Holiday Gaiety

Edwin Outwater regularly works with the world’s top orchestras, institutions, and artists to reinvent the concert experience. His ability to cross genres has led to collaborations with Metallica, Wynton Marsalis, Renée Fleming, and Yo-Yo Ma. He is music director of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music and music director laureate of the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony.

Recent appearances include the New York Philharmonic, Cleveland Orchestra, Chicago Symphony, Philadelphia Orchestra, San Diego Symphony, Seattle Symphony, and the New World Symphony, as well as the Royal Philharmonic in a multi-concert series opening the Steinmetz Hall in Florida. He also served as a producer and musical advisor for the National Symphony Orchestra’s 50th Anniversary Concert at the Kennedy Center. In December 2022, he premiered A Christmas Gaiety at the Royal Albert Hall with Peaches Christ and the BBC Concert Orchestra, and returned in 2023. 

Outwater has held a long association with San Francisco Symphony since making his debut in November 2001, having served as Resident Conductor, Director of Summer Concerts, and Music Director of the SF Symphony Youth Orchestra.

Peaches Christ is a filmmaker and cult leader living in San Francisco. Her infamous movie events are self-produced at the Castro Theatre and regularly draw more than 1,000 attendees to each new production before they tour. Events have featured special guest stars John Waters, Cloris Leachman, and Pam Grier, among others. 

Peaches is the alter-ego of Joshua Grannell, the writer and director of the feature film All About Evil. The award-winning dark comedy gore film stars Natasha Lyonne, Thomas Dekker, Cassandra Peterson, Mink Stole, and Peaches Christ herself. Joshua is also co-owner and creator of Into the Dark Productions, which produces immersive theatre events at the Old San Francisco Mint building, including Terror Vault. Peaches Christ has been featured in the films Milk, I Am Divine, The Diary of a Teenage Girl, Mansfield 66/67, Tura!, Scream Queen: My Nightmare on Elm Street, You Don’t Nomi, and more. She created the San Francisco Symphony’s Holiday Gaiety show with Edwin Outwater in 2017.

A Second City Main Stage alumnus, Evan Mills has written and performed in three revues, winning a Jeff Award for Outstanding Performer in a Revue in 2023 for the show Don’t Quit Your Daydream. He was named one of the Chicago Tribune’s “Ten Best Theater Performances” in 2022 and 2023, was a Just For Laughs New Face of ’23, and was featured in the 2023 CBS Showcase. He makes his San Francisco Symphony debut with this performance.

Sasha Allen is a singer-songwriter and content creator who first gained national attention as a semi-finalist on The Voice Season 21. He recently released his debut EP Jawbreaker, introducing listeners to his unique sound and lyricism. Beyond music, Sasha has reached millions as a transgender activist and social media creator, building a dedicated community through LGBTQ+ advocacy and authenticity. Currently recording his debut album, Sasha continues to blend artistry with activism, using his platform to inspire, uplift, and connect with audiences worldwide. He makes his San Francisco Symphony debut with this performance.

Adore Delano is a singer-songwriter and actress. She appeared as a contestant on American Idol in 2008 and later competed on the sixth season of RuPaul’s Drag Race, placing in the final three, before returning for the second season of RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars. In 2019, Adore was named as one of the “Top 10 Most Powerful Drag Queens in America” by New York Magazine. Her recent posts about her transition have garnered staggering numbers.

As a musician, Adore has recorded and released three studio albums as well as an EP, Dirty Laundry. With several songs and music videos reaching tens of millions of streams across Spotify, Apple Music, and YouTube, Adore has solidified herself as a titan of drag music. Her music has also appeared on several television programs including Pretty Little Liars. Her most recent large-scale tour, Party Your World, spanned 50 cities including many sold out dates across three continents. Adore is thrilled to be starring in her first movie, HAG, which was shot in South Africa this past summer. She makes her San Francisco Symphony debut with this performance.

For more than three decades, Sister Roma has been one of the most outspoken and highly visible members of San Francisco’s Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence. From fighting on the frontlines in the war against HIV/AIDS to taking on social media giant Facebook as the creator of the #MyNameIs movement, Roma has dedicated more than half her life to community service, activism, and fundraising. She is a proud accomplice to the trans and QBIPOC communities and an advocate for LGBTQ refuge and asylum. Rising to the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic, Roma partnered with the San Francisco Department of Public Health, Supervisor Rafael Mandelman, and the mayor’s COVID response team to create the Sisters’ #PracticeSafeSix mask campaign to raise awareness and promote health and wellness citywide.

But don’t get it twisted, this Sister is no Saint! Her colorful wit and sharp tongue have made Roma one of San Francisco’s favorite entertainers and emcees, landing her front and center on the main stages of SF Pride, Folsom Street Fair, and Easter in the Park, where she emcees the infamous Hunky Jesus Contest. A frequent guest on television and radio, Roma is blessed to travel the globe as an LGBTQ ambassador and event host, striving to uphold her Sisterly vows to expiate stigmatic guilt and promulgate universal joy.

Sapphira Cristál was runner-up and Miss Congeniality of RuPaul’s Drag Race Season 16, and is a classically trained opera singer, composer, and drag queen known for her theatrical lip syncs and six-octave range. She is renowned as a charismatic host who forges a special connection with her audiences. She makes her San Francisco Symphony debut with this performance.

Sapphira holds 16 pageant crowns and has performed globally. In 2024, she was a three-time guest artist in Madonna’s Celebration Tour, and she debuted her original operatic production, Soundcake, with Monét X Change and Thorgy Thor at Lincoln Center. Afterward, she brought her one-woman show, The Cristál Ball Tour, across North America.

Sapphira works to inspire young people through appearances at colleges, youth camps, and high schools. She taught several years of master classes in drag makeup and performance at Emerson College, and she has given artist talks at Rockland Community College. An experienced attitude and stage presence coach, Sapphira has also taught master classes at the Philadelphia Burlesque Academy and various dance studios.

Whenever she gets the chance, Sapphira partners with charitable organizations to raise funds to change people’s lives. Her personal credo is: “There is no better exercise for the heart than reaching down to lift someone up,” and she has made it her mission to uplift, encourage, and inspire those around her.

Nikola Printz recently made their London debut performing in a concert presentation of Laura Karpman’s opera Balls at the Royal Festival Hall with Marin Alsop and the Philharmonia, after originating the role in the world premiere staged production by Opera Parallèle.

Their recent highlights at San Francisco Opera include the role of Jade Boucher and covering the lead role of Sister Helen Prejean in Jake Heggie’s Dead Man Walking and singing the Alto Voice and covering Kundry in Parsifal. Additional appearances this season include a debut at Opéra de Lille in a production of Philip Glass’s Les Enfants terribles and a titular role debut as Handel’s Alcina with the Bay Area’s Festival Opera. They made their San Francisco Symphony debut in April 2016.

Past SF Opera performances include the titular role in Carmen Encounter and various featured roles during a two-year Adler Fellowship. Printz is the recipient of a 2025 Richard Tucker Career Grant from the Richard Tucker Music Foundation and the 2021 Schwabacher Debut Recital Award. They were also celebrated for their March Madness program—an exhilarating descent into identity, reinvention, and musical rebellion, performed at the Chan National Queer Arts Center. They are an accomplished aerialist, distinguished for designing, choreographing, and performing acrobatic opera productions in grand concert halls and smoky cabaret clubs across North America and internationally. 

Jacob Stensberg is an enthusiastic and energetic conductor and performer whose creative output centers core values including authenticity, connection, and compassion. He is the artistic director of the 250-voice San Francisco Gay Men’s Chorus and the Chan National Queer Arts Center.

Prior to his appointment with SFGMC, he was the assistant director for Purdue Musical Organizations at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana. In addition to his work at Purdue, Stensberg enjoyed working with Butler University choirs and orchestras, the Indianapolis Symphonic Choir, the Circle City Chamber Choir, the Booth Tarkington Civic Theater, Zach&Zack Productions, BOBDIREX, the Eclectic Pond Theatre Company, and the Civic Theater of Lafayette.

Stensberg’s recent highlights with the SFGMC included a record-setting Holiday Spectacular, record-setting spring performances of Disney PRIDE in Concert, and his debut conducting the San Francisco Symphony in July 2023, in partnership with SFGMC. He earned a bachelor of music education at Carroll University in Waukesha, Wisconsin, and a master of music in conducting from Butler University.