I Dream of Feedback

First, an update. I got all the files back from the engineer. The ones without reverb sound much better however there is an echo-ish sound to the ones recorded the second day, because the engineer did something different, which he thought would make things sound better, but didn't. I would say that other than the Nabucco aria, all the files reflect my singing at its more or less best right now. I will decide when the engineer gets back whether I want to "produce" a CD to sell at the church, or only to distribute to friends (I will not include the Nabucoo aria). If I do the latter I will not spend money on packaging.

I think I may have to wait another year to do this Verdi Requiem. I now only have two months and my teacher and the soprano who sang at my concert now are not available as a result of musical and nonmusical commitments.

The good news is that the pastor said I can use the church for free, which I assume is an open invitation, not time limited.

I tried two people, one a tenor the other a soprano and the tenor said no thank you and the soprano I think is looking for something at a higher level. If I can't get three people and a pianist by Friday I think I will officially postpone it until next year and start planning in the Fall.

Also, I got a nice letter from the person I auditioned for earlier in the month saying he would keep my resume on file. They seem like nice people to work with and I am more comfortable with people my own age.

Finally to the subject of this post.

I realized that there is a type of feedback that I want that I am not getting, and really it has to do with the same issue I brought up in this post.

I realize I don't really need all that much feedback about my singing. I get that from my teacher, sometimes from accompanists, and, in a different context, from the choir director.

The feedback I desperately want and have not gotten is where would be a good place either for me to sing (it can be bloody anywhere as long as I can sing classical music and don't have to pay more than $25 a pop) or to meet people. My therapist was the one who suggested meetups, but when I went everyone was at a much higher level (not to mention much younger) so I was not comfortable.


One helpful suggestion I got a long time ago (I only just now remembered it) was several years ago, when I had just left the Unitarian church and The Mentor, a woman I met online said that I should join a small community chorus that sang classical music. If I did that, then A I would be one of the better singers and would probably get solo opportunities and B I could just sit and quietly work on my vocal technical issues in the course of whatever music we were working on.

So that is more or less what I have done with this church choir. The music is suited to classical voices, the choir is small enough that, yes, it matters if I'm there or not, I would definitely say I am one of the better singers with more training, which is a morale booster, I get solo opportunities, and I can work on technique as things arise (not to mention that I have been forced to develop a better pianissimo high A flat than most dramatic mezzos, even a lot of professionals). And there are a lot of social and spiritual fringe benefits.

I find it hard to believe that in a city as big as this one there aren't some older adults with big operatic voices that they began training late, who will never be professionals or even, apparently, good enough to get cast in most of the amateur productions in the city (these people used to get cast in leading roles in the small companies in the 70s) but who can slog their way through some operatic arias and scenes and even do some nice singing, and would like the opportunity to do so.

Or I just want someone to invite me to do something which is why I don't like frequenting places where I'm in the 15th or the 20th percentile in terms of skill. It's not ego, really.

ETA: I think a lot of this problem would be solved if I could even find one!!! person with similar demographics (older, still working on technique, hungry not burned out) who would be my support buddy. I really feel all alone with this most of the time, which is a major part of my problem, particularly in terms of how I feel. If I had a buddy who could go with me to these meetups, for example, we could be each other's cheering section. The other people there are all talking to each other about auditions and agents etc. so if I had someone to go with we could talk about whether a particular note or phrase sounded better than it did last time, or whatever, and I know I would be less nervous that I was when I went there and basically might as well have been by myself in a vacuum.