Tonight's Program

University of Georgia Performing Arts Center
recital with Jocelyn Dueck, piano

Prelude
Henry Purcell: Music for a while

Sergei Rachmaninoff:
Vocalise, Op 34, No 14
Dreams, Op 38, No 5
Zdes xhorosho, Op 21, No 7
Fso xhotchet pet, no opus

Francis Poulenc: Calligrammes (1948)
L’espionne
Mutation
Vers le Sud
Il pleut
La grace exilee
Aussi bien que les cigales
Voyage

Interlude
Henry Purcell: O lead me to some peaceful gloom

-- Intermission --

Interlude
Henry Purcell: If Music be the food of love

Richard Strauss:
All mein Gedanken, Op 21, No 1
Ständchen, Op 17, No 2
Die Nacht, Op 10, No 3
Heimliche Aufforderung, Op 27, No 3

“Seven Deadly Sins”
Lust - Modest Maid (Marc Blitzstein)
Pride - Amor (William Bolcom)
Gluttony - Lime Jello Marshmellow Cottage Cheese Surprise (Bolcom)
Sloth - TBA
Wrath - Another reason I don’t keep a gun in the house (Tom Cipullo)
Envy - The Stepsister’s Lament (from Cinderella) (Richard Rodgers)
Greed - The Pocketbook (Cipullo)

Epilogue
Henry Purcell: Evening Hymn

The Bird starts tweeting

If even Bob Edwards is doing it, maybe what The Concert needs is Twitter.

I have definitely entered a new chapter of my life, both personally and professionally, and with a total of eighteen posts in the past eight months, I think it's safe to say that this blog doesn't really fit.

Yesterday I joined Twitter after listening to the big NPR story about it, and this morning I thought: "Maybe this is what The Concert needs!" No more 300-500 word mini-essays about role preparation or life on the road, which means no longer spending an hour composing said mini-essays a few days a week. I don't have the time anymore, and while I have missed writing, I think I need to explore a more private avenue for that.

But I also miss sharing my career with people, passing on lessons or recounting funny moments or working out frustrations... So I'm going to try Twitter. A few times a day, probably, I will post tidbits about what I'm working on and how it's going. Kind of like a Facebook status update, but for The Concert. There are new themes to pursue: new rep (next season will see Micaela and Marguerite), being part of a two-singer household, and hopefully some new companies/states/countries to explore...

Maybe? I'll give it a try. If you're interested in following along, check it out here: The Concert on Twitter.

Tweet tweet!

And just like that..

I’m home.

I got back to NYC on Monday, and after more than five months on the road, it felt great to know that I had only a few days of suitcase living left. B and I moved into a new apartment on Wednesday, moving from a hobbit hole in midtown Manhattan to a 4th-floor walk-up in Brooklyn Heights: lots of light, friendly neighbors, and a neighborhood full of incredible restaurants, bars, conveniences, and shops. The cafe on the ground floor of our building has great coffee and lunch AND a friendly shop cat. Not only that, but the daytime staff saw us moving in (we bought our lunch from them), and when we came back after dark, another waiter, who had not been there during the day, made a point to stop us as we were entering the stairwell and say “hello” and welcome to the building. Maybe he was just courting our business, but I smiled for a good two hours after that.

Thursday was spent giving thanks with the Brooklyn Birds, then home to put together some more furniture. B had rehearsal* on Friday so I spent most of the day unpacking and organizing before meeting him for dinner near Lincoln Center. Walking up from the subway into Verdi Square I immediately smiled: I was back! We had tickets for Tristan & Isolde at the Met, and I loved walking in through the stage door again, being greeted with smiles and hugs from security guards and colleagues. We made our way to our seats, and I was thrilled to learn that we had almost the same seats I had for my first Met Wagner experience. Great seats, but I wish I had found something a little more exciting to wear in the mess of my unpacking. I felt very boring sartorially... Nothing like six-months out of the city to get you of your fashion game! I’ve already warned B that a serious shopping excursion is in my future.

To complete our evening, we headed to the Village to find our destination closed and relocated, only to stumble upon a wonderful substitute. B has become quite a “wine guy,” and we have more than once found ourselves in deep converstaion with waitstaff about wine lists. Last night was no exception, and the waitress and host must have enjoyed themselves, too, because we found an extra glass of wine and a dessert sent to our table with compliments.

I was worried that I would be overwhelmed by returning to the city: the hustle and bustle and the noise and the fact that everything takes more effort here. But one after another, encounters with my fellow New Yorkers have reminded me that I belong here, that this is Home... now more than ever.

* More on this in a future post...

“Obligations”

Often, when on a gig, we as the “stars” of a show are called upon to entertain at various donor events around town: Opera Guild gatherings or Board dinners or the like. I have always enjoyed these evenings, finding them a delightful change of pace from the day-to-day life of rehearsals in jeans and performances in costumes. A nice dress, a nice dinner (usually accompanied by nice wine), and a chance to meet some of the people who make my work on the stage possible.

These evenings are most often gratis on our part, included in our contract and considered part of our job. “Outreach” to the already initiated, I guess you could say. And as such, it can sometimes feel like a duty, like an obligation.

But not tonight, not for me! I had such a wonderful time. Maybe I was just in the mood for a good party (it’s been a rough few weeks in the parts of my life that this blog doesn’t cover, hence the lack of blogging...), but a few hours of good food and great conversations really hit the spot. I sang for my supper, sure, but I even loved that part. I love singing for a small crowd in an intimate space like this; our venue was a gorgeous home in the Phoenix foothills and our “crowd” was about 80 Guild and Board members. I got to sing Quando men vo’ and the Pamina-Papagena duet and Yum-Yum’s beautiful aria... and then I got to end the set with my favorite party piece: Weill’s “The Saga of Jenny.” Now, to be fair, those of you who know me “IRL” will agree that I can be, well, a bit of a flirt, and this song is just one big flirt with the audience! I love to sing it, and it has always been well received.

It felt good to sing some other rep, and was great to listen to my Ko-Ko, the elegant ND, but the highlight of the evening was truly my lovely meal. The food was outstanding: perfectly cooked halibut with a tomato-olive sauve, and scalloped potatoes with white truffle oil and shitake mushrooms. DIVINE. (B was very disappointed that I couldn’t remember the wine we had! It was Chateau Something Chardonnay, 2005 maybe? That’s something, right?) My hosts and table companions were beyond delightful, with tales of first dates and lasting love, being at La Scala the night an unknown named Maria Callas made her debut as Norma, rescuing birds from the mouths of Siberian huskies, and even some good-natured attempts to fool the Englishman at the table with tales of the Jackelope. It was a true pleasure.

We were told that anyone who sings under a Saguaro cactus becomes an instantly adopted Arizonan. I don’t think I’d mind that one bit; maybe I’ll try to find one tomorrow...

Preview

Another little teaser post, I’m afraid, but this one with multimedia! On my first day in Arizona I was interviewed by the company’s PR department for this promotional video, which they had edited and up on their website five days later. It’s a great piece (with fantastic camera work, I think), and I’m relieved to say that I don’t sound like a complete idiot.

Arizona Opera Mikado preview video

I will say that I already disagree with myself, though! I no longer think that Yum-Yum in “conniving” or even that she sets out to “get what she wants.” Nanki-Poo is the one with the plans, mostly, even though it is Yum-Yum who saves his hide at the end of Act I with her silly nonsense-syllable attack on Katisha. She is largely an “in the moment” kind of girl, accepting even the most outrageous or seemingly hubristic moments as natural and understandable. Think of Giselle in Enchanted... (If you haven’t seen it, you must, especially in you live in NYC. It is so charming your head will explode.)

This has been a wonderful rehearsal process, one that has taken me back to my theater roots. We’ve got a full day today, but I will be writing soon about how much fun it has been to “read lines” again and walk around with a script in my hand. Can’t wait to tell you all about it!

"Dumb blonde"

A note for everyone who has told me that Yum-Yum is "really just a dumb blonde:" Let me point out that she is, in fact, "right at the top of the school and has three prizes."

There is a difference between stupid and simple or naive. And besides, it's not nice to laugh at stupid people.

More on this later, as you can imagine...

Singing with a cough

(Here’s another entry written en route to the desert last week. Things have been a bit unsettled around here, so I’ll get to current events in a little bit...)

Another trick I employed during Giovanni tech week (and performances) was my “cough drop trick.” It’s hardly original, I’m sure, but it always seems to catch some folks off guard.

I came up with this trick in 2006 when I was singing Ainadamar performances in NYC. I had the typical winter cold (I used the get them pretty regularly, and they would really stick around. Why I don’t any more is for another post...), and it had started to settled in my chest as a pesky unproductive and uncontrollable cough. I will never forget the moment... We were in the middle of Lorca’s gorgeous “statue aria,” when the stage was quiet and darkly lit, except for a light following Kelly. We “Granada Girls” were all grouped behind Dawn, with me just over her right shoulder. Kelly came up to her, and as she did, we were all brought into the light as they shared a wonderful quiet moment. And then it hit me. My chest started to spasm, and I needed nothing more than to just cough, loud and long. But I absolutely could. not. I held it in, eyes watering and body shaking, for what felt like five minutes but was probably only 45 seconds, until we all broke away and spread to all corners of the stage.

I should say here that this was a production where once we were onstage, we were on until the end; we walked on at the “places” call and walked off after the bows. There were no real “exits,” just small entry points upstage left and right. Our staging for the end of the aria fortunately led me in a big circle around the stage, ending up right by the USR exit! It was still dark on stage, so I slipped out, praying that my mic was off, and I coughed and coughed. The poor stage manager was so confused and concerned, knowing that she wasn’t supposed to see any of us for another 30 minutes! I drank some water, dried my eyes, and surreptitiously slipped back onstage. Only one of my castmates, and no one in the house - not even the front of house stage manager! - had noticed. “Crisis” avoided.

But we had two more performances to get through, and my cough wasn’t going away over night. How could I make sure this didn’t happen again? I might not be so lucky the next time. I had no pockets on my sleeveless costume, so nowhere to stash a cough drop... or was there? Cough drops are sticky, after all. So, before each show, I stuck a cough drop to my skin just under the shoulder strap of my dress. Whenever I wasn’t singing, I would turn upstage and, as gently as possible, pull the cough drop off and, yes, pop it into my mouth. Now, I know, I know... this is kind of gross! And it hurt!! But I never coughed onstage again.

I had to use this trick again during Giovanni, and the stage crew was endlessly amused watching me fussing with my cough drop in the wings just before I’d go on. But I also had an unexpected ally in my Masetto. (No, he did NOT help with the cough drops!) He knew I was struggling during the dress rehearsal, and he had seen me turning upstage more than once to cough and grab a “Ricola moment.” During the trio with Giovanni just before the party scene, our blocking brought us all far stage right. When Giovanni passed me to Masetto, DC whispered in my ear “Go off” and pushed me into the wings! I was a bit confused, but not nearly as much as - you guessed it - the stage manager! I got some water from the table and started to relax, thinking “Thanks, DC; good thinking! Now I’ve got about five minutes to settle myself before we all go back on for the party scene.” Except... I still had to finish the trio! The SM got my attention, and I got to the stage just in time to stomp past Masetto in a huff and take Giovanni’s hand to go to the party. When we all exited (together, as staged) on the other side of the stage, DC and I started laughing while poor Giovanni said, “What happened?! What was that all about?” Quick thinking from a concerned colleague saved me from another on stage coughing fit, and got everyone’s adrenaline pumping a little bit!

I’m sure this won’t be the last time I use this trick. I just hope I never have a cough while I’m in a costume with a high neckline...