd season, Villa Montalvo's Performing Arts Series is loaded with more than 120 performances in a broad spectrum of musical genres and price ranges, truly living up to its subtitle of California's Historic Estate for the Arts.

The venues offer something for everyone, with the newly restored 300-seat Carriage House Theatre, 1,150-seat Garden Theatre, 2,000-seat front lawn and the 1,750-seat Historic Mountain Winery, which is located less than 10 minutes from the Montalvo grounds.

The menu for 1998 includes singers and bands playing pop, blues, rhythm and blues, jazz, country, bluegrass and international music. Dance groups, storytelling, comedy and children's and family entertainment are also part of the mix, which Villa Montalvo performing arts director Bruce Labadie predicts will be a recipe for success.

"This series represents one of the most comprehensive and ambitious ventures by any performing arts organization," he says.

"The four theaters combined have become an international destination for those who wish to listen to music in the rare combination of intimate settings and natural beauty."

Elisabeth Challener, executive director of the nonprofit Villa Montalvo, adds that patrons enjoying performances are also benefiting many other members of the community.

"When you purchase tickets, you are reinvesting in the community. Proceeds from the series support our internationally recognized Artist Residency Program, The Gallery at Montalvo and the Education Outreach Program," she explains. Among the community outreach activities are children's matinees, performing arts lectures and demos, assemblies at local schools and open studio days with resident artists.

Among the performances throughout the year are the KFOG Festival; the KKSF Jazz Festival; the Phil Collins Big Band 20-piece orchestra; Ladies Sing the Blues with Tracy Nelson, Marcia Ball and Irma Thomas; a Bill Cosby gala; country acts Mary Chapin Carpenter, Vince Gill and The Mavericks; rockers Huey Lewis & the News, Kenny Loggins and Gregg Allman & Friends; Harry Belafonte; Irish flutist James Galway; an Africa Fête; Smokey Robinson; Gladys Knight; Boz Scaggs; The Doobie Brothers; the Del McCoury Band; Laurie Anderson; and the classical Academy of St. Martin and the Moscow Chamber Orchestra.

Tickets go on sale through the Montalvo Box Office April 19. Tickets will be available by mail before public sale for those people on the Villa Montalvo mailing list. To be included on the list, send a postcard to Villa Montalvo, P.O. Box 158, Saratoga, 95071. For more information, call 961-5858.

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