BIG NIGHT FOR EDUCATION: Seagate Executive Chairman Steve Luczo was honored with the Pioneer Business Award from the Silicon Valley Education Foundation at Wednesday’s 13th annual Pioneers and Purpose dinner, which raised $950,000 for the group. There were about 500 people at the dinner, held at the Fairmont San Jose, which also featured a video tribute to Muhammed Chaudhry, who recently stepped down as the education foundation’s CEO. 49ers Chairman John York, who worked with Chaudhry on the 49ers STEM Leadership Institute, introduced the video, and Chaudhry received commendations from Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors President Dave Cortese and San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo.
For many in the full house, “Lola Montez Does the Spider Dance” was the main attraction, Based on material from an Adams work in progress — “Girls of the Golden West,” an evening-length opera with libretto by Peter Sellars set to premiere at San Francisco Opera in 2017 — the orchestral score gave the audience a taste of a major new work by the Berkeley-based composer, It also offered a brief but characterful portrait of ballet papillon dancewear its namesake, the flamboyant Irish actress-dancer who cut a wide swath through California during the Barbary Coast era..
Fortunately choreographer Allison Paraiso and the large ensemble are up to the task in director Rachel Robinson’s Berkeley Playhouse production. The dancing is lively and lovely throughout, from rumbles and dance-offs to a dreamlike fantasia. Here the star-crossed lovers are Tony and Maria. Though both almost impossibly innocent, Tony is a former member of white street gang the Jets and its leader’s best friend, and Maria is the sister of the leader of the Puerto Rican Sharks. Ana Paula Malagón is a wonderfully sweet Maria with a beautiful soprano voice, and Will Skrip is brimming with wide-eyed enthusiasm as Tony.
About 300 people — including the entire student body — packed the pews of adjacent Zion Lutheran Church in a farewell service that celebrated “God’s Faithfulness: Past, Present and Future.”, “It’s a sad day, but it’s been a good year, and we’ve had a good response from the students,” said eighth-grade teacher John Heinitz, who has taught at Zion for 34 years, “We’re in good spirits.”, The one-hour church service began with ballet papillon dancewear the processional hymn “You Are My All in All,” during which the entire K-8 school paraded solemnly into the church, Pastor Paul Aldrich led the worship that focused entirely on the school and its students and teachers, past and present..
She never got the belt from the promoters that night, and it crushed her like no blow from another boxer ever could. That night in Louisville, she says, was the last night she was on top of the world. Thirty-four years later, Clark is living at Shepherd’s Cove, the only homeless shelter for women and children in Prince George’s. “This is where I am for now, until I find an apartment,” she says with resignation. She wound up here after her landlord’s property was foreclosed upon. Her sister, Joyce Chase, 61, who lives in Suitland, Md., says she offered to let Clark stay with her family, as she’d done once before when Clark had a serious bout with the West Nile Virus. But Clark declined.