A Syllabus and a Follow-Up

First, a peek at the outline I've been working on for the 5-week Inside Opera class I'll be teaching here at Wolf Trap this spring. 400 years of opera in approximately 7.5 hours :)

SESSION 1 – HOW IT ALL BEGAN
From Florence to London

• OPERA PEOPLE: Divas & Divos
• TOOLS: Recitative & Arias
• FACH: Mezzos & Friends
• THE BIG IDEA: Words & Music

SESSION 2 – THE PENDULUM SWINGS
Classicism to Buffa

• OPERA PEOPLE: Composers & Librettists
• TOOLS: Ensembles
• FACH: Baritone
• THE BIG IDEA: Mozart

SESSION 3 – OLIVE OIL
Bel Canto to Verismo

• OPERA PEOPLE: The Chorus
• TOOLS: The Singer’s Technique
• FACH: Tenor
• THE BIG IDEA: Death Be Not Loud

SESSION 4 – ANYTHING YOU WANT, AS LONG AS YOU SING IT
Grand Opera

• OPERA PEOPLE: The Orchestra
• TOOLS: Language
• FACH: Soprano
• THE BIG IDEA: Gesamtkunstwerk

SESSION 5 – SPRAWLING AND GLORIOUS
Opera in Our Time

• OPERA PEOPLE: Conductors, Directors & Designers
• TOOLS: Park ‘n’ Bark Meets Stanislawski
• FACH: Bass
• BIG IDEA: Where Do We Go From Here?

If you live in the DC area and you're interested in signing up, you should be able to find information at www.wolftrap.org/education in a couple of weeks. Or, you could send me an email, and I'll make sure you get the information. It's on 5 Monday evenings between March 24 and April 21. Plenty of interesting stuff for opera fans and newbies alike.

Had a Bad Audition?

Singers may be interested in this exchange, which recently took place in the Comments section of Josh's post on The Audition Game:

Anonymous said...

This past fall, I sang for the Studio program. I would relish the opportunity to hear feedback about my audition - except for the fact that this was my worst audition yet. I'm sure that the feedback would be framed in a positive manner - all my experiences with Wolf Trap and their personnel have been fabulous - but I still feel like I'd be setting myself up for a bruising by asking for feedback from an audition that 1) I didn't think went well and 2) was months ago!However, Wolf Trap is so generous to offer feedback that I feel foolish for NOT asking for feedback. Josh and Kim, what would you do? I ask mostly because it seems like a pattern that even more established singers might experience.

A response from Josh:

Really good question. As a singer, I have to say that I probably would not ask for feedback from an audition that I felt was NOT reflective of my usual abilities. (Just being honest.) I am not sure I would be interested in having someone pass on their observations of me on an off day... I would probably be very likely to dismiss any constructive criticism, assuming it was not about me at all, but rather in observance of whoever that beast was that crept in and impersonated me! As an administrator, however, I would say you should really go ahead and ask. You may be surprised, especially if the feedback contains comments that you have heard before from coaches and teachers that you trust... it may prove to you that even when you feel you are at your worst, your level of auditioning is more consistent than you think. That applies not only to those elements that you need to work on to improve, but also to those things that we felt were successful.

And a postscript from Kim:

If you feel you have a handle on the specific ways in which you underperformed (vocal indisposition affecting a particular aspect of your technique; general indisposition affecting energy level or focus), then it might be just fine to get feedback. Because if what you hear from us aligns with your own impressions of what didn't go well that day, then some of your questions are answered.On the other hand, if you just feel it all went badly, and the feedback might just confuse you because you wouldn't be able to project backward and figure out which comments, if any, are truly useful - well then, it might make more sense to just move on.

Inside Wolf Trap Opera Casting

A guest post from Joshua Winograde

ossia A Semi-Outsider Perspective on an Amazing System

ossia Why You Might Want To Take It All Slightly Less Personally

CHAPTER ONE: What You Maybe Didn’t Know About Wolf Trap

Wolf Trap Opera Company gave me my first job … three times. First, when I was a grad student transitioning into a year-round Young Artist Program I became a Filene Young Artist and sang in five operas and four recitals over the course of two summers. Second, when Wolf Trap commissioned the world premiere of John Musto’s Volpone I was given my first guest artist contract to sing the title role. Third, when I decided to give the exciting world of Young Artist training a whirl as an administrator, Wolf Trap gave me my first “desk job” which was to help create and manage the Wolf Trap Opera Studio.

It would be redundant and a profound understatement to say that I am eternally indebted to this amazing place. Not just for the career opportunities Wolf Trap has given me on every level, but for shaping the way I view this incredible art form. As an artist I was always aware of the good vibe going around the Wolf Trap Opera Company. It’s one of the reason people love coming back: it just feels good to work here. And having now been a staff member, I am floored to see what a well-run and progressive place it is on every level of the whole Foundation. It is traditional where tradition works best, yet can be cutting edge where tradition no longer applies. It is reverent to art and music that has survived the centuries, yet is always willing to expose Monteverdi and Mozart for the rude (lewd?) little devils they could sometimes be. The entire Wolf Trap Foundation has achieved this wonderful balance, and you can see, feel, and hear that special quality in every department. I would venture to say that calling Wolf Trap’s modus operandi “revolutionary” is only a little bit dramatic. (“Progressive” might be more on track, but hey, I’m an opera singer and I tend toward the hyperbolic :)

This is all background information that I felt you should know before I get to opera casting.


CHAPTER TWO: WTOC Casting - Why It Is So Much Harder Than It Needs To Be (In a GOOD Way)

One major example of Wolf Trap’s revolutionary – ok, fine! – progressive approach to the performing arts is the way the Opera Company casts and programs its seasons. To be precise: the Wolf Trap Opera Company works backwards.

Most opera companies choose repertoire, then cast that repertoire with the best matches they can find for each role. That system definitely works, and what’s more, it allows companies to hire directors, conductors, and designers WELL in advance. It also allows companies to start fundraising for specific shows, to plan marketing and outreach strategies, and to get the word out to various target audiences. Wouldn’t that be easier on so many levels? YES!

What I mean by “backwards” is this: WTOC hears hundreds of singers and chooses the repertoire based on whom they’ve heard. That means that the entire season plan can shift on a dime as late as the final singer at 6 PM on the very last day of auditions. And this kind of rollercoaster happens EVERY SEASON!

The following is a slightly fictionalized re-enactment, and any resemblance to actual events is only partially coincidental.

Last year, I remember how beautifully the casting seemed to be falling into place for Hansel and Gretel. KPW heard the perfect Hansel, the perfect Gretel, the perfect Witch, the perfect Father… and then who walked in but Mr. Amazing Bass #1 and Mr. Amazing Bass #2 – basically back to back! Basses are, quite simply, a rare breed and you can never count on hearing very many in any given season. One a day would be a lot!

These TWO fantastic basses walked in, sang the heck out of a couple of arias each, and KPW turned and said, after spending thousands of minutes figuring out how to produce, cast, and market a Humperdinck opera to sell up to 12,000 seats: “I guess we’re doing Magic Flute this year!”

WHAT??? What happened to how perfectly the Hansel could also sing Hermia opposite the Demitrius who would be such a great Guglielmo with the Despina who could sing the heck out of Sandman AND Dewfairy??? And now you wanna do MAGIC FLUTE???? Is it possible to offer Hansel the 2nd Lady, and Gretel the role of Papagena, and 3rd Lady to the Witch? Maybe, but you get my point.

On one hand, choosing rep for a particular person is not a new idea: most major companies like, let’s say HGO, will plan, let’s say, a Traviata around someone like, let’s say, Renee Fleming, who may decide that it is a role she would like to add to her repertoire two or three or six years down the line. But that leaves a LOT of time to find the perfect Alfredo, Germont, and Doctor Grenvil (did I mention I was Doctor Grenvil in Renee’s first Traviata at HGO?). But at Wolf Trap, these decisions are happening in any given January for this coming summer only 5 months away!!!

Now that we have added the Wolf Trap Opera Studio to this casting equation, there is a new piece of the puzzle to fit in. The Studio Artists are cast in small roles and in the chorus of the Barns operas. First and foremost, the Studio Artists as an ensemble MUST populate a wonderful and repertoire-specific chorus. Any small roles or role-studies are perks based on the current readiness of individual Studio applicants.

Let’s use the comparison example of the Cosi-Midsummer-Hansel season that became Volpone-L’Etoile-Flute basically overnight, here is how it all affected the Studio Artist casting:

STUDIO CASTING EXAMPLE #1

Cosi
Studio Artists must sing chorus, so we know we need more or less 3 sopranos, 3 mezzos, 3 tenors, 4 bar/basses
Possible Despina and Alfonso study-roles if a perfect match presents itself

Midsummer
no adult chorus
Puck: smallish guy, lots of acting and dance experience, good rhythm
Snout and Starveling: tenor and baritone

Hansel
Nothing

So you can see that in EXAMPLE #1 we have the freedom to choose the Studio Artist with very few limitations other than by voice type.

STUDIO CASTING EXAMPLE #2

Volpone
Soprano Judge, tricky to cast
Baritone Judge, strong high F
Bass Judge, sits on a low G for DAYS
Epicene, funny mezzo who needs to imitate a bass for one page
Castrato, soprano or male-soprano
Nano, bass
Police Capt., baritone, tricky rhythmically
NO chorus

L’Etoile
SATB chorus that is much more demanding than Cosi: the women sing REALLY high and the men sing REALLY low … a lot!
Patacha and Zalzal, tenor and high baritone

Flute
Nothing

So you can see that when Mr. Bass #1 and Mr. Bass #2 walked in, the equation shifted dramatically not only for the Filene Young Artists, but for the Studio Artists as well. Now we need to make sure that there are very specific voices in the Studio. Now that we need two baritones and two basses for Volpone, for example, we may no longer be able to offer a spot to a wonderful bass-baritone who would have been a perfect Alfonso study-cover. Also, now that we have the role of Castrato, we can seriously consider a countertenor that we would not have been able to in EXAMPLE #1. I mean, who would ever know that the reason they did or did not get in to the Wolf Trap Opera Studio was because of those two awesome basses?


CHAPTER THREE – Why Am I Writing This?

Having heard about a hundred Studio auditions in the last week, and having another hundred more scheduled for next week, I felt compelled to get these thoughts out. For some reason recently I have been asked the same question by several singers, voice teachers, and administrators: “How does Wolf Trap Opera choose its singers?” which to me translates to “Do you think I/my student/such-and-such singer will get in to Wolf Trap”? The answer can be as short as “I have no idea.” But as you can see, it is nowhere near that simple. I think it does singers good to know some of the insider perspective. In fact, now that I reflect on every time I didn’t get, let’s say, a Figaro that I really wanted, I can just let go of so much frustration, because how would I know if it came down to something as simple as being too tall for the 5’3” Susanna and the 5’7” Count? Or maybe they wanted the Figaro to also sing Escamillo in the same season (a role I am just not right for).

Knowing this about casting in general, and specifically about Wolf Trap Opera Company and Studio, whose repertoire is so tailor-made to each season’s artists, just might help a few of you to let go of what it essentially out of your control. Having said that, what IS in your control is developing the skills needed to audition and perform as best as you can.

Steve Smith, a fantastic New York City-based voice teacher, just wrote a book about what he calls “Whole-istic Singing” which is modeled after holistic medicine. The focus of holistics is to address the small, internal components of any issue rather than to simply treat the symptoms. In other words, DO the right things and the right result will HAPPEN. For example: rather than taking decongestants, cough suppressants, and an anti-inflammatory to mask the symptoms of a cold, the focus should be on sharpening the immune system through nutrition, rest, and stress-reducing. The RESULT will be that the cold doesn’t get you next time, or at the very least that your body gets rid of it quickly. In the long run, it seems to me to be a much more gratifying solution than being hopped up on Theraflu every few months. The same can be said for singing: rather than worrying about the RESULTS – i.e. Did they like me? Did I sound great? Will I get a role? – you should think only about the small things: excellent language, good breathing and vocal technique, connection to the text, having something to say, presenting yourself professionally, etc. Those things are very much IN your control, and I bet you’d be surprised at how much faster the RESULTS roll in.

Has this made any sense? If not, just think of it as five minutes of your time wasted reading the 4 AM ramblings of someone who meant well but got caught up in a tangent.

If it did make sense, cool.

Is It Crowded in Here?

Remember Sybil? I guess she made an impression on me because I was in thrall of a music therapy career at that time, fascinated by all manner of personality disorders. (Plus, my own very sheltered childhood included a Sally Field fixation.)

There have been far too few hours in these recent days. The combination of the abrupt frequent changes of gears and the lack of sleep has made it seem as though a temporary (purely recreational) dissociative identity disorder might be just the ticket.


Thelma, Mild-Mannered Arts Administrator

Thelma has been dogged by guilt this week, for she has let many things slip through the cracks. Ready or not, opera will be happening in just 6 weeks, and she is ill prepared. Verdi orchestra parts must be created, Handel cut lists must be finalized, and Candide roles must be assigned.

Web page content needs to be fleshed out, program copy begs to be written and supertitles cry out for attention. Guests artists and teachers must be booked for seminars. (She's thinking that a website development session might be helpful - not the nuts and bolts, but how to find a designer and what to expect.) And Thelma knows that there's no time for any of this nonsense once artists arrive. On your mark... set... administrate!


Ella Mae, Fearless Accompanist

If Ella Mae were of a younger generation, she'd call herself a Collaborative Pianist. But old habits die hard.

She had far too good a time playing a concert last week. Crazy transpositions and lead sheets and all. The day of the performance, just in the nick of time, she remembered an important lesson. Rehearsing with singers gives a pianist a good amount of inadvertent practice, but only on the "sung" portion of the rep. But what about those preludes, interludes and postludes... when no one is singing? That's when the audience listens to the pianist. Oops... those are the parts Ella Mae always forgets to practice. But she generally found her way to that magic place between accuracy and fakery, and she made some pretty good music.

Singers for this program were former Wolf Trappers, and it was such a joy to make music with them. Being a mentor is wonderful, but it's refreshing to shed the coach/teacher mantle and just be a colleague.


Priscilla, Inspirational Opera Lecturer

Remember the Inside Opera class that began March 24? Imagine Priscilla's surprise when she realized that it was really happening the same week as the aforementioned rehearsals. Teaching this class seemed like such a good idea a few months ago...

Priscilla managed to pull off Session 1, and the response was gratifying. She had a great time with the Florentine Camerata, Monteverdi, Handel, deux ex machina and Farinelli. By tomorrow evening she'll figure out how to jam Mozart, bel canto, librettists, supertitles, baritones, and commedia dell-arte into 90 minutes.


Mazie, Crazy Jazz Pianist

Overlaid on all of this opera are crazy fun rehearsals for Cy Coleman's City of Angels. Mazie is having the best time with all these cool half-diminished and major-minor-ninth chords. Yum. She did a production of On the Twentieth Century a lifetime ago and has been waiting 25 years to get back to Cy.


Harriet, the Happy Housewife

Well, Harriet hasn't been to the grocery store for 3 weeks, so she's not going to win any awards. But she did do laundry today, and she swept up the worst of the dirt on the floor. She made a quick shopping trip to look for a new sofa, but got into a fight with Mazie, who quickly established dominance and blew the sofa budget on a cool new Yamaha S90ES. I guess Harriet can sit on the floor a little longer.

Journeys with Così: An Overture and Five Chapters

Overture

In a previous life, I worked for several years in the mental health field. Shortly after I transitioned to the opera business (yes, as I'm often told, not a change of career, just a change of venue...), Howard Gardner's theory of Multiple Intelligences became all the rage. I bought all of his books and immersed myself in what seemed to be a concept that was so fundamentally sound and obvious that it seemed impossible that no one had explored it before. Of course, it didn't spring from nowhere - there were plenty of antecedents, and there have been countless new and similar theories since. But to me, it was rocket science. Exciting and world-changing.

Had the internet existed at the time, I mightn't have tunneled so deeply inside this theory. But I was alone with my books, and I spent several years applying the multiple intelligences approach to my musical life. It completely changed the way I approached learning and performing music, and it fundamentally altered the way I coached and taught. For a time I even had pipe dreams about writing a book on the application of multiple intelligences in the performing arts, but I was sort of interrupted by child-bearing and child-rearing. :)

So what does this have to do with Così?

I'm approaching my 5th Così. And it feels (in a good way) like completely new territory. Familiar, yes, but not the least bit predictable. (Unlike my eight Flutes, which always seem like Groundhog Day. But that's another story.) As I stewed on this a few weeks ago, it occurred to me that each one of my Così experiences was approached in a very different way. There was a distinctly different agenda for each one, and yes, they align in a curious way with Gardner's Multiple Intelligences (visual, aural, kinesthetic, linguistic, mathematical, interpersonal, and intrapersonal).

So, here's the table of contents:

Chapter 1 - I'm Playing as Fast as I Can
1989, The Washington Opera (kinesthetic, mathematical)

Chapter 2 - Guns? Really?
1991, Wolf Trap Opera (intrapersonal, interpersonal)

Chapter 3 - Recitative Whiplash
1995, Wolf Trap Opera (aural)

Chapter 4 - Imposter Syndrome
1998, Wolf Trap Opera (visual)

Chapter 5 - Let Me Tell You a Story
2009, Wolf Trap Opera (linguistic)

This tale, serialized and posted in installments. See you next week in 1989.

Sacred Monsters and Nice Guys

Master classes are many-headed monsters. I've seen very few that deliver significant results and even fewer that purport to be about what they say they are. But according to Sunday's New York Times, it sounds as if Barbara Cook is using this format to do important work with young singers.

The master classes that are really star turns for divas (or divos, thank you very much) or other ego-driven individuals are often destructive. I won't go so far as to believe that they're malicious in intent. But they often revolve around vocal/technical issues that are unwisely addressed in 15 minutes in front of hundreds of people. And there are hidden agendas that are counter-productive, to say the least.

Ms. Cook tells singers that "Your own humanity is your pathway to artistry." But any performer will tell you that allowing one's humanity to speak through the music is threatening and risky. And most of the training that we foist upon young singers is designed to reduce risk. As it should be. After all, there has to be a foundation. But somewhere, somehow, that essential risk must be honored.

She tells them "The place that seems most dangerous is exactly where safety lies." In futher elaboration by Times writer Charles Isherwood: "...self-exposure and the abandonment of technical propriety, scary as it was, was the surest, the best, maybe the only way to communicate with an audience."

Sacred Monsters

It's easy for us to see this phenomenon in opera's stereotypical and often dysfunctional diva culture. (Those same divas who insist on torturing students in master classes:)) These are people who live on the edge, who thrive on risk, danger, and confrontation. They strike fear in the hearts of mild-mannered administrators such as myself, and they find worthy sparring partners in the form of strong-willed impresarios. They have thrived in opera's culture almost from its beginning.

We, the audience, crave their potency and intensity. The art form itself consists of simple ideas, emotions, and truths that are so saturated that they be stretched out over a 3-hour opera and still speak to us. Our artists cannot pale beside this vivid material. The opera culture has always welcomed these larger-than-life creatures, and they have found a home there.

Nice Guys

There will always be divas and sacred monsters in our business. But as we strive to bring opera into the mainstream and to allow the education of our next generation of singers to be less haphazard (dare I say more thorough and linear...) we welcome a higher percentage of aspiring performers who just may be slightly less neurotic and self-destructive than many of their predecessors. Are we selling these young artists a bill of goods? We say, "Be respectful colleagues, run your singing business conscientiously, moderate your lifestyle and take judicious care of your instrument, be a 'well-rounded' person." When was the last time you paid over $100 for a front orchestra seat to hear a careful and cautious performer?

I've veered slightly past my goal in order to make a point. Do I want the performers of tomorrow to be destructive to others and dangerous to themselves? Of course not. But we should lose no opportunity to remind them never to lose their connection to that part of themselves that is so potent and laser-focused that it will speak to someone in the back row. We all have it somewhere inside us. In the 21st century we're all increasingly good at tamping it down. Technology and mass culture are its enemies. Live performance - the opportunity to allow another person and his connection to the music to touch us - will keep us connected to our humanity.

Up on the Roof

Many years ago, when we were younger and climbing on the roof every December seemed like a reasonable thing to do, we unwittingly established a Christmas decoration tradition. A few years ago we decided to take a year off, and by the week before Christmas we had strangers knocking on our door, making sure that we were all OK, that no one in the house was sick or anything. Why else would we miss putting up our lights?

Anyway, the weather hasn't cooperated this year. Cold, windy, and snowy since Thanksgiving. But yesterday found us up on the top of the house, grumbling just a little. Shoveling and sweeping snow off the roof before fighting with the damn strings of lights. Bah humbug.

Today my back aches but I know why we did it. No matter your religious, metaphysical or philosophical perspective, it's hard to deny that as we head toward next week's solstice, we need light.

Cheaper than Therapy

A few weeks ago I started getting responses to the unedited audition comments that I'd begun to post. Some feedback came in the form of posted comments (anyone can comment on an entry by clicking the link at the bottom), some were emails sent to my address (see right), and others were posted on forums and other websites.

"You Go, Girl"

There were quite a few encouraging responses, and that was a great relief. I had debated long and hard before including these comments on the blog, but ultimately decided to go for it for the following reasons.

• Many singers actually believe that what audition panels write and say about them is far more vituperative and downright mean than it actually is.
• Many times, auditioners get bogged down in details (what if I breathe in the middle of that one phrase... is that "e" open or closed... should I say anything when I enter the room...) or despair over a single cracked high note or forgotten word. The big picture is far more important, and again and again, responses to the auditions show this.
• And (this is the most difficult one), many singers never have the opportunity to receive and integrate specific feedback. The Emperor's New Clothes is alive and well in conservatory and studio situations. I'm all for unconditional love and encouragement, but it only gets you so far. Even if feedback is all wrong, you have to learn how to deal with it.

The Dark Side

I filter ("moderate") the comments to this blog, which means that I see them before I allow them to be visible from the website. I've only witheld a few. Many bloggers won't publish anything that is signed "Anonymous", but I realize that singers and colleagues may have legitimate gripes with a posting but be justifiably afraid of saying so and signing their real names.

Generally, the objections go like this:

• You must hate singers.
• You are unbelievably self-important.
• How could you be so pretentious?
• You know nothing about singing/opera/singers, etc.
• My favorite recent one reminds us that "persons involved in opera are genetically predisposed to ego and drama."

Now, I realize that most of you don't know me. But the craziest part about this is that I've been struggling all my life to have the courage to speak my mind, believe in my instincts, and be convinced that my opinion has any value. And any of us who last more than a few minutes in this business have to have a healthy ego. But drama queen? I wish. I can't even throw a diva fit when my life depends on it.

Of course, the whole damn blog is about my opinions. That's the nature of the beast. If this were a third-person, just-the-facts narrative, no one would read it. But in finding out that readers believe I am boorishly overconfident and pretentious, I realize that I've come a long way. And probably saved myself thousands of dollars in therapy.

Anyway, in spite of my brave defense, I've been scared off just a little. For sure won't post any more comments, and will probably be a little gun-shy for a while. But I'll get over it.

Concert Report

Recital with Alan Held last Friday was one of those nights that's all about the music. I'm not prone to jitters, but I usually have to battle several crises of confidence during any given performance. (Did I really mean to choose that tempo? Was that dynamic choice too indulgent? What was I thinking??) But that little evil voice inside my head was quiet. Probably because I'd been so sick that I was just relieved to be there at all. And because my colleague was so calmly and unswervingly confident that I didn't have to absorb any free-flowing anxiety. And because I was so giddy that all of the various bells and whistles in my pre-show talk (video, wireless audio, iPod, PowerPoint...) functioned flawlessly.

Finally, Looking toward Summer!

First big project: Figaro! We're doing a brand-new production of Figaro in the Filene Center in August - the first time in over 25 years that we've built an opera production for that theatre. If you've followed the Filene Center opera discussion that we started last summer, you know that we've had our challenges. But this approach will allow us to take artistic ownership in this production in much the same way that we take great pride in all of the new productions we do for The Barns. And, believe it or not (and it does strain credulity), we'll be able to do it without spending any more money than we did to rent.

Excited about Figaro, as I always am. I'm as weary as you of the Mozart hype, and I get impatient with the "timeless masterpiece" approach. But I've done 8 Figaros, and each time I enjoy it more. Reading about David McVicar's production that just opened at Covent Garden has further whetted my appetite. Lots of people disagree with him, but I'm totally on board. The legacy of the play is revolutionary, but the primary experience of the opera is about the people. I started out with Figaro as a newlywed who shared Susanna's excitement; I returned to it many times to cry with the Countess, and now I've moved on to Marcellina.

Didn't mean to go on that long... plenty more where that came from... back in a few days!

Chapter 1 - I'm Playing As Fast as I Can

For context on this post, go here.

My first full Così was at Washington National Opera in 1989 (then The Washington Opera, a.k.a. TWO, when I was a proud member of the TWOTWO's - The Women of The Washington Opera). I was the only pianist/coach assigned to the show, and the conductor was one of the best Mozart pianists of our time. I was terrified.

I had recently survived a confusing and misguided struggle with carpal tunnel syndrome, and it had left me with a lingering lack of confidence in my keyboard technique. (Misguided because I spent two years deconstructing and reconstructing my technique, only to find out that the whole thing was hormonally induced, then undergoing carpal tunnel surgery.) Playing Mozart for this conductor had me so intimidated that I retreated inside my physical technique in a way I nevber had before.

I had never trained to be a solo pianist, and I had developed curious ways of approaching things that had more to do with recreating an orchestral sound at the piano than they did with building a pristine keyboard technique. The conductor used to come around behind my shoulder, watch my "nervous repetition" and alternately shake his head in wonder and cluck his disapproval. ("Nervous" in this case not having anything to do with my terror; it just means banging out a single note or chord in quick succession by kind of hammering at it, instead of using finger-substitution. Sorry - no more pianist jargon, I promise.)

In that way, this was my kinesthetic Così. I was so preoccupied with my own body and its relationship to the piano that I missed many other things. But it was still an important gateway to the piece. I still remember the hours of trying to make what was on the printed page for "Soave sia il vento" (which kind of looks like a Hanon exercise in E Major) reconcile with the shimmering sound the orchestra made when it played it. And, this being my first big experience with playing technical rehearsals on both the piano and the harpsichord (for recits), I was finding my sea legs on how to move my hands to the harpsichord in a split second and have it not sound like I was playing it with oven mitts on.

I had also retreated inside my body because I was in the first trimester of my second pregnancy, and I spent long 4-hour staging sessions wondering if I could wait until the next break to throw up.)

This Così also was a mathematical one. Gardner calls this intelligence "mathematical/logical." In music, it has everything to do with architecture and structure. Understanding Mozart as a pianist is a challenging and rewarding thing, but it barely prepares you for wrapping your mind around what it takes to create an overall structure for a 3.5-hour Mozart opera. The pacing, the way that the small moments need to stack up as building blocks for the entire evening - that's a left-brain task in the extreme. 20 years later I am still in awe of conductors who can do it, and I first became aware of its terrifying significance in my first Così at the Kennedy Center.

Next: Chapter 2 - Guns? Really?

A Day in the Life

What all fashionable denizens of the Underworld are wearing these days.

Front:


Back



Friday, 6/23/06

9:15am: Emails
Calm, reassuringly boring start to the day, spent answering correspondence. What did we do before we had email? Did we talk to people on the phone? Did we remember any of what we said?

11:15am: Costume load-in
Costume rentals for Figaro arriving. Since our shop is full of Ory and Orpheus costumes at the moment, this meant that the administrative staff (me, the Program Coordinator, and our intern) retrieved the costumes and put them in temporary storage.

12:30pm: Grants meeting
Brainstorming about upcoming grant applications for the opera company and for our chamber music radio series (Center Stage from Wolf Trap).

1:00pm: Lunch.
Wendy's take-out, dripping all over notes for my comments for tomorrow afternoon's company concert.

2:15pm: Rehearsal
...for "What A Movie" segment for tomorrow's concert. Hawai'ian shirts and leis.

3:00pm: More prep for tomorrow's concert.
Find tenor aria from Koenigin von Saba. Sketch in some more remarks. Try to find my chops...

4:15pm: Scheduling
Wrestle some of next week's scheduling issues to the ground. Too many people in too few places for too few hours. Gridlock.

5:00pm: Rehearsals for tomorrow's concert.
Actually, that's an overstatement. We just sort of sing/play through the arias to feel better about having said we were rehearsing them...

5:45pm: Inside the Opera prep
Set up audio and powerpoint for tonight's pre-show talk.

6:00pm: Meeting with NEA site visitor.
Was supposed to be over dinner, but there was too much to cover. Gazed longingly at the food.

7:00pm: Inside the Opera pre-show talk.
Didn't get asked too many questions that I couldn't answer.

7:50pm: Dinner?
Looped back to find the lovely sandwiches and salad that we didn't get to eat earlier. Gone!! (Discovered later over at the theatre, thanks goodness!)
8:00pm: Orpheus performance #3.

11:20pm: Set the theatre
...for tomorrow's company concert for the Wolf Trap Associates.

11:30pm: Practice.
Has anyone seen my chops?

1:00am
Home

Concert for the Wolf Trap Associates

Always a lovely event. Receptive, enthusiastic, warm audience. Each of our singers gets to perform an aria/song of his/her choice. Today's menu:

O mio babbino caro
Nobles Seigneurs, salut
Ah, Pescator

Klänge der Heimat
Magische Töne

Jeremy Little, tenor
Nandi's Love Song
In quegli anni

Se vuol ballare

Que les destins prosperes
Von ewiger Liebe

Sein wir wieder gut
Donde lieta

È sogno
Ain’t It a Pretty Night?

Silver Aria

Shenandoah
Ah, lêve-toi, soleil
What a Movie!

It's always a privilege for me to sit at the piano and make music with each year's group of artists, and this afternoon was a highlight of the summer. Group photo of this year's fabulous group ensemble:

One more Orpheus tomorrow. Improv training for Instant Opera! starts Monday. Comte Ory proceeds apace. Figaro and Romeo prep continues.

07.13.08

10:30 am - WT Opera Studio audition class

11:15 am - Work commences on the next day's schedule

11:40 am - Practice room hallway fills up

12:20 pm - Patrons begin to arrive for preshow talk

12:30pm - WTOS singers enjoy post-class bagels

12:40 pm - Turn on preshow powerpoint loop

12:50 pm - Morgana warms up before her hair & makeup call

1:45 pm - Bradamante warms up al fresco

1:55 pm - Life in the House Manager's office just feels like a multiple exposure

2:15 pm - Alcina Act 1 on the steps. Handel inside the curtain, check request forms outside.

2:55 pm - Piano moving. Don't ask.

3:10 pm - Instant Opera rehearsal

3:30 pm - So this is what the Alcina chorus does in Act II.

3:55 pm - F&B staff await second intermission

3:40 pm - Camera misplaced, then returned bearing mysterious photo

4:10 pm - Backstage left

5:25 pm - Crash in the lobby

6:35 pm - Opera Goes to the Improv Show #1. "In the Duck Blind"

8:45 pm - Opera Goes to the Improv show #2. "The Great Deficit"

11:55 pm - Baltimore Washington International Airport. Retrieve guest artist who had a 7-hour flight delay. Check out the flight options to Aruba.

2:07 am Monday - Post Version 3 of tomorrow's schedule. To bed by 3, then up at 4:30 to see my charming son off to college orientation.

Since July 13 really did feel as if it lasted for two days, it will hereby qualify as two blog postings. Taking the rest of the day off. See you Tuesday.

Stars and Sillies

Thinking a lot about star power and large personalities. Three days' worth in this weekend's National Symphony Orchestra concerts: Lang Lang, James Galway, Marvin Hamlisch.

I worked the Lang Lang concert. It's always fascinating to see a pianist who's completely at home at the keyboard. There are pianists who conquer the instrument, who dominate it and make it speak volumes. But it doesn't always follow that the keyboard seems to be a completely natural extension of them. I'm not being articulate, but the distinction seems so very clear somewhere inside my head.

I didn't work the Galway concert because I had a technical rehearsal for L'Etoile. But I made a quick run over to the theatre to hear the Pines of Rome that was supposed to follow Galway's appearance. Got there a few minutes early, just in time for his Danny Boy encore. It was a long night, with several hours ahead yet, and the idea of Danny Boy wasn't particularly appealing. Guess I was having a music snob moment.

I have to say, though, that even though the idea felt like kitsch, the execution was completely satisfying. Simple, honest, heartfelt, unapologetic, all that good stuff. Followed by some gloriously bloated Respighi, complete with bird calls, 32' organ stops and herald trumpets from the U.S. Army Band. Emil de Cou called it a giant deep-friend symphonic Twinkie. (To truly appreciate Emil's wacky sense of humor, spend a couple of minutes with his YouTube ad for our NSO concerts.)





Life After the Woods




We finished up our week of Instant Opera with a couple of atypically glorious midsummer mornings. You've heard me talk a lot about this project, but I'm struck again and again by how well this experiment seems to have turned out. We started out 2 years ago with a goal that even we weren't sure we could reach. And we surpassed it.

What do the kids and their parents seem to learn from these crazy mornings of improvisational acting and singing?

That there are smart and funny 20-somethings who sing opera.

That they do it willingly and happily at 11am for hundreds of small children.

That the crazy conventions of opera are pretty simple after all. By the end of the show, everyone knows the difference between bravo, brava and bravi. They can also order a hamburger in recitative.

That there can be a sense of excitement and total investment in opera that has nothing to do with the stereotype of large immobile people in boring costumes parking and barking.

And, as if that weren't enough, what do the participants take away from the woods?

Well, for starters, that they can get up on stage and negotiate every curve ball thrown at them for 15 whole minutes and live to tell the tale.

That they have the recipe for Mozart recitative so firmly imprinted on their subconscious that they can navigate around the circle of fifths unerringly and convincingly.

That their colleagues are not only talented, they are also gracious.

That it's possible to bring their art to the uninitiated without boring themselves or patronizing the audience.

That almost nothing will happen to them onstage for the next 20 years that will surprise them.

Next year we're upping the ante. Improvised English text during the arias.

Warsaw

Once again, the Sunday New York Times was a source of amusement and amazement, this time in the form of James Oestreich's diagram for Finta giardiniera. After all of these years of embarrassment over my anal-retentive plot and character diagrams, I can finally hold my head high, knowing I'm in distinguished company.

I've been working on my own diagram as I prepare a talk for Washington Concert Opera's upcoming production of Tancredi. Other than the basic context of the famous showpiece "Di tanti palpiti", and a vague memory of the fact that Tancredi has two endings, I knew little of the plot before I started digging in this week. I knew I was in trouble when I was still confused after re-reading the first 3 paragraphs of the synopsis, and the next pargraph began with "As the opera begins..."

Thus, the diagram. Funny, I'm not a "visual" person, but it's tremendously helpful to plot out places, characters, and relationships. I even do it on the inside front cover of multi-generational epic novels, and my book club members mock me for it.

Warsaw Concerto

OK, I promised the story (scroll down on the link), for what it's worth. Please keep in mind that the pitiful state of my longterm memory is legendary, so the details are sketchy.

From age 7-15, I took lessons with a lovely lady who was the only piano teacher in my very small hometown. When I was 15, she signed me up for a competition and assigned me a transcription of Richard Addinsell's Warsaw Concerto. I worked hard, and I think I played the shit out of it. And all I remember was the scathing remarks from the judges about the unsuitability of the material for a serious competition.

I had always played the piano for pleasure, really. And I lived in an active but isolated musical environment. At that age I had yet to hear a concerto, or a symphony, or an opera, for that matter. There was plenty about music I didn't understand, and there's no doubt that the Warsaw, in all of its unrefined, unrestrained, and populist glory, was neither Beethoven nor Liszt.

The only thing I knew then, though, was that I played that music for all I was worth, and it wasn't good enough for the classical music snobs. Obviously, they formed a club for which I would never qualify. An experience that would be repeated multiple times over the next several decades, and, in spite of (or because of?) which, I seem to have become a fringe member of the musical establishment.

Audition Comments with a Twist

"It didn't capture my attention at all.....it was so non-emotional."
"It was very brave of you to be very ethereal and intimate."
"It was like being at some horrible Sunday lunch with a child getting up to sing out of tune. It was a complete and utter mess."

I waded into the American Idol morass a week or so ago, and as I was sitting here minding my own blogging business, I got a call from a friend who urged me to turn on the TV right away. Seems that the young lady who talks of her serious voice study was singing. (Actually, this is not the same one I referred to in my previous posting, but it's all so confusing I couldn't explain it if I wanted to. Lots of readers have tried to set me straight.)

No matter. What I just heard, though, was pretty sobering. And the comments above are not mine, but the Idol audition panel's. The only thing that's important here is that, bless her heart, she sang hopelessly and woefully out of tune. And she told millions of viewers that she studies opera. Public relations like this, we don't need. Ouch.

Back into the Fray

But First,

the

Really

Important

Stuff...

Toys for Tots
collection at work.

For the Record

A few responses to some of the challenges posed to my previous postings on the Juilliard master class event:

I acknowledge that the star artist behavior in most master classes is neither brutally inhuman nor more abusive in general than much of the rest of our lives.

If performers are not able to develop a bit of a thick-skinned approach to all sorts of criticism, they will either not last long in this business or they will have particularly tortured careers.

There are many paths in life that are far more difficult and ultimately less rewarding than a career in the arts.

If I'm having a bad day, one of the first places I go on my iPod is Barbara Cook singing "In Buddy's Eyes".

Now, to proceed.

Once again, there's an equation. Emotions, frustrations, and all defenses aside; the net result of a master class experience should simply register on the positive side of the ledger. The lessons learned and insights gained may come at a price. They usually do. But the costs should be in proportion to the benefits.

What are these costs? Well, as an administrator, the real expenses are never far from my mind. I'm not just referring to dollars, but to the human resources that go into preparing for and managing an event like this. As a coach and teacher, I'm aware that time and energy are always at a premium and should not be misused. And, as a performer, I resent public performances (and indeed, that's what these singers are doing in master classes) that sap rather than feed me.

The audience generally has a very good time at these kinds of events. Actually, the audience's ability to get a glimpse inside our process is often the solitary benefit of a master class. They come away with a new and stronger connection to the music and to the mind of a performing artist. And this audience benefit is important on many levels.

If we were to be honest and put our singers up there with the knowledge that they're acting out a script for the benefit of the public, that's one thing. Give them a role to play, and send them home with a paycheck for doing their part for the visibility of the institution and the adoring public of the artist. But to expect them to take risks and to make a huge investment in the outcome is wrong.

More Participant Reactions

But first, to put these singers in perspective: They are not wringing their hands or giving up their careers. They're tougher and more realistic than that. But their feedback is important.

“I was nodding but in truth I had absolutely no idea what she actually wanted me to do. So I just tried one thing after another, randomly, and I was just more and more confused.”

“I didn’t even get a chance to do anything before I was being judged. It offended me.”

"I came onstage with a real connection to my song. But from the minute I had to sit in that chair and hold some guy’s hand, I was just faking it, anything to get through the next twenty horrible minutes. I felt nothing, and I gave nothing.”

“Oh, you just humor her, play along. Whatever it takes. In real life, I am never going to go onstage without a mike in a 950-seat house and not sing out, so the whole thing was meaningless from the get-go. You want me to mutter, I’ll mutter.”

“I learned two things. One: I can sing while I am crying. Two: I shall never sing musical theater again in my life.”

A Voice of Experience

Until now, you've heard from me (more than enough, I'm sure) and from some of the Juilliard students. I'm a grownup (or as much of a grownup as I'm ever going to be), and the performers' responses are thought by some readers to be tainted by their youth and inexperience. I don't agree, but bear with me here.

I'm indebted to Steve Blier for allowing me to post his reactions to this event. Steve needs no introduction to those of us who work with and love song. But if you don't know his work, here's an introduction.

Steve works with these and other professional singers on a daily basis. He suffers no fools, as they say. And he was extremely disturbed by the master class.

"We knew it was a sham when the following happened. Alex Mansoori got up and gave a deeply touching, modest, and heartfelt performance of an Ahrens and Flaherty song. He knew exactly how much pressure the song could take, and he didn’t push it too hard. The audience was rapt, and many of us were in tears. Barbara waits for a moment and then says, “Honestly, I don’t know where to start. You don’t know how to use language, you sing it like ‘Nessun dorma,’ and…who wrote this song anyway?” I instantly felt slightly sick to my stomach. (I later heard this same reaction from more than a dozen people.) From then on, the students could see that they were pawns in a theater game where they were at a complete disadvantage.

Cook really tipped her hand when she went to get the repertoire notebook Juilliard had prepared for her a month before. It was clear she hadn't opened the book at all--the music was still clipped together, and she seemed completely unable to remove the paper clips. We all could see that she hadn't felt it necessary to prepare for the class in any way, though she seemed very maladroit coaching material she didn't know. So she rips the first song out and says, "All right. Your lyrics say, 'Take the moment, make it happen, hold moment, make it last...'" Embarrassed silence. "Um, no, Miss Cook. Those are the lyrics to the other song I brought." It made us wonder: had she even listened to Alex before she went into her pre-packaged rap?

The most distasteful thing about the whole afternoon was Barbara’s pandering to the audience. “Isn’t that better?” “Oh, YES!” comes the Pavlovian response from the fans.

As one student said to me, “it’s always better the second time.” The modus operandi seemed to be: make the student uptight, confuse ’em, rile ’em up, then sit them down in a chair, take them off their voice, maybe remove some clothing, and claim credit for a transformation.

[Sidebar from Kim: The "always better the second time" trick is almost foolproof. The resident expert has to do almost nothing in order for the audience to register a noticeable improvement when the performer has a chance to ground himself, relax, and sing something a second time.]

On the real work of helping opera singers find their voice in the song repertoire:

Yes, some opera singers are a bit stiff and obsessed with volume, but others are amazingly versatile. To educate them, you need to share the real secrets: how to phrase, how to bend a line or a word, how to use rhythm, how to find an interpretation that releases your life-force into the spaces of a theater. It is completely counterintuitive for an operatically trained singer to put out more “emotion” while you cut off access to his musical energy.

We all heard repeatedly that the song was a “journey,” and how the printed page was “just a starting point.” I assure you that this is not news to my students. What might have been helpful would have been to explore the specific journey of a few of the songs, to guide the students through the creative process of making choices, and to help them to internalize and manifest those choices.

In sum:

It's not that the advice given wasn't true - it was simply banal. It’s very condescending to assume that these students are not interested in expression because they’re opera singers."

"We should never put our students in a position where they are made to feel ashamed of their gifts. We are training our singers to sing resonantly and let their creative energy explode. This is what they need to do in the profession they are trying to enter.

The day ended better than it began: the Vocal Arts students--including several that had been in the "master" class--put on a 70-minute show called “Shall We Dance” in which they sang and hoofed their way through a wide repertoire of popular music. Under the direction of Jeanne Hime, the cast showed such ease with themselves--their physicality and their voices. Everyone in the room felt it: this was the best possible antidote to the afternoon’s effronteries."

When Steve and I talked about this today, he reminded me that one of the most important things to get across is that we should not believe the whitewashed reports in the press. Something that we media-savvy people think we know, but of which almost all of us need to be reminded.

That's All, Folks

I'm sure I'll succumb to the temptation to address this topic again, but for now, it's all the time I have to spend on it. I'll be offline for several days, posting again by the middle of next week. By then I'll be able to be specific about some of the repertoire and projects we've put in place for next summer's opera season. One Mozart (not a huge surprise, I realize, but particularly important since he's celebrating a big birthday in 2006), one Rossini, and one baroque opera (but not Handel!).

Have a great weekend.

Opening night

Opening night. But first I had to get through my pre-show talk. For several years now, I’ve been doing free pre-show “Inside Opera” talks for any ticket-holders who want to show up an hour early. In a perverse way, I love doing it. Maybe it’s because I was never an “insider” myself, having come to this business only in my late 20’s. (It seems that everyone I meet in the opera world started listening to the Met broadcasts when they were four…). Anyway, I enjoy telling audiences about what went into the show they’re about to see. Unfortunately, this week has been so difficult on many levels that I was sorely under-prepared. But thanks to my total immersion in this production, and to the amount of chutzpah I’ve learned to summon up in these instances, it went very well.

As did the show. When we travel across the country and hear these young (average mid-20’s) singers, it’s tempting to fantasize about perfect casts. But real life gets in the way, and although all of the singers we bring here are terrific, the casting puzzle doesn’t always fit together just perfectly. But somehow this time I think we lucked out. You could disagree, but it’s a fact that these folks exceeded expectation. It wasn’t an easy rehearsal period, and on top of that, there was the elephant in the room – the fact that we are operating here on the fringe of our repertoire, and anytime you do that, you take more risks than usual. But the first show was touching, witting, and terrifying, and a quantum leap from the rehearsals earlier in the week. The full house brought the remaining acoustical bugaboos into focus, and the resultant totally “unplugged” performance had a powerful visceral impact.

Photo by Carol Pratt

What *Were* You Thinking?

I just got back from hearing dozens of aspiring young singers in the North Carolina district auditions of the Metropolitan Opera National Council.  As is typical, I am equal parts exhausted and energized.

And, as is typical, I had the following post-competition discussion with a number of audience members.

Patron: It must've been such a difficult job to decide how to pick the winners. 
Kim: Indeed, it was - they were a talented bunch!
Patron:  I made my own list of winners, and I only have one question.
Kim: Yes?
Patron: What were you thinking?

OK, paraphrased, but you get the idea.  It happens again and again, and it never surprises me.  And it's usually not confrontational but is born of true curiosity about the judging panel process.

Most of these MONC spectators are seasoned opera-goers and true lovers of the voice. And as such, they usually have pretty good taste.  They know when something is out of kilter, and they know when they are truly engaged and excited by a voice.  The kicker is that sometimes we don't choose some of the singers for whom the audience had the most enthusiasm.  Why?

It's too complicated a question to answer in an exhaustive fashion, but in short, we're looking for singers whose profile (as demonstrated on this particular day at this particular moment) indicates that they possess the particular tools to distinguish themselves within their particular voice type.  Being a compelling performer is part of it, to be sure.  But having the vocal equipment and potential to rise above the norm as a coloratura soprano or lyric tenor or basso profondo or dramatic mezzo, etc. (random examples) is what matters.  If you can't nail the exact requirements for whichever voice type you seem to be best suited (highest and lowest notes, ability to project in certain registers, flexibility and agility of the voice, etc), you will have a difficult time getting hired.

We have to take this into consideration, for the Met is looking for career potential.  But singers in their 20's are so often (rightly so) in development and/or transition, and many of them don't yet know what they "are" - which box they best fit inside.  (Of course, some of the best singers of all time didn't fit in a box at all, but you'll have a hard time selling that concept if you're a 20-something opera singer in America...)  And every single person that comes into contact with young singers has a different opinion.  It's a recipe for extreme confusion.  Nevertheless, in order to figure out which singers should advance, panels have to grapple with the implications of it.

So, if you're in the audience for one of these events, and your scorecard doesn't line up with the panel's, don't despair. 

First of all, you might be right and they might be wrong.  We do our level best, on the basis of decades of experience, but we are not infallible. 

Second, the judges may have had the same positive gut reaction as you, but were responding to details of the voice and its development that would indicate that it might not be optimal yet to send a particular singer on to the next level of the competition.

Fortunately, there are many opportunities for young singers to be heard - in various competitions, in auditions for young artist programs, in performance in conservatory and university.   Even the most amazing singers don't always win, and everyone has off days.  But over time, talent will out. 

Musicians' Shorthand

This image of a conductor's abbreviated note to the orchestra (referenced on Arts Addict's New Year's Eve post) inspired me to pull one of my Rossini opera scores off the shelf.

See, when you get into a Rossini finale, the piano score reduction covers about 2 measures per page. (Once everyone gets singing, and each individual vocal line is stacked on top of another, it takes up all of the available vertical space on the page.) Add to this the fact that most of these finales are moving at an Allegro-or-faster pace, and you begin to see the problem. You end up playing the piano with one hand and turning pages constantly with the other.

Hence, my shorthand version of the first act finale to L'italiana in Algeri. A thing of beauty, representing 56 pages of the score and eliminating 28 page turns!

I'm a bit of a music theory nerd. If you're lucky, maybe someday I'll pull out my Schenkerian analysis of Salome. Or not.

Happy to report that InsideTheArts.com has welcomed an opera interloper. Brian Dickie of Chicago Opera Theatre will be representing all things operatic for the Inside the Arts blog portal. Check it out! (Although I have been teasing Drew that he does need a chick on the roster...!) Looks like there's a new blogger coming next week - keep the faith, ladies!

The First Round

Ah, the paperwork phase of sorting all of this out. The information in front of me falls into the following general categories:


Academic and/or conservatory training: It's extremely rare that we'll take someone without either an advanced degree or a stint in a year-round YAP. Each year we end up hiring a few people who are still finishing their post-graduate degrees, but the majority of our folks have recently finished formal training.

Other training programs (young artist, apprentice, etc): Knowing that you've been involved in an apprentice program or had other opportunities to get comfortable onstage is very helpful. Singing small roles, doing covers or chorus, and watching other professionals in the opera business prepares singers to make decisions about what kind of singer they want to be.

Awards / competitions: Do you regularly put yourself "out there"? Not strictly necessary, but a lack of any recognition is a worrisome sign. Staying safe and comfortable inside the studio is necessary for a while, but by the time you audition successfully for us, you're ready to strut at least some of your stuff.

Full-length roles performed: We're looking for people who have a least a couple of roles under their belts. Only having sung scenes programs doesn't mean that you won't be able to tackle a role. After all, you have to start somewhere. But this isn't exactly the place to start.

Making the Cut

The résumés contain other helpful information, but the first cut is really made on the basis of these four things and where they intersect. No one factor trumps all others, but the aggregate needs to be strong. I have very little backbone when it comes to saying no to people, but weighing in on the low side of 2 or more of these factors indicates that a singer probably isn't ready for a program like ours.

I know, this all sounds more than a little cocky, but consider this. Our singers have to show up with full-length roles thoroughly learned and completely memorized. Their languages must be strong enough that they can communicate well onstage and accept very detailed fine-tuning instruction from our language coaches. The technique must be secure enough to withstand the rigors of a professional 3-week intensive rehearsal and tech period. And although we are a program that exists to help emerging artists transition to professional careers, the visibility is fairly high. Yes, it's better to premiere a role here than it would be to do so in a large company. But our performances are reviewed by metropolitan and national press, and they are attended by VIPs from other opera companies and management firms. Trust me. You don't want to jump into this pool if you're not ready.

Geography Counts

And even though this might sound kind of formulaic, it's all relative to the amount of competition for any given audition site. This is the second year in a row that Chicago is a hot property. (Truthfully, I think it's because it had the latest application deadline.) 105 applicants for one day. Last year was busy in Chicago, but it was the first time in many years, and I thought it was an aberration. It wasn't. And because the travel arrangements and the hall reservations had to be booked months ago, we can't extend it to two days. So the Chicago pool has to be cut by two thirds.

The Young Artist Dilemma

We have no age limits, but we are still a company for developing artists. Ah, you say, aren't we all perpetually learning and developing? Of course. So how to figure out whom we should serve? What is our demographic?

There's a sweet spot, right after you've pretty much absorbed and tolerated those half-dozen or so years of full-time introductory study, and before you fall into a career pattern. I'm going to take a real chance here, for I know I'll get hate mail. But here are a few descriptions of singers we feel we are not in a position to serve. Those who have already performed a series of supporting or leading roles in regional or national-level companies. Those who finished the intensive part of their training more than 3 years ago. Those who have embarked on successful careers outside of the U.S. and are looking for ways to jump-start their careers in the states. If we existed simply to grant singing engagements to performers who desired (and deserved) them, we would be an entirely differerent sort of organization.

Momentum

Can you be over 30 and apply successfully for our company? Unequivocally. Although our average age hangs around 26-27, each year since we've dropped the age limit, we've had at least one 30-something in the company. If you went to school in your early twenties, dropped out of the opera scene and returned a few years later, we're happy to consider you. Likewise if you change Fach or begin a new career in music much later than the traditional student. But in these cases, even more than usual, we're looking for momentum.

Over the last year or two, do the companies who have hired you, the roles you've been assigned and the awards you've won show that you're moving forward? If you're breaking back in, and you haven't sung a role in 3 years, that doesn't mean that we won't ever consider you. But if other applicants are showing a significantly higher degree of activity and recognition, you may get passed over. But by next year, if you persevere, yours could be one of the applications that rises to the top.

I know that most performers are loath to believe this about the beasts behind the table, but there are lots of us who are painfully empathetic. We know you work hard, that you've spent a lot of money in pursuit of something that calls out to you, and that you know you have something important to offer. I wish I could take every single one of the singers reduced to these pieces of paper called résumés and grant each one a satisfying career in music. I do, perhaps foolishly believe, that for those whom it matters in the right way, there always is a life in music.

Today's CD's

I listen to CD's through headphones attached to my laptop. My computer plays the files through iTunes, and usually the selections show up as Track 01, Track 02... Occasionally, just to keep me awake, the iTunes tagging software thinks it recognizes the CD and gives it a name. Tonight's entries included "Sex Beat" by the Gun Club. It was actually "Cruda sorte" from L'italiana in Algeri. Actually, not quite as far from "Sex Beat" as one might think...

Gotta Empty Out the Inside of My Head

Engaged in the annual springtime delusion that I'm going to turn my 2.5-mile regular power walk into a jog. (Don't be too impressed - so far that means that I walk up the hills and run down them.) I have an iPod playlist just for this purpose, and it doesn't contain anything that comes close to the music I work with for a living. The purpose is to deactivate my left brain and provide an irresistible groove. A tight rhythm section, some good acoustic guitar or piano, lyrics that make me smile. The perfect spring-cleaning song in today's shuffle - Inside Of My Head (David Wilcox).

The Bassi Speak

A comment posted on this blog a week or so ago:

"A question for you about us big, heavy voices that take years to develop - how do you recommend we find opportunities? I'm a basso profundo, so I'm looking at just hitting my stride in my late 20's. Of course, when you're 30 it's too late to win a Met competition, and young artist programs still seem to have this prejudice for younger instruments. But the rungs of this business are set up for people to finish their degree(s), hit the YA circuit, and then try for covers or comprimari - and it seems beyond the pale for some companies that a singer might miss a rung or two.So what's a low bass to do? How do we deal with the "end of the great big American voice" syndrome?"

I polled some of my favorite basses. Here's a composite response.

Degrees

Music schools are a great umbrella protecting a young bass from the "real" world. (NOTE: a bass is still "young" in his late twenties!) You can build up a lot of concert, recital, as well as operatic repertoire, all under the watchful eye of your "team" of teachers and coaches.

Find a way to extend the schooling -- you'll always be a commodity if you're a low bass at a school, and it's a lot of fun being needed (more fun than being one of every bass in New York, 20 to 75 years old, auditioning for the same role).

Find a degree program that won't require a loan and then revel in that program's offerings; stretch out the time -- it's not a race to get out, particularly for a bass. You'll get more stage time (invaluable, in my opinion) and more studio time.

Outreach

Create opportunities to sing in any capacity wherever possible. For me, the greatest benefit came from singing outreach/runout shows for a local opera company for a number of years while in my twenties. I proved to myself that I could sing in the morning, and it provided a daily dosage of excited, energetic audience of elementary school students. There is no better way to develop the voice than to use it every day! And there is also no better way to get comfortable onstage than to sing a lot, particularly when the role is in English.

YAPs

This country has seen an enormous surge of young artist programs in the last decade, and just about all of them will be looking for a bass each year.

Many YAPs have a prejudice for younger instruments, but I promise that a bass that sings consistently through his natural vocal range could just about write his ticket into any program he chooses.

Be smart about finding YA programs that actually put their YA's on stage in smaller roles. Granted, sometimes having to do your 14th performance of Ceprano sucks big time, especially if you consider Sparafucile and Sarastro more up your alley. But being a bass "saved my ass," because I would have absolutely HATED doing all that language work, music study, role memorization, movement and acting work, etc., and only occasionally put it to test. Even in the smallest roles, at least I was on stage constantly through my 20's.

A young bass is actually at an advantage. Even if you are miles away from your "prime" there are a million roles you could do.

Young basso profundi (as well as dramatic types) presumably already have a sizable voice, even if it's rough around the edges. For that type of voice, it would seem logical to look at young artist programs that are attached to big houses ("big" as in "cavernous auditorium") and who look to the young artists for actual mainstage work (generally to save money). If (again presuming a future "dramatic" singer already has a large, if unhewn, voice) these companies do in fact use their young artists on the main stage, they would love to save money by using a young basso as a second armored man or as one of the 25 bass comprimario roles in a Verdi opera. If you have a loud voice and a middle C, you're on.

The Met Competition

I wouldn't worry about the Met competitions, unless you are a once-in-a-lifetime voice. The cutoff age of 30 is just about impossible for a bass to truly compete with other voice types. To start with, the bass repertoire has very few show-stopping arias compared to any of the other voice types, so you have that working against you, too!

Roles

Take any greatest hits operas and I'll show you how many roles for bass there are, smallest to biggest... just off the top of my head: Rigoletto has Ceprano, Marullo, Sparafucile... Traviata has the "Cena e pronta" guy, the Doctor, Marquis and Baron... Flute: Armored Guy, Sprecher, Sarastro (more and more Papageno too these days)... Nozze di Figaro: Antonio, Bartolo, Figaro... Don G: Masetto, Commendatore, Leporello, Don Giovanni... Romeo has Capulet and Friar... Boheme has Benoit, Alcindoro, Colline (sometimes Schaunard)... Don Carlo has at least 2 bass roles smaller than Phiilip, Tanhaeuser has 2 smaller than Landgraf, Sampson has 2 mid sized roles, Midsummer has 3 smaller than Bottom... anyway, you get my point.

USUALLY the smaller roles can be done with ANY type of bass, be it "profundo" or cantante or bass/bari or buffo or whatever... additionally, they can almost ALL be sung by a bass in his "natural" voice (as compared to the small roles for tenor, which tend to be pretty "sprech-y" and "barky" right?)

In virtually any given season at virtually any given opera company, I PROMISE there are more good-singing small opportunities for young basses than for any other young voice type.

The Buffo Question

Another option would be to embrace stage craft and dive into some character stuff. This basically requires the ability to let go of the thought that every sound a bass makes has to sound like Kurt Moll -- if you're 25, it's okay to sound 25. And, if you're singing Bartolo, it's okay to not sound gloriously Rene Pape-like on your high e's. Figure out how to lighten up and sing up to an e, and buffo is a cakewalk.

In the young artist world there aren't any old basses around to sing the buffo stuff. If a company's gonna perform Don Pasquale, then some young singer is gonna have to don some aging make-up. If they're gonna do Barber of Seville, someone's putting on a fat suit. May as well be you -- you'll be making money while being on stage.

If you can follow a conductor while singing patter, you can follow a conductor anytime. Now, most basses tremble at the thought of being pigeon-holed and labeled "buffo," but if this you're an actual profundo, ain't nobody gonna care if you did a Pasquale in Des Moines when you were 25.

Finally...

Consider yourself lucky that you have a rare voice type. If you can make it through the "growing pains" of the voice type, then your chances for a career are better than most. Find a good teacher, be a good colleague, learn languages, study music/art, and get onstage as much as possible. Understand that life, like singing, is simply a "work in progress".

Laying Low

Thanks, guys. Love having other people do my work for me.

Expect a few weeks with pretty lame blog content. I'm a little fried. Putting one foot in front of the other, trying to carve a few work-free hours out of every day, knowing that I have about 6 weeks to recharge before the summer steamroller hits me.