Spirit of the Garden

Rose & the Nightingale, a band of four powerful women celebrating the sublimity of gardens through song, perform the West Coast premiere of The Spirit of the Garden at the San Francisco Conservatory of Flowers on Saturday, June 9, 2012.

Rose & the Nightingale is a New York City-based quartet of world-class improvising vocalists and instrumentalists, creating beautiful and unique genre-defying music, full of melody, harmony, and energetic expression. The Spirit of the Garden, blurs the boundaries of world music, folk, and jazz improvisation. Listen to the album!

All the lyrics in The Spirit of the Garden are poems celebrating the nexus of spirituality and nature, and the ability to connect and feel a part of something greater through open & aware engagement with the natural world. The songs offer immense gratitude to botanical gardens’ role as contemplative spaces, as places helping us reflect and engage with our concepts of individual versus collective identity. Poets featured include living American poets Maria Brady Smith, Ella Cvancara, & Wyn Cooper, as well as Oc poet Miquel Decor (southern France), and Rumi.

As a very special component of the Conservatory of Flowers event, Rose & the Nightingale collaborate with local San Francisco poets Evan Karp and Silvi Alcivar to craft new compositions to be premiered at the event. Karp and Alcivar will write new poems inspired by the Conservatory, which will become the lyrics to new songs performed during the 8:00 pm public concert on June 9.  

Purchase your tickets now! Doors & Evening Conservatory Entry 7 PM, Performance 8 PM, Artist Q & A 9:30 PM

Member Tickets $25; General Admission $30; Youth $15

Ticket prices include light refreshments in the galleries and during intermission.

Afternoon Youth Haiku Workshop

The Conservatory's goal is to program events that inspire, and this has resulted in learning how each visitor experiences the Conservatory in a unique way. What plant catches your eye? How does the changing climate from one gallery to the next make you feel? With this workshop, we hope to encourage our younger visitors to think and reflect as they experience the Conservatory. Rose & the Nightingale will teach them how to turn those observations into art, and then use the youth's poem to complete the Spirit of the Garden song cycle. Ages 8-18. Parental supervision required for ages 11 & under. Time: 2-4 pm | Fee: $15

About Rose & the Nightingale

Rose & the Nightingale live performances have proven to uplift audiences with the power of the quartet’s fiery rhythmic energy, sublime harmonies, lyrical beauty, and staggering talent.  Onstage, the band is a great demonstration of female strength. 

Members of Rose & the Nightingale have performed internationally on five continents, at venues such as Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, Radio City Music Hall, the Barbican in London, Davies Symphony Hall in San Francisco, Chicago Symphony Hall, and at the world's most prestigious jazz festivals including the North Sea, Montreal, Montreux, Newport, San Francisco, and CapeTown South Africa Jazz Festivals, and Tokyo’s Blue Note.  

Rose and the Nightingale is Jody Redhage (cello, vocals, compositions); Sara Caswell (violin & mandolin); Laila Biali (piano & vocals); and Leala Cyr (vocals, trumpet and percussion).  Please visit www.roseandthenightingale.com.

About the Conservatory of Flowers

The Conservatory of Flowers is a living museum, bursting with life waiting to be discovered. Its intimate setting gives visitors an upclose look at rare, exotic plants and beautiful, tropical flowers. The Conservatory of Flowers has captivated guests for more than a century. This gem of Victorian architecture has a long and storied history. As a city, state, and national historic landmark, the Conservatory remains one of the most beloved attractions in Golden Gate Park. Visit conservatoryofflowers.org for more information.