HD Dilemma

Trying to figure out what to do. I'm seeing Carmen at the Met at the end of January. But the HD broadcast is at the beginning of January. Do I go, for a sneak peek? And see Liz? Or wait to see it live through binocs. After all, eventually it'll end up on PBS.

I'm leaning towards not going to the broadcast. I'm pretty sure I'd like to see it fresh and new when I see it at the Met. Really the only reason I'd go to the movie is to see Liz. BUT obviously I'll be seeing her live on stage and backstage. Have I mentioned that here in the blog? That backstage at the Met thing? To see Liz? Have I ?????? Cuz I jumped up and down and squealed like a girl when she suggested it. And it's a good thing she did, because Husband said he'd come with me to the Met only if I could guarantee him a visit backstage. So we're good.

And now, I think I'll go with him to a Yankees game only if he can guarantee me a visit to the locker room (clubhouse?) afterwards.

Ok, so I've blogged it out and I think I've decided, no HD. Good. Now I can mentally apply that $23 to the train ride to Manhattan. It's a money transfer in the brain bank. I just made that up, by the way. Not bad, eh?

New Link: Wonder of Voice

Thanks to the incestuous nature of social networking sites, I have discovered another great blog out there. The Wonder of Voice is written by a voice teacher from (possibly in?) Finland. Really good advice there and she's only just started! Writing the blog, that is... not teaching voice. And how did I find her? I got an email notification from Twitter that a new person was following me. I always check out the profiles of people who follow me (and of people who leave comments on YouTube videos I've posted) and her Twitter profile has a link to her blog.

I think I just got dizzy, going in that circle. I better get used to it.


PS: The reason to view the profiles of people who follow you on twitter is because the porno sites follow you in hopes, I suppose, that you won't notice... I like the twitter block function almost as much as the facebook one... It occasionally happens on YouTube too.

Chesty Voice

Yeah. I know. The title of this post is going to pull in all sorts of strange google searches. But I couldn't resist. After all, my voice lesson yesterday was about chest voice and head voice and blending the two. I almost feel like I'm going back to how I sang before I started voice, but that's not true. Some of the physical element is the same, but before, it was all in my throat. I didn't know proper breathing, so I was forcing the air out pretty high up. So now going below the break in my voice puts the sound into a similar type of range as before, but I (try to) use proper breathing technique. And keeping the breath low produces a much nicer sound. Then we did a little blending - not much yet. I've been focused for so long on keeping my voice above that "shelf" as I sing the lower notes, and then it would switch on its own to chest voice. So now I'm learning to control the switch to make the transition smoother. I like it. I love it, actually. I love learning another layer, and to me this layer is much more tangible than some of the others. I mean, literally, it's tangible. I can feel it in my body. As I practice it'll start to feel natural, but for now I'm focused on it so of course I'm aware.

We also did the next two pages of Gretchen - IPA, pronunciation, rhythm, more pronunciation of course and singing. Oh and more pronunciation.

I told my teacher about the potential thing this weekend. And do I need to get a clean copy of the music? If I do sing, I'll do Una Donna, but my copies are all pencil marked. She said that for something casual like this I probably don't need to. I'm thinking, I can probably buy the sheet music online, download it and print it for $5, so I might as well get myself a clean copy.

On my way into the building I ran into Alex's music teacher. She was there setting up. She has been fabulous at modifying her teaching style to fit with his special needs. She has been in touch with the case manager of his school's child study team and she'll be visiting his class to see how he is in a larger group, although I'm pretty sure that the music class will be small again, like 4 or 5 kids. Alex is very excited that she's coming to visit. I asked if he likes her and he said he DOUBLE likes her. Love that!

The Never Ending Project

Really I should say, the never beginning project.

I have mentioned a possible performance opportunity in past entries. They want to hear me sing but we've been unable to arrange anything for a variety of reasons. Life, I guess, just keeps getting in the way.

It was on my To Do list to call again this week, and before I had a chance to call, I got an email about an upcoming performance. So I called. I'm waiting now for a call back, but the person I spoke with mentioned a date before the date of the upcoming performance, I assume as a sort of rehearsal/audition. And the date is the very same date as Back to School night for Alex. Can't miss that. He just started kindergarten and he's in a collaborative class, which means there are kids like him on the autism spectrum (PDD-NOS and SPD, please click the links to learn about what his life is like!!) and "model" children. I really want to meet the other parents and see what his school day is like. That means putting this off yet another month, unless they're planning on doing this in the afternoon. But... I doubt it...

Well, on the bright side, that gives me more time to improve, practice and add a layer.

Phonemic Awareness

German pronunciation is driving me insane. There. I said it.

When I was growing up, all 4 of my grandparents spoke Yiddish. My maternal grandparents were Russian and my paternal grandparents were Hungarian/Rumanian/Transylvanian depending on where the lines went on the map at any given time, but they spoke Hungarian and Yiddish. So they all spoke Yiddish to each other and to my parents. And of course any time my parents were talking about something they didn't want us kids to know about, they switched to Yiddish. Yiddish sounds sort of like German, and I think has some of the same phonemes and pronunciations. So after being exposed to so much Yiddish during my formative years, why the heck can't I pronounce these German words? Of course looking at that link I see they list alternate pronunciations of Yiddish words depending on the region the speaker is from. So perhaps Yiddish and German are not as closely related as they seem to sound? I realize that they are two different languages, and speaking one does not mean that you speak or understand the other. In fact, I recall my aunt telling me about one of her music students who did a German translation (into English, I think...) but used Yiddish instead and got it all wrong. But I'm not talking about meaning. I'm talking about sounds, about phonemes. So maybe my subconscious knowledge of Yiddish sounds is actually interfering with my ability to pronounce German. There must be a link somewhere between my brain and my mouth that's either helping or hindering my pronunciation. I just have to find it and adjust it. And I better do it fast, because my next voice lesson is tomorrow and my teacher is picky picky picky about pronunciation to the point where she'll cut me off to correct it.

Petty Teenage Behavior

After two years of Thursday evening voice lessons, it's weird for it to be Thursday but I didn't have my lesson. Saturday mornings this time around... but I still feel like I should report. I have nothing to report. I've been practicing what we did last Saturday. Does that count as a report? I didn't think so.

Let's see... I was going to post a link to a radio interview about a recital, but I decided not to. I was going to do a mini-mini-mini-rant about the "About the Artist" blurb here, regarding I'm not gonna say who but if you follow the link you'll figure it out and see for yourself how outdated the info is. Banawoman pointed it out to me, saying that it was inexcusable for the info to be so outdated. I suggested she call either the opera company or the press agent to complain. After all, just finding or defining a problem isn't enough - once you know about it, you should do something to correct it. I mean, she should. I personally don't care what it says where. So anyway, I was going to post something about that, but decided not to.

Truth be told, I'm this close to ... telling ... about something... but... I won't. Instead I'll just keep on keeping on in this confused and stupid life I lead. Unless, of course, anyone else drops me from their facebook friend list and cuts off all contact a week or so after their boss joins facebook. Oops did I just type that out loud? Hm better not put ANY names in the tags.

So anyway have I ever mentioned how much I love the "block" feature on facebook? If you're reading this and you can't find me there, I've blocked you! Isn't that exciting?

I'm so confused. I'm a screwed up 42 year old teenager. I think I need to go find a daisy so I can pick the petals, "I like him, he pisses me off, I like him, he's a CENSORED, I like him, oh who the hell cares."

Ok, back to Valley Girl AND the chocolate crumb cake that my in-laws brought over tonight. I love that cake almost as much as I love the block feature on facebook.

Kar-a-OH NO!-ke

Found out this weekend that I stink at karaoke. I'm not surprised. I was at this work-sponsored picnic. One of my coworkers, one who sang in the chorus in that talent show at work, kept telling everyone that I was an opera singer. Um... no...? But then people were like, oh, you can't do karaoke because you'll show us all up. Um... no...? So I finally broke down when my manager started "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun," but she was trying to sing it straight. I stood next to her and whispered, "Psst... Imitate Cyndi" and she did, and I joined in, and it was silly and fun. Then we switched over the kids' songs and I sang Row Row Row Your Boat with the 5 year olds. Much more my speed. It was very casual - someone set a computer up on a picnic table and we stood in between the tables. I spent most of my time squinting at the words. Well not at the words to Row Row... but you know what I mean. You do have to watch the dots light up so you know where you are in the music.

So anyway it's good to know that my suspicions were correct re: my lack of party karaoke skill, because one of my friends is having a stage with karaoke next month at her annual crazy over-the-top Halloween party. Of course there will be alcohol so anything goes. Luckily yesterday I realized that we have an entire karaoke section in the On Demand section of our tv service, so I'll have plenty of time to practice "Hopelessly Devoted" whilst sober before Halloween.

Opera Karaoke, on the other hand, I can handle. I especially like them when their site is actually working, unlike at the moment when it seems to be down. Read about them here instead.

Update on Next Summer

I reported here that according to the list in the back of Opera News, my local opera company is doing Don Giovanni, Street Scene and Faust next summer. Still nothing on their official website about that, but I peeked at the audition application they've posted. It lists Don Giovanni, Don Pasquale and Faust for next summer.

So whether I super or not, looks like it's going to be a great summer season! The next question is, will I be able to see all three for $15 like I did this year?

A Much Nicer Post - La Juive, Live from Amsterdam

This is a much nicer post than the post I didn't post.

THIS post is to direct you to a copy of live broadcast of La Juive from last night in Amsterdam, starring an I'd Rather Be Sleeping favorite who sometimes reads and comments, John Osborn!! I'm listening right now. *sigh* It's beautiful. I've never heard of this opera and it's so so pretty. Bravo Johnny!!!!

Restraining Myself

I'm in one of those moods where I want to post about something that most likely I'd later delete. So rather than post that snarky obnoxious content that I so badly want to share but won't, I'll just say here that I have something snarky to say but I'm restraining myself. It is opera related, sort of, so it wouldn't be totally out of place on the blog, but really it's more gossip than anything else, which is out of place everywhere. And while often I'll put a clue in the tags, that's not gonna happen today.

Instead, I updated this.

Let's Twist Again... On 2nd Thought, Let's Not

Great voice lesson this morning!

First, of course, she asked me WHY I was trying to sing Gretchen when we hadn't gone over the pronunciation and rhythm and all that. She basically gave me the same lecture/advice as SEY did in the comment here. Patience, patience, patience, layer by layer, one thing at a time and so on. Then we went over the first two pages of music, IPA, pronunciation (yeah of course I was pronouncing a few things WRONG!!) and rhythm, then I sang just those two pages and we worked on that a bit. Oh even before all that... well, AFTER the lecture but BEFORE the singing, we did some warm-ups to work through what she calls "the valley of the shadow of death," those low-ish notes where my voice (and other people's voices too, I imagine) tends to break and crack. Then we were doing things up and down with a glottal stop to prevent me from adding an H to the beginning of the vowels. At one point she stopped me and asked if I realized I was doing a bit of what she called a "washing machine twist." For certain parts of the scale, but not all, apparently I was doing this little sway back and forth as I sang. I'll have to look back at the videos to look for it. So I concentrated on standing still, keeping the breath low, using the low abs and all that, not adding that H to the beginning, up and down and up and down to iron out that break... THEN we worked on Gretchen. Ok that's not true either... she said something about the A vowel being difficult at certain notes, which reminded me that I wanted to ask her about one section of Batti Batti, the "sapro baciar" part, where I have so much trouble with "baciar." At least I thought I did. I think I do. She had me sing it and said it didn't SOUND like I had trouble with it. She said that the CH causes us to close down when we need to be open for the next vowel, the A. She suggested practicing those measures without the CH and then adding it back in. Same old story. So back to Gretchen because AFTER that, we did work on it. My homework for Gretchen is to keep the vowels going to the end of the words. Some of the notes are held for a bit, and I tend to let down as if I've run out of energy. Thinking about it now, I think it's because I'm unsure of the song, so hopefully I'll be able to practice now, along with the cassette recording I made of the lesson, and gain more confidence. My other homework is to read about Faust, to see where Gretchen's lament about losing her lover fits into the story. My teacher said she loves how I can carry the emotion in the music, and it'll be better if I really understand the character and the story beyond, "She's distraught because she lost her lover."

So that's my homework for the week. Oh and to focus on standing STILL. I guess it's back to the mirror for me.

Oh, and she read/watched (and commented on) this. She thought it was great. She knows Alex because she used to each in the Early Childhood department and was his teacher for two years. That's how I met her, and when she switched to teaching voice she recruited me as one of her students. Read about that here.

When I got home, Alex asked me for a blank tape to record some CDs, just because it's fun to play with the boom box, so I gave him an old voice lesson recording. Well, before recording his songs onto it, he listened to the whole thing. I was in the next room and it was strange (and almost creepy, for some reason?) to hear my voice doing scales and what-not from the next room.

I'm so happy to have my voice lessons resume!

Singing Zoo

If I do end up supering in my local opera company's production of Carmen this summer, I'll get to hear Denyce Graves sing this all the time. Uh, well sort of. With the original words.

Muddled and Befuddled

I so need to get back into the voice lesson groove. I know how I feel when I learn another layer and really incorporate it, then go back to something I learned earlier and hear how much better I sound. I need to focus for 45 minutes on singing. That's really what I need. I rarely get that chunk of time at home to myself to focus on anything.

One thing I love is when my voice hits some timbre and I feel it resonate in my head and/or in my body. I get into a groove and just feel it. I almost stop thinking and just go.

Once again I'm finding it hard to explain what I mean. But this time it's mainly because it's 11:30 pm and I've had a stressful day unrelated to opera. I won't bore you with the details, but needless to say they have mushed my brain a bit.

Ok I just yawned such a big yawn that I felt like how a snake must feel when it unhinges its jaw to eat some big thing it's caught.

Perhaps I'll read this tomorrow and post a follow up when I'm feeling more eloquent and can see a bit straighter.

Blast from the Past

My high school chorus teacher just popped up in the "People you may know" list on Facebook. Of course I added her - will she remember me, the soprano she stuck in the alto section? We shall see...

Singing in the Kitchen

Alex and I had so much fun singing in the kitchen today. He jumped on his mini-trampoline while I prepped dinner. I played the warm-up from one of my voice lessons and we did all the exercises together, then we sang all sorts of songs, mine and his. Mine were mostly songs I've done with my teacher. His, of course, were all Thomas the Tank Engine Songs. Hopefully he'll have these memories when he's an adult. I definitely remember singing with my mom in the car, in the bath and around the house, but I don't remember how early the earliest memory is. The bath - that one must be pretty early - maybe age 7? Who knows.

Tomorrow: First day of KINDERGARTEN!

List Time at the Circus

So much to do and remember! Time to make lists.

Let's start with stuff NOT related to music/opera/etc:

Alex starts kindergarten on Wednesday!!!!!!! I can't believe it. Still have to get some things together for him - they gave us a long list! I have everything on the list except a 4x6 photo. Who prints photos? So tomorrow I'll have to run out to one of those photo stands in the local pharmacy and print a pic. Maybe I can get Husband to do it in the morning... Hmm...
I have to fill out a bunch of forms and stick them in a folder, then I have to get that and all his other stuff together into his backpack.. Then I have to sleep without having another one of those "OHMYGOD it's Alex's first day of school and we're going for a walk in the wrong direction and he's still in his pajamas and the other kids are on their way and there's no way we'll get home, get him dressed and get his stuff together to make it to school on time and then we'll get lost on the way there and by the time we get to school they'll be leaving for the day," dreams, like I had the other night. I thought I was done with those once I graduated from college. I guess now I'll have them for Alex until he's old enough to have them himself.

Whew.

That's really the only non-opera/music thing on the list. But it's pretty much the biggest thing on my mind this week, and it has temporarily replaced opera as the thing that's keeping me awake.

The rest of the list:

• Prepare for Saturday's voice lesson - music, CDs, blank tapes
• Call my voice teacher to see if we can tack on the extra time this and next week before Alex starts HIS music class.
• Call that local opera/singer group to find out about potential opportunities
• Possibly attend an "(local town) Friends of Opera Meetup Group" meeting/reception on Sunday... must RSVP by Friday.

Ok I think that's it, list-wise.

Alex has been into Adam and the Ants lately. That, and he likes the thunderstorm scene in the Met's version of La Cenerentola, when the umbrella catches on fire. Adam and the Ants... Rossini... Adam and the Ants... Rossini... It's like a circus at my house.

Prepping

You know, just in case I do end up supering in Carmen this winter (not at the Met, somewhere else, local to me) I should re-familiarize myself with the music.

Watch through for the surprise ending at about 1:15. I don't think Bizet wrote that part into the opera, but who knows? Maybe this is based on a rare edition of the libretto or something. And you know the drill... if it doesn't fit on the blog page, click over to YouTube. It always fits on the preview before I hit publish.

Duet Desire

As Verruca Salt says, I want it NOW!!! As I wrote before, I've been listening to the highlights of Nozze di Figaro. I sing along. I want to be able to do that! For real. But it's unlikely, as I'm not on a professional track, so to speak.

That said, I do want to do a duet. I love love love the first duet in Nozze, between Figaro and Susana. *Everyone HAS to click that link. Thanks.* Surely there's some guy out there who can sing it with me. Of course he has to be cute, because that will help me with my acting. I'm not yet at the stage where I can pretend to be in love with some guy who I find unattractive.

My only opportunity, possibly, might be with that group I wrote about a few months ago, where "regular" people perform. I think I'll give them a call next week to see what's what with that opportunity, or, as the guy in charge called it, opera-tunity.

Beauty Smack

I was listening to one of those "highlights" CDs on the way home from work. You know, where they cut out the recit and put just the arias/duets/etc on the CD... In this case it was Nozze di Figaro. So la la la I'm driving along and it gets to the part with the Spanish March, I think it's the end of Act 3, when Figaro tells Susana give him her arm... starting at about 4:05 in this video... and all of a sudden the beauty of the music just smacked me in the face. I mean, yeah, I know it's beautiful, but I suddenly felt like crying. And yeah, I know, I'm an easy weeper when it comes to opera. It runs in the family. So anyway I was like, what the heck? Why is this making me so emotional? Of course the answer is, it's Mozart. Duh. And I guess I was in the right place at the time I heard it, or at some place, anyway, that made me all weepy when I heard something I've heard dozens (or more!) times before. Go figure.

I am such a girl, sometimes.

More Liz

Look! Another fabulous clip of Elizabeth Caballero! This is from La Traviata, but obviously it's a recital and not a performance of the opera. Yeah I guess you can all figure that out. Duh. Never mind.



And even though it's a recital and not the opera itself, it still brings me back to when I supered in it and she sang this role. I usually missed the beginning of this because the green room backstage was kinda far from the stage, and I always had to pee of course, so by the time I made it to the green room she'd be in the middle of this already. I'd be there in time to see her smash the glass, which she doesn't do in this particular clip. And we'd be watching on this tiny little black and white video monitor with a sort of tinny flat sound. And she was still fab. I wanted to yell at everyone to shut up so I could hear.

In fact, I want to yell shut up right now, because I'm listening as I type, and there's this quiet section about 7 minutes in where someone decided to have a coughing fit. Why why why??? I want to invent a theater seat that causes someone to turn to a pile of dust if they cough during a performance. Wow I'm getting all biblical, but there you have it. That's one of the greatest sins. Hold it in and cough during the applause. Yah ok mini rant over.

So anyway, the sound on this clip, or perhaps it's my computer, doesn't do her voice justice. And check out that purple gown! I'm going to have to make her matching earrings.

Can't can't can't wait til Carmen!!!


PS Just for fun, here's a clip of Liz singing in the very Traviata I supered in.