The loss of this coach has hit me very hard, much more than I expected. I didn't cry over the news, the way I did the day I heard that my 91-year-old violinist colleague had died, but that was a different situation. I truly loved him and saw him dwindle day by day. I regretted that I hadn't visited him one last time. But it was not a shock.
I suppose much of this is about "why is she gone and why am I still here"? She had a musical career that I can only dream of (it wasn't a big career, but she was always in demand playing for operas and concerts, usually ones in which the singers are not paid but the pianist is) and she had amassed quite a few regulars coming to the studio for coachings, myself among them. So she got to do what she loved on a regular basis and had the respect of her colleagues.
And then there is the mother/daughter thing. That's a touchy subject with me. One thing I have to remember is that however bad my relationship with my mother was, most of my friends and acquaintances' relationships with their mothers was as bad or worse. I think it's a generational thing. Mothers born at a certain time, even ones who fancied themselves as "enlightened" (meaning in my mother's case that she used the "F" word all the time and talked about sex in a clinical manner in a loud voice in public places) were still quite authoritarian (as in "my way or the highway") and didn't know how to respect their adult children as separate people. The women I know who are under 45 have an entirely different kind of relationship with their mothers. They can be different from their mothers and that's ok. Their mothers are interested in them instead of trying to control them.
I know this is childish and pointless, but I really do think if I had had a different kind of mother (and a different kind of school environment, and different peers - or maybe none; my coach's daughter who is a rising young mezzo was home schooled) I might have done something with my musical talent. I know character is important, and I probably lacked it until I was well into my 30s, certainly, but most people's successes or lack of it involves a synergy between the person's character and temperament and their environment.
My coach and her daughter adored each other. As I said, this young woman was hand groomed to be a singer from childhood, but I never got the feeling that she was pushed in a way that she would resent later. One sign of this was that she was independent enough to go abroad after graduating from Juilliard (which doesn't seem to offer as much to singers, as, say, Manhattan School of Music does, as a case in point, the woman in my choir whom I call "Little Miss Conservatory" has nailed a high profile mentor at MSM whereas my coach's daughter never did at Juilliard).
So again, the question is, why is she gone so soon and why am I still here?
Don't worry. I am not feeling suicidal. I couldn't imaging killing myself. Things are not that bad; there are many things I enjoy in the moment: singing well, reading, going to museums, my favorite tv programs, cuddling with my SO and my cats, to name a few. It's just that things are not that great either. In addition to having a perfect life, I always was in awe of my coach's sense of wonder at how things turned out. She was always not just happy or positive, but "elated", a mood I am almost never in, or if I am, briefly, all the much of toomuchness of twenty-first century New York, particularly here in the lee of Lincoln Center, comes crashing in on me.
In a strange kind of synchronicity, the night I heard the news about my coach's death, Verdi's Messa da Requiem broadcast on Channel 13. I listened to the beginning, then my SO asked me to turn to something else. I got to hear "Liber Scriptus", but not "Lux Aeterna". I think we changed the channel at the point that we had had an intermission in my concert; after the big ensemble ending in "Amen".
I was underwhelmed by the men, for the most part, but of course my eyes and ears were on Michelle de Young who was the mezzo soloist. She sang well (not as impressively as some of the mezzos I have on recordings) and looked stunning. Her very long (bleached no doubt) blonde hair hung in tight curls, her makeup was more for the balcony than for a closeup, and she had on a black lace dress. As I have said before, I covet all that as much as I covet being able to sing a work like that in a large venue with an orchestra and chorus behind me (no, I would not be interested in being a chorister in a large venue unless I was paid; I turned down an offer to do that several years ago). It's funny, my partner said she looked "trashy", which I suppose is understandable. She is obviously over 40, and her hair was obviously bleached and not a length recommended for "professional women".
On a more positive note, go me for being able to hear (and remember) most of the mezzo line when they were all singing together. I am not a natural harmonizer and certainly had to drill, drill, drill, my part so as not to get distracted by the top. Which is one reason I am grateful to have been singing with that church choir for all these years. If I hadn't done that, I wouldn't have had the musicianship to sing the mezzo line in the Requiem.
What I wish now, is that I could find some "takeaway lesson" from this loss. I am not sure what it is. Interestingly, at my last lesson (which went superbly; the big breakthrough I made has held, especially in new art songs and church pieces; too bad I am not 20 years younger with all the big girl rep ahead of me to sing well, instead of behind me with memories of singing it badly) my teacher said that what I did over the past ten years has been important: taking care of my mother (even thought I did not like her) at the end of her life, and now taking care of my partner. In the eyes of God, doesn't that mean more than having (had) a singing career?
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