Still Counting

I'm not so good with blog statistics. Occasionally I look at them, but not so much lately. I have the same uneasy relationship with them as I do with box office numbers. My mental health, such as it is, depends on my doing the best I can at whatever I'm thrown at, but stopping short of getting emotionally invested about how many people care.

Yes, that's a dangerous thing when you are trying to balance a budget and eke out some earned income. So on a professional level, I care greatly about whether or not we sell tickets. (I am the master of masochistic box office spreadsheets.) Likewise, I'm glad someone reads the blog, and I suppose that if no one did, I'd just quit. But I can't pay too much attention to the numbers and stay sane. If I had to personally market my services, I'd be unemployed. Just can't do the sales thing. Feels too much like asking your friends to vote for you for class president or something.

Rambling, I am, and too confessional for my own good. All by way of saying that I noticed a few weeks ago that the cumulative blog stats were pushing 100,000. And Saturday night we crossed the line! If you were my 100,000th reader, thank you.

My first car (1969 VW Bug) saw me through to 220,000 miles. And at each 100,000 I stopped wherever I was (once in the farm country of Pennsylvania, once on a side street in northeast DC) and had a little celebration. So I'll take a few seconds to celebrate this milestone and wonder if it bodes well for my sanity that I'm still doing this.



Field Trip. Literally.



Hiked back to the Children's Theatre-in-the-Woods with the Instant Opera cast today. This is when you truly realize that you have signed up to work at a National Park. It was 99 degrees, but spirits were high nonetheless.

Definitely....Not.....Opera

There's an email that goes out to all Wolf Trap Foundation employees the morning of the weekly Little Lunch Music concert. (So that if you'd like to attend you'll know what's coming up, and if you would like to avoid opera at all costs you can plan to be out of the building:) My colleague JW crafts these entertaining missives. This Friday's mini-concert had a different slant - here's the email:

Ever wanted to know exactly what to say to make a soprano rustle her feathers?

Want to know just what phrases will make a tenor get so defensive you can actually see the veins in his neck pop out while he is NOT singing?

Here are a few doozies:

• You’re an opera singer? I LOVE “Phantom” … I’ve seen it a hundred times!
• Which Cat would you most like to be? Can you sing me a bit of “Memories” right now? That’s MY favorite opera.
• Isn’t Andrea Boccelli the BEST!!!??
• Do you actually KNOW Josh Groban?

Why are these such fightin’ words? Because opera singers are FIERCELY protective over their art form, and the aforementioned shows and people, while perfectly lovely …

are not … no way no how, not in a million years, not upside-down, not in a possible space-time continuum, not in Greek nor on Mars …

OPERA.

Please join us TODAY for a lunchtime concert of fantastic “crossover” music which is …

definitely …

NOT …

opera.

When?
July 6 from 12:00 – 12:15 PM.

Where?
In the Earle Williams Learning Center … come listen from the balcony, the main level, or even your office!

What?
“Crossover,” in classical music applies not to a man in a dress, as you may have suspected. Rather, crossover music would imply that although the style of the piece is somewhat more popular or casual than a typical classical selection, the requirements to sing it well demand a classical technique and training.

WHAT???
Basically … we would like to present for you three songs and a chorus which, while sung beautifully and by bona fide opera singers, are …

definitely …

NOT …

opera.

FYI, the selections were "Me" from Beauty and the Beast, "I Never Has Seen Snow" from House of Flowers, and "Being Alive" from Company. (Photos courtesy of EM. Match the pictures to the songs:)






Yes/And

Improv games today with this year's casts for Instant Opera! I partook (is that a word?) for the first couple of hours, then had to go back to my boring grownup activities.

Today's serious comedy work involved Zip Zap Zup, The Name Game, Dr. Know-It-All, Tiger Martian Salesman, and Yes/And.

Pictures Only

After having taken two (count 'em, two!) consecutive days off, I'm far more clear-headed than I've been in weeks. I'm using my newfound (and I'm sure temporary) clarity to plow through the backlog on my desk, so today's blogging is images only. Little of substance, but a pretty good representation of life around here lately.

Instant Opera prep starts tomorrow - the fun is just beginning.

Ciao, Volpone. It was a wild ride.

L'Etoile design presentation

L'Etoile costume sketches (Carol Bailey)

L'Etoile set model (Erhard Rom)

Keeping me company outside my office window.


Today in the copy room. Life is a series of compromises.

Garden Cam. Late June in Zone 6. Gotta love it.

In the Can

I've alluded to this, vaguely and cryptically, over these last weeks. As of 4 hours ago, we now have the raw material for a commercial live recording of Volpone. And this has been possibly the most frustrating and confounding journey of my professional life thus far.

The recording project was launched and cancelled more times than I can count. The path to today was littered with obstacles, aborted attempts, misinformation and misunderstandings. But it also included generous colleagues, helpful advice, supportive coworkers and bosses, and a learning curve that was so fierce that it demanded to be conquered.

I intend to articulate that process here in the blog. It's critical that other small organizations have the chance to learn from our mistakes and our successes. Very little of this journey is private or confidential, and there are no real villains. Yet it was a bigger mess than almost anything I've witnessed. But it will have to wait for a day (week? month?) that is requiring less of me than this midseason whirlwind.

Patch

Yesterday was spent listening to the audio from the first three performances so we could have a short list of things to address during our post-performance patch session today. Fortunately, the list was manageable - largely full of scene change music that in live performance is compromised by unavoidable bumps and bangs. We also polished off a few scenes that needed to be sung from a more stable stage position (read: rather than being sung while running at breakneck speed through doors and up ladders).

Now, Soundmirror will mix and master a composite recording from the live performances and the patch session, and we'll resume the big discussion about record label. But first, we turn our attention to Chabrier's charming L'Etoile, which begins rehearsal tomorrow morning.

Hump Week!

7 down, 7 to go. Good thing, too. I came to work with my clothes on inside-out the other day.

Another Kind of Instant Opera

Carmen in concert on Thursday night. (Photos by Carol Pratt)

With the National Symphony Orchestra, guest artists, chorus, World Children's Choir.

More exhausting than it had any right to be, but more rewarding, too.

Diva and divo (WTOC alums Denyce Graves as Carmen and Simon O'Neill as Jose) were on site for about 3 days, both a bit jet-lagged but happy to be here. I've known Denyce since she was a young artist and I was a staff coach, so it was lovely to catch up again. Simon was here more recently, but his career is really taking off. Bringing both of them on gave us a chance to do something like Carmen - a piece that has great roles for our regular company members, but requires more vocal maturity and heft in its two lead roles.

I was a bit unsure as to how the mixture of young artists and experienced guests would work (it's been over 20 years since we did anything like it), but aside from the first few awkward minutes, it was perfectly fine. Everyone had a job to do and did it well.

Actually, that is the key to these crazy projects. Just a few days from page to stage, and there's no time to coddle or coax. So the success lies in surrounding yourself with people who know their jobs cold and can turn on a dime. Conductor, singers, stage managers, coaches, director (yes, even a concert staging needs a good director), chorus (grownups and children)... the list could go on.

The whole really is bigger than the sum of its parts. Thus it is with a traditional production, but in that case, everyone involved can watch the coming together in a gradual, predictable fashion. With these quickies, the big picture only appears at the single performance, suddenly and belatedly. Fully formed and sprung from the head of Zeus.

And for some reason the administrative burden (oops... rather... administrative contribution) is greater than in a typical production period. So it feels pretty overwhelming to a small staff like ours. It didn't help that the heat on our only day of rehearsal in the theatre was crushing. And I'm not doing so well with heat this year...

Denyce did a Q&A session with guests and young artists as part of Wolf Trap's master class series. We captured some audio, and I need to check it to see if it's usable and editable as a podcast. If the quality is decent and Denyce gives permission, I'll try to get it posted.

Grinding the Gears

Deep into Carmen mode - suddenly and brutally. It always seems as if we should be able to pull off a concert opera with minimal staff and less fuss. But it's always far harder that I remember. (Yes, we all know my memory is not my best feature.) Why can I not learn?

Anyway, all is fine, but we are drowning in the details. Like how to get the refund for the parking ticket validation at the Kennedy Center after the ticket personnel go home. And why it takes so very long to peel off those damn sticky labels and put them in the supertitle score. (At left, in my satellite office in the Hall of Nations...) Note to self: Hire someone to do the &($*% supertitles next year.

But tonight's rehearsal (with the NSO, Denyce Graves, Simon O'Neill, WTOC and World Children's Choir) was exhilarating. Largely due to the magic and mastery of conductor Stephen Lord, who I continue to be able to talk into spending time with us at The Trap. It's the 30th anniversary of his Wolf Trap debut, too, but who's counting? (Doktor Faust, 1977) I learn more about what's happening in the business of opera from Stephen in 4 days than I do the rest of the entire year. And I invariably come away from it thinking that perhaps I need to find another line of work:)


Nice press for last weekend's opening of Volpone. Last I checked, we still had tickets for this coming weekend. There's been a lot of activity, but I don't think it's sold out just yet.

We're Still Here!

When there's time to blog, there's not a whole lot to report. And when there's a lot happening (euphemism for not keeping my head above the operatic waters), there's no time to blog.

Thus, this week-long silence.

Volpone

Nice web feature on WETA.org - go here to listen.
A week of indescribable ups and downs, putting this show on its feet. A tense tech week and bumpy dress rehearsal (no surprise there) led to a terrific first set of performances. Audiences just love this piece. Justice Ginsberg was there today, enjoying her favorite part of this opera - the courtroom scenes.

All photos by Carol Pratt.

The Judges

Celia

Birds of Prey: (L-R) Cornaccio, Corvina, Voltore

Erminella

Bonario

Mosca

The Moscateers (L-R) Epicene, Nano, Castrato

Big Daddy Fox

Death by Aria

Yesterday, our annual parade of party pieces for the Wolf Trap Associates. Not really "Death by Aria", as we fondly christened the event decades ago. Everything from verismo to Broadway, with a virtuoso Falstaff fugue ending by the Studio. Photos later.

Wait, There's More

It's been a series of long days broken only by a raucous 50th birthday celebration on Thursday. (And of course, now that I'm that old, I have the right to complain, right?)

Documenting a few days-in-the-life as a way of convincing myself that I'm tired not just because I'm old, and also to demonstrate to the loyal readership that the blog silence wasn't deliberate...

FRIDAY

9:30 - Facilitate radio interview with Volpone composer & librettist. (Sent unsuspecting colleague to Baltimore with the duo.)

10:30 - Practice the piano (a.k.a. omigod where are my chops) for lunchtime concert.

11:15 - Prepare for NEA luncheon

12:00 - Bash through arias and Falstaff finale at lunch concert. Escape with dignity reasonably intact.

12:45 - Make brief presentation for visiting NEA panel.

2:00 - Make corrections to supertitles for tonight's Volpone opening.

3:30 - Run through more arias for tomorrow's donor concert. Try to remember how to transpose. (Where are my chops? Did I suddenly get stupider now that I'm 50???)

5:00 - Ask intern to please do surgery on powerpoint presentation for preshow talk.

6:00 - Load supertitle corrections into the file. Negotiate with cranky projector

6:30 - Give a passing thought to what I might say at the preshow talk.

7:05 - Breathe sigh of relief as composer and librettist show up at preshow talk and happily dominate the conversation.

7:45 - Check in at box office. Only a few last-minute surprises.

8:05 - Enjoy opening performance, with exception of cranky supertitle projector that is cutting off some of the cues.

10:30 - Curtain. General rejoicing.

11:00 - More practicing for tomorrow's donor concert.

12:30 - Try to write notes for remarks for tomorrow's concert.

1:45 - OK, I've had it.

SATURDAY

10:15 - Open up the theatre. Check air conditioning. More time at the keyboard.

11:45 - It's as good as it's going to get. Change clothes and double-check notebook of music. Get cranky about being indoors on the most beautiful day of the whole summer.

1:00 - Brief Falstaff rehearsal

2:00 - Death by Aria. Lots of fun. Truly.

3:30 - Chat with patrons at reception, several of whom ask why I haven't written in the blog since Monday. :)

5:00 - Return to the office, work for a while, then decide to quit because I seem to be getting stupider by the minute.

7:30 - Decide to watch The Departed DVD with my husband while working on Carmen supertitles. Bad idea. Got totally lost in the movie. And heaven knows what effect it had on the titles.

10:00 - Tomorrow's another day.

SUNDAY

10:00 - Follow through on various arrangements for local transportation for visiting artists; picking up, dropping off, getting food, etc.

11:00 - More changes on supertitles and more negotiations with cranky projector. Think we have it figured out.

12:30 - Now the projector for the preshow presentation is cranky, too. I really have the A/V touch this weekend, it seems.

1:00 - Happily allow composer and librettist to do the preshow talk.

2:00 - Spend the entire Volpone performance on the steps behind the curtain at the back of the house working on the schedule for tomorrow.

4:30 - Volpone curtain

5:00 - Geni audition for Magic Flute

5:15 - Carmen run-through (Figured I'd better go to Carmen rehearsal soon, since the assistant conductor recently sent me this photo of their progress. Frasquita as Cousin It.)

7:30 - Carmen production team meeting

8:30 - My daughter made dinner!

9:30 - Export Carmen supertitles. Trim, tweak, tease.

11:00 - Blog!

Back in a day or two. Promise.