We love Halloween in Sonoma County. We’ve got Spooktacular Sonoma and towns like Cotati and Santa Rosa host annual costume contests and pumpkin carving competitions. This October, joining the celebrations is Candleight Halloween Sonoma County — a haunting 60-minute show that pays tribute to those spine-tingling songs and movie scores we listen to every year.
Candlelight: Halloween Classics
Horror cinema owes much to Bernard Herrmann’s revolutionary scoring techniques, particularly his Psycho Prelude that redefined how music could induce terror. This masterpiece joins Beetlejuice’s manic energy and the hypnotic repetition of Tubular Bells, creating a goosebump-inducing exploration of how different composers approach fear.
When a string quartet interprets these varied approaches to horror, the results are phantasmagorical. Herrmann’s string techniques become even more visceral in intimate setting, while Elfman’s orchestral chaos gets concentrated into pure essence. Oldfield’s electronic minimalism transforms through acoustic instruments, gaining organic warmth that makes the golden shadows seem to breathe with each sustained note.
Candlelight Halloween at The California Theatre of Santa Rosa
The historic California Theatre of Santa Rosa becomes mesmerizing under the glow of thousands of candles, each flicker casting dramatic shadows on ornate walls and gilded ceilings. This luminous atmosphere transforms the 60-minute Candlelight Halloween concert into a hauntingly beautiful experience, inviting audiences to arrive 30-45 minutes early to be fully enveloped in the shimmering, otherworldly ambiance.
As the string quartet performs pieces like Danse Macabre by Camille Saint-Saëns, Night on Bald Mountain by Modest Mussorgsky, and Ghostbusters (Theme) by Ray Parker Jr., the interplay of candlelight and music conjures a sense of playful suspense. With tickets in high demand, waiting to plan your Halloween could mean missing out on one of the most popular and atmospheric seasonal experiences in Sonoma County.