Green Music Center Garners Reputation as World-Class Concert Hall

It’s all about music and choices at Sonoma State University’s Donald and Maureen Green Music Center, a world-class performing arts complex in the heart of Sonoma Wine Country. Experience the true Sonoma Wine Country lifestyle by selecting your desired blend of music, food, and beverages, in a gorgeous natural setting.

The performance lineup for the center’s venues can include chamber music, symphony orchestras, jazz, bluegrass, cabaret, blues, recitals, soloists, world music, dance, acrobats, and comedy. And from October to May, the resident Santa Rosa Symphony presents a series of classical concerts in Weill Hall.

Enjoy a performance in the intimate 240-seat, cathedral-like Schroeder Hall, with its 1,248-pipe Brombaugh Opus 9 organ in the balcony above the stage. A typical concert season offers a wide variety of performances, including chamber music, pops, masterworks for pipe orgran, cabaret, recitals, and more.

Or, experience a performance in the acclaimed 1,400-seat Joan and Sanford I Weill Concert Hall. Designed to replicate the intimacy and acoustics of both Vienna’s Musikverein and Symphony Hall in Boston and to match the aesthetics of Seiji Ozawa Hall at Tanglewood, Weill Hall features handcrafted beech wood chairs, with seating on three levels. It’s considered to be one of the most acoustically superb concert venues in the world.

You can choose a seat in the hall or, during the summer season, the entire back wall of the hall opens up, allowing additional audience members on the landscaped and terraced Weill Lawn, with a choice of tables and chairs or blankets on the lawn (increasing the total concert capacity to 5,500). Kick back, relax, and enjoy the music as well as the views of Sonoma County’s rolling hills. An excellent sound system and a massive screen on the back of the hall lets everyone enjoy the show as it unfolds inside Weill Hall.

The on-site Prelude restaurant usually operates only during performances, offering a seasonal Prix Fixe dinner, various desserts and appetizers, and pours of Sonoma County wines, but is presently closed until further notice in observance of Covid-19 precautions. 

However, those enjoying the summer season shows from Weill Lawn can either pack their own picnic or pre-order an elegant boxed meal from San Francisco’s iconic Boudin Bakery, as well as wine from the university’s on-site catering. 

Green Music Center has been crafted with an incredible eye for quality, from the acclaimed artists who perform there to the 125-year-old olive trees in the courtyard outside Weill Hall, to the beautiful landscaping that surrounds the complex. It’s just a matter of choosing how and when you want to experience this focal point for arts in the Northern San Francisco Bay Area.

Green Music Center, 1801 E. Cotati Ave., Rohnert Park, 707-664-4246

Written by Sonoma Insider Patricia Lynn Henley