The World of Film and Opera - I Pagliacci & Cavalleria Rusticana

As part of its Merola Goes to the Movies series, San Francisco Public Library will show a pair of operas directed by the legendary Franco Zeffirelli for the screen. Cavalleria Rusticana by Pietro Mascagni and Pagliacci by Ruggero Leoncavallo both premiered years apart in the early 1890s.  Of relatively shorter length, these two operas are so often performed together that they are collectively know as "Cav and Pag."

Zeffirelli had directed both of these operas on stage with the Royal Opera House in 1959 and the Metropolitan Opera 1969.  He filmed these operas in 1981 in the midst of his shooting the Hollywood blockbuster Endless Love.  Cavalleria Rusticana was filmed in a Sicilian village.  It stars Yelena Obraztsova, Plácido Domingo, Axelle Gall and Renato Bruson and was recorded at the La Scala opera house.  Pagliacci also features Plácido Domingo as well Teresa Stratas, Juan Pons and Alberto Rinaldi.

I Pagliacci & Cavalleria Rusticana is part of our continuing collaboration with the Merola Opera Program.  Those of you may have come to our previous screening of Zeffirelli's La Traviata will already know what a treat we have in store for you.

Both films will be screened on Sunday, May 24, 2015 between 1 and 3 PM in Koret Auditorium in the Main Library on the Lower Level.

All Library programs are free and open to the public.

Further reading:

Zeffirelli: The Autobiography of Franco Zeffirelli (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1986).

Scapegoat: the 1871 to 1906 San Francisco City Hall

The Art, Music and Recreation Center and the San Francisco History Center are pleased to host the screening of Scapegoat: the 1871 to 1906 San Francisco City Hall, which tells the story of the ornate and remarkable City Hall that San Francisco built for itself starting in 1871 and that was destroyed in the 1906 Earthquake and Firestorm.

We will show this film in the Koret Auditorium, on Wednesday, May 20 at 6:00 pm, only 200 feet from what was once this City Hall's great colonnaded, public entry.

The Question and Answer period will include the filmmaker, Glenn Lym, joined by Paul V. Turner - Stanford emeritus professor of architectural history - and Chris Carlsson - San Francisco historian and founder of shapingsf.org and foundsf.org and historian Gray Brechin.

Glenn Lym is a practicing architect and documentary filmmaker in the South of Market.  He studied architecture at U.C. Berkeley and has a Ph.D. from Harvard University.  He has lived in San Francisco since 1978.

City Hall was bordered by Larkin, McAllister and City Hall Avenue and there was no Hyde street.  This link will take you to a 1905 Sanborn map where you can see how City Hall was situated in regards to Market, McAllister and Larkin.

The following photographic reproductions of the "old" City Hall from the archives of the San Francisco Historical Photograph Collection will be on display before and after the screening.

view from Larkin and City Hall Avenue

view from City Hall Square

view from Market looking towards City Hall Ave on the left and McAllister on the right

view from Market before the dome was completed

view from City Hall Avenue

and the ruined City Hall after the 1906 Earthquake and Fire

Mete Tasin performs Italian Opera with the Aurora Mandolin Orchestra

Mete Tasin, backed by the Aurora Mandolin Orchestra, will perform in the Koret Auditorium Saturday, May 16, at 2:30pm. He will perform songs from the Italian repertoire.

Mete was born in Wurzburg, Germany, and raised in Turkey. He studied at Istanbul University State Conservatory and later in the US  at Brooklyn College. Mete’s first big role was as Don Jose in Carmen performed in Minnesota. He has also performed as this character at Carnegie Hall with the New York City Light Opera.

Mete previously performed the lead role of Arlecchino in Pagliacci by Leoncavallo and Gastone in Verdi's La Traviata at Opera San Jose in California. He has also represented the San Francisco City Opera by singing at Union Street and North Beach Festivals as a soloist. In addition to singing, he composed the music for Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves, which premiered in New York. Mete has performed many roles in the Turkish repertoire at Izmir Istanbul State Theaters and other venues in Turkey.

The Aurora Mandolin Orchestra, the largest and one of the oldest orchestras of its kind in Northern California has performed many concerts over the years to thousands of listeners throughout the San Francisco Bay Area. The uniqueness of this group is its varied repertoire and creative arrangements of folk music, semi-classical Italian, Spanish, Russian songs, popular "oldies", contemporary pieces (some taken from familiar musicals), excerpts from operas, and classical orchestra compositions written specifically for mandolin.

If you're interested in looking at books on Italian opera click here.

Film & Television Literature Index with Full Text

The Film & Television Literature Index with Full Text is one of the specialized subject databases available to San Francisco Public Library card holders.

Subject coverage for the Index includes film & television theory, preservation & restoration, screenwriting, production, cinematography, technical aspects, and reviews. The database includes more than 380 publications as well as full text for more than 120 journals, and 100 books. One of its special features is the exclusive Variety Movie Reviews and an Image Search.

This Index has citations for articles and in many cases the full text as well.  It allows you transfer these citations and articles to your desktop, USB drive or email.

In addition to Film and Television Literature Database, San Francisco Public Library boasts of a healthy in-print film and television periodical collection. A subject search in our online catalog for Motion Pictures – Periodicals and Television Programs -- Periodicals will reveal the range and choices the library has built up over the years. Many of the articles concerning film and television can accessed Full-text through this database. Other articles may be available by accessing the periodicals housed in Magazine and Newspaper department.

Read this online .pdf document for more information about the Film & Television Literature Index with Full Text.