Past, Present, Future

I really have no excuse for not blogging in so long. I keep having ideas of things I want to blog about, but I never seem to have them when I'm sitting in front of my computer.

So let's first do an update on Things That Have Already Happened.

Remember that contest I begged for votes for? Not the vintage cherry one. This one, to win a Meet & Greet with 30 Seconds to Mars? Well, like the vintage cherry contest, I won this one too, thanks to everyone's loyal daily voting!

Here we are in the room while Jared Leto thanked us blah blah blah.

Then we had the photos. Tomo, the "thumbs-up" guy in the black leather jacket, is the guitarist. As soon as he saw me he shouted, "OPERA SINGER!" So I gave him a big hug. Chatted with them a little, took this BORING photo...

So I asked for another, more creative pose:

This all took place before the concert, so even though we had been in the front of the line, we had no chance of getting on the barrier by the time we got into the theater. Instead we went up to the balcony and joined this row of photographers in the 1st row up there. They left after a few songs so then we had the row to ourselves!!

Next, let's have some singing updates. My last voice lesson was in March. I haven't had one since, and have been to only one coaching. I did perform, though. Here's what I did ... probably the best singing in front of people that I've ever done:



I'm thankful that I did have a chance to show this video to my voice teacher before she died.

There's a memorial for her at the end of the month. It'll be nice, I think. I've had no one really to talk to about her, I've just been mourning sort of on my own, which is very lonely. 

The other thing that's been filling my time and brain is that my son is now going to a special ed school for "smart kids with behavior challenges" ie, autism and adhd. We toured a bunch of schools, it was quite stressful. But we all like where he is now, him included. So things are settling down. I'm still doing a great deal of advocacy on his behalf with the school district over a few things, but things are getting done.

All this and I haven't really had time to sing. I sing a little, here and there, and of course in the car. But I feel like I'm losing my breath control and technique. I need a teacher. I have no idea how to find one, because I want MY teacher back. She didn't require payment up front, she understood that "life happens" and sometimes you have to cancel a lesson. I think I canceled maybe twice in the 4 years I went to her. Funny, my 1st two voice teachers sort of fell into my lap, without me looking for them. So who knows what'll happen next in my explorations.
 
More future stuff is, Met Opera tickets go on sale August 11. I want to see La Cenerentola and Die Fledermaus. It's hard to find someone to go with me though, and I don't have the money to shell out for an extra ticket in the hopes that someone will go. So I have a week to find a companion and convince them to pay now for an opera in April. Otherwise, I'm going alone. Wish me luck. I'll probably be going alone to Joyce DiDonato's recital in Princeton, but that's no big deal... just a 20 minute drive. I can eat pizza for dinner and still make it to the recital. But it's more fun when going to the Met to make it an adventure. So, we'll see!

Fledermaus or Gunn? What????

It has happened again. I recognized a piece of music -ok, an entire opera - and I'm sure it's because the opera was part of popular cartoon culture when we were kids - Tom and Jerry, Bugs Bunny and so on.

The entirety of Die Fledermaus was so familiar to me that I could have hummed along. And yeah yeah I know my mother told me that she used to play it all the time. But I could swear some of it brought up cartoon images in my mind, so I thought for sure that Husband would recognize it. So yesterday I played the overture for him. This was my first time hearing it since seeing the performance on Friday. Not only was I able to hum along, I was able to "play" along on his back. Ok ok get your minds out of the gutter - when I was a kid my aunt used to play piano on our backs or arms, for fun. So anyway that's what I was doing to Husband while we listened to this. I played a few scenes for him here and there and he agreed that it looked like a lot of fun. I mentioned that the performance I saw is being done next weekend too and he said, "You know, I'd rather go to that than go to Maryland to see some boring Nathan Gunn recital. " I stared at him. I decided to... ignore him. I asked him if he has heard from a young relative of ours who we had asked to babysit... not yet.

Then today the relative said no, sorry, he can't. So luckily for Husband, he's OUT of the "boring Nathan Gunn recital." But he's not going to Fledermaus either, unless he arranges the tickets and childcare, and somehow I don't see that happening.

The Amazing Revenge of the Bat

Die Fledermaus was AWESOME!!!

Ok, that's all.

No no no I'll write all about it.

Let's see. I already posted the pic that Husband took of me on my way out the door.

Actually I need to backup here for a sec.

A few weeks ago I joined a local opera-fan MeetUp Group. A bunch of people in the group were also going, and one of them emailed me to say that she'd be in the lobby with a MeetUp sign. I didn't see them before the performance, although I did see this sign:




I went to my seat up in the third-to-last row in the balcony.



The theater is pretty small though so all seats are great.

The opera started with the maid singing as she came up the aisle through the audience. She was awesome! She stole the show. The entire opera was just ridiculously goofy with current cultural references. There's a lot of room in the dialogue for that. The plot is very silly. Um... let's see... there's this husband and wife. He got arrested for jaywalking and then his jail sentence was extended because he tried to bribe the police officer. So he's supposed to go off to jail. Meanwhile, his old college buddy, some cute baritone whose name I don't recall (and it's just as well, for my own sake!) plans to get back at him for a prank he played on him when the guy was drunk. He was dressed as a bat for a costume party, and was so drunk that the husband character, as a joke, dropped him on a bench in the middle of town. He woke up the next morning and had to run home dressed as a bat. Ok so he wants to get back at the guy so he ... ok wait this is too complicated to describe. Read this instead. It's the very production I went to see. So basically, everyone has a costume and they all go to this party and pretend to be someone else. They all get drunk and let's see.. the husband who should be in jail flirts with a mysterious woman who is really his wife in a mask. She had been with an old boyfriend earlier in the evening, a tenor who kept singing Verdi. After the husband left for the party (the wife thought he was going off to jail) the boyfriend came in, put on the husband's robe and sat down. Then the jailer came to arrest the husband, and, to avoid scandal, they let him arrest the boyfriend. At the end everyone goes to the jail for one reason or another and it all ends happily ever after. There are can-cans, conga lines, silly songs and many physical gags. And the singing- WOW WOW WOW!!! Everyone was FABULOUS. Seriously. On top of all that silliness! It was AWESOME!!!! It was semi-staged so the orchestra was on the stage behind a scrim. It came down after the overture. I really liked watching the orchestra - seeing all the violin bows move in unison, like a dance. And I knew all the music. Go figure. I've never heard this opera, that I know of, yet I knew the entire thing. I mentioned that later to my mom and she was like, "Well, of course. I used to play it all the time." And then she launched into song!

Ok so first intermission I was wandering around and found the MeetUp people. Uh oh. Remember that group I was mixed up with when I was waiting for Juan Diego Florez to come out the stage door at the Met? Yep. Talk about socially awkward. All they did was complain that the orchestra sounded muddy, did I think they sounded muddy? The violins and the horns? They were asking me about the summer season and one of them said, "Aren't you in the opera company?" and I'm trying to tell them that I'm a super, no singing, etc, but it was too late - they were starstruck! It was bizarre! They kept asking me all these questions, firing them off one after another, and they were so excited to speak to someone who actually appears onstage during an opera. It was awkward and finally I truthfully told them that I had to get on the line for the ladies' room before intermission ended. They invited me to join them for dessert after the show and I gracefully declined, again truthfully telling them that I was meeting someone from the chorus afterwards. Not that I had plans to hang out with said chorus member, but they didn't need that info.

Afterwards I did get a chance to say hi to someone I worked with this past summer. We chatted a bit about this and that. Then as I was leaving I ran into the super captain. Haha love how that sounds. Super-Captain. The guy in charge of the supernumeraries, I mean. His 10 year old son was a super in the production. He said he'll probably learn in April or May if they need supers for the summer. I told him I saw Lucia at the Met and they had maids and servants, so hopefully whoever directs our version will want them too. I told him I'm interested and to keep me in mind.

And then... I left.

Another "Alone to the Opera" Post

Tonight: Die Fledermaus. Going alone. Sitting in the balcony. It's at a smallish theater so my cheap seat in the balcony will still be better than any seat I've ever had at the Met. Of course I'll still bring my binocs, just in case I want an uber-close up view.

There's this reception thing afterwards (remember Turandot and Rigoletto?) but I don't have a ticket for that. When I called about it a few weeks ago they told me that the tickets were $100!!! This week I learned that they are a mere $25. Now, if they had told me that when I called, I probably would have bought one. But I'm not buying one now.

Hm. Maybe I can crash...

Will report later. Now I must swallow some food and then hit myself with a pretty stick. (As opposed to a stupid stick, which I sometimes grab by mistake.)

Ticketed

The tickets for the live HD transmissions from the Met went on sale today. I bought a pair of tickets for two performances - Lucia with Anna Netrebko in Feb and La Cenerentola in May. That spreads my opera out quite nicely:

Oct 22- Lucia at the Met - Diana Damrau!!!
Feb 2 (I think)- Lucia in the movies - Anna Netrebko!!!
Feb - Die Fledermaus, either as a super or else as a paying customer
March 24 - La Sonnambula at the Met - Juan Diego Florez!!! Natalie Dessay!!!(AAAHHHH!!!!!!! Can't wait!!!)
May 9 - La Cenerentola in the movies - Larry Brownlee - Sorry, I mean, Lawrence. I don't know him so I can't call him Larry. (well not yet, ha ha)

Now... what to do... what to do... The Gunnster is starring in The Rape of Lucretia with the Opera Company of Philadelphia. It's in a tiny theater. Tickets are available now for subscribers. So I could pay $75 to subscribe and then $95 for a ticket... or... I could wait until December when they go on sale for the Rest of Us. The theater is so small that all the seats are probably pretty good, but... 3rd or 4th row sure would be nice. On the other hand, do I want to see an opera that involves a rape and the ensuing emotional breakdown of the victim? And do I want to pay an extra $75 to guarantee that discomfort? Yeap. I think I'll wait until December, when I will then kick myself for not shelling out the extra money to get a ticket now.

Dayum, why is opera so friggin' expensive?

Ok. It's Friday. Cat pic time.


OHMYGOD what happened to the cat????
Ok that is so not a cat. It's my friend's dog Bear!! Bear-Bear, what are you doing in my house????

Let's try again:

Nope. They're not allowed on the table. Right.

Finally, I will end the post by embedding the video to which the comments here refer. Enjoy!