Chorus Director & Chorus Accompanist
Marie Plette, Director
Marie Plette is currently department chair for Oakland School of the Arts Vocal Music Department. She has performed for many of the major opera houses in the US and abroad including San Francisco Opera as Madame Butterfly. Highlights include Jake Heggie’s one woman opera Another Sunrise for Festival Opera, the role of “The Woman” in Holodomor by Virko Baley for the Kiev Opera, Ukraine, title roles of Strauss’s Ariadne auf Naxos and Barber’s Vanessa for West Edge Opera, Mimi and Donna Elvira for Livermore Valley Opera, and Tosca for both LVO and Anchorage Opera. Her repertoire includes such diverse roles as Love Simpson from Floyd’s Cold Sassy Tree, Rusalka, the Countess, Nedda, Elsa, Eva, Sieglinde, Desdemona, Alice Ford, and the Marschallin.
Allegra Chapman, Pianist
Allegra has been described as “brilliant” by the San Francisco Classical Voice. She is dedicated to engaging with new audiences as both performer and presenter. As a soloist and chamber musician, she has performed at Alice Tully Hall, in the Dame Myra Hess Memorial Concert Series, and at festivals including New York City Center’s Fall for Dance Festival and Bard Music Festival. Her performances have been broadcast on WQXR New York, WFMT Chicago, and KALW San Francisco. Allegra performs regularly with local San Francisco ensembles and has collaborated with musicians Blair McMillan, Ian Swensen, and members of International Contemporary Ensemble and the Orion String Quartet. In addition to her performing career, Allegra enjoys a thriving teaching studio and has coached chamber music ensembles at many institutions, including San Francisco State University. She recently joined the faculty of the Xi’an International Music Festival in Xi’an, China.
Passionate about performing and promoting the music of today, Allegra has worked with composers Joan Tower and Charles Wuorinen and premiered the works of many young composers, including Dylan Mattingly, Benjamin Pesetsky, and Shen Yiwen. Highlights have included soloing with the New Juilliard Ensemble at Alice Tully Hall, performing in a groundbreaking collaboration between Yamaha RemoteLive Technology and the Juilliard Technology Center, and performing new and twentieth-century works alongside San Francisco Conservatory of Music faculty members at the 2013 San Francisco-Shanghai International Chamber Music Festival. From 2013 to 2014, Allegra co-founded and played with Phonochrome chamber music ensemble. After their commissioning project at the San Francisco Center for New Music, San Francisco Classical Voice’s Jeff Dunn wrote, “…new-music lovers crammed into the concert space. Almost everyone…was apparently under 30. I can now die in peace knowing art music will continue to prosper.” Allegra is a graduate of the Bard Conservatory of Music’s inaugural class, receiving both a Bachelor of Music and Bachelor of Arts. She also holds a Masters of Music from The Juilliard School, where she was the recipient of the L. & G. Goldberg, Betty Larson, and Ruth D. Rosenman scholarships. Her teachers have included Jeremy Denk, Seymour Lipkin, Julian Martin, Sharon Mann, John McCarthy, Robert McDonald and Peter Serkin. Allegra has studied chamber music with members of the Juilliard, Guarneri, and Orion String Quartets, and performed in master classes with Richard Goode, Claude Frank, and Leon Fleisher.
Throckmorton Chorus, inspired by Bay Area master accompanist, teacher and composer Joe Bloom, was formed in January 2014 to foster and share the art of choral music and offer an educational process that focuses on the pursuit of choral excellence in repertoire and performance. Today it is composed of about 30 singers from all ages and walks of life who share a love of music and a desire to learn and grow in collaboration with others. Each season the repertoire includes a wide variety of styles allowing members to expand and deepen their skills and understanding of this rich music. The quality and artistry of the chorus continues to grow each season by leaps and bounds.
Rehearsals are held on Monday nights and each season culminates in a public concert at the theatre. The group is offered other seasonal opportunities to perform and contribute to the thriving artistic environment around us. Membership is by audition and subject to availability in your voice section. Auditions for new members are held twice a year – in January/February and September. Returning members re-audition each September before the Fall season.
