After the Storm

Sandy has come and gone (left a lot of devastation, which is tragic, but thankfully not in my neighborhood) and Obama will be President for four more years.

So it's now "OK" to get back to thinking about singing.

I spent most of the storm week with my partner.  First I waited out the storm with her and then when it hit, I stayed with her every night because she had no power.  I did, so I spent a few hours a day in my apartment, using it as an office.  The worst thing for me was missing choir rehearsal, which I had to do.  I would never have forgiven myself if I had been there and she had fallen in the dark and not been able to get up, or even use her Life Alert button.

Now it's almost time for this week's choir rehearsal, and it's snowing, and it's windy, so she of course is on at me to stay home.  Absolutely not!  If the thing I want most isn't a paying choir spot, but the respect accorded a professional choir member, I don't stay home because of inclement weather, as long as the subway is running.  In all fairness, I should say that the majority of the choir, trained or untrained (and all unpaid) would not stay home either.  So much for the people who roll their eyes about "volunteer" choirs!

I am working on the Spanish Christmas songs (called "Villancicos") for the concerts I am doing with the woman who produced the September 11 concert.  I am also going to sing one on Epiphany at the Spanish service in the Lutheran church.  Epiphany is the biggest holiday for the Spanish-speaking parishioners so the service should be well attended.  I also xeroxed some of the more contemplative songs for the choir director, to give him as possible ideas for Communion for Christmas Eve.

I now have three other soloists for the Requiem but it is like herding cats.  A rehearsal day that is good for one person is not good for someone else.  Well, I will organize and negotiate.  I spent years doing that with my staff in an office, so I can do it for this.

I was also realizing that one reason I haven't made as much progress as I would have liked over the past 8 years isn't that I have the wrong teacher or that I don't practice enough, but that it is not "total immersion".  A conservatory student with a Master's in Vocal Performance will have studied for 8 years, but she also will have been immersed in, for example, performance classes where she will get feedback, listen to other singers, as well as studying languages and music theory.  For me it is really all stolen moments.  One reason I like working with the woman producing the Christmas concerts is that in addition to being knowledgeable and supportive she is also someone who gives me a different perspective.  If I were, for example, a conservatory student taking an intensive seminar in Spanish song, I would get ideas that perhaps would be different from those I was getting from a voice teacher.

I don't know what this says about anything, but one of the women singing with the group this time is a mezzo with a lovely voice who has real experience: meaning having been a soloist with orchestras in smaller "cities" (to me anyplace you have to drive is not a city, hence the quotes), not to mention having a professionally designed web site showing her in a gold dress lying on a bed of roses!!  I wonder how much a photo shoot like that cost??  That's what I want.  Someone to photograph me in a low cut dress lying on a bed of roses....