Berkeley chorus, orchestra to start their 60th year with Verdi's Requiem'

"When Eugene Jones founded the Berkeley Community Chorus & Orchestra in 1966, he may never have imagined the chorus continuing for 60 years. Jones, who died in 2003, was the first African American conductor of a large Bay Area chorus and orchestra drawn from its local community. Devoted to presenting great works from the choral canon, Jones was a charismatic leader and often lent his glorious bass voice to the choir."

"Similarly, when Giuseppe Verdi commemorated Italian novelist and poet Alessandro Manzoni by composing his Requiem, a masterpiece that combined text drawn from the Roman Catholic Mass for the dead with mighty, operatic-style music, he likely focused primarily on the task at hand. Surely, Verdi could not have predicted that his piece would one day be performed by Jewish prisoners for their Nazi captors at the Theresienstadt concentration camp during World War II."

Eugene Jones founded the Berkeley Community Chorus & Orchestra in 1966 and served as a charismatic leader and bass soloist. Jones was the first African American conductor of a large Bay Area community chorus and orchestra. Giuseppe Verdi composed his Requiem combining Roman Catholic Mass text with operatic music; the work was performed by Jewish prisoners at Theresienstadt during World War II. The BCCO will perform Verdi's Requiem Jan. 2–4, 2026, at UC Berkeley's Hertz Hall under conductor Ming Luke with about 200 volunteer singers, 60 orchestra members, and named soloists. Admission is free; funding comes from member tuition and donations. The spring concert will feature a commissioned Terezin Requiem by Michael Schachter.

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