Blogging during class- naughty me

I'm in masterclass with Martin Katz, collaborative pianist extraordinaire, on a program of Spanish song.  Danya Katok is singing a gorgeous, pain engorged version of de Falla's "Asturiana."  Stunning.  Katz is pushing her (in a good way) to challenge herself in terms of dynamics and the "primal" sound of the piece.  Holy cats (hee hee!)

Blogging during class and getting away with it because I'm being a bad student and sitting in the back!

Back to June 9, the sad day after my birthday :)  After some time in the practice room on my Alma Mahler piece and my musical theatre pieces (Tale of the Oyster, Will You?, and So in Love) I went to a class on "More than Diction" by Margo Garrett.  She simplified the major ideas in French, German and Italian (2 or 3 things in each language) that she has felt are most important in singing effectively in those languages.  Fascinating (mostly about consonants and word stress).  THEN, a class by Jake Heggie on his music. A heart-melting piece--"Lucky Child"  WILL be on my fall recital.  It is about memories of childhood and it is so so so touching.  He really worked for long lines and affect. And boy did he get both from the wonderful singer. I also loves how he makes both singer and pianist so comfortable, and also plays as well.  Hearing a composer play his own notes is so exciting.  I think we all love him!

"Lucky Child," lucky mezzo-soprano! (piece transposed for Susie Graham!)
Then my coaching with D'Anna- we worked "Bei dir ist es Traut" by Alma Mahler-she had really helpful things to say about resonating on m and n without holding in the throat, not singing so soft that I come off the core of the sound, singing over the bar lines, and finding the schwung of the line.  We then spent the rest of the time discussing possible literature--we came to Musto settings of Dorothy Parker.  I think I shall work on them this week.  I enjoy her very much as a person- she is really down to earth and very humble about her accomplishments.                

Finally, the official day ended with a masterclass with Margo Garrett on comparative texts, means two different composers' settings of the same poem.  I did a recital like that in graduate school so I knew many of the songs.  I can not tell you what a splendid musician she is--she could work for hours on one piece and I would never get bored, or would she.  Text work, diction, tempo, breaths, color, focus, clarity of sound, cut offs, and on and on and on.  It is absolutely amazing, inspiring, astounding, stupefying, awesome, and humbling.  We heard Berlioz/Gounod, Sonnet by Hall and I am in Need of Music by Moore (yum!), An fine Aeolsharfe by Brahms and Wolf, and both Er Ist's--excellent excellent excellent repertoire, wonderful focus on texts, and yet different interpretations of the same poetry.  Delicious, to use Margo's word!

Margo at Work

Omni, friends, and drinky-poos!

Afterwards, Wanda and I and a few others went out the the Omni Hotel which is next door for a drinky-poo.  I had a form of a California cosmo that had fresh strawberries in it, and truffled mac and cheese.  O.M.G.  both were so good!!!!!!!!!!!!  I even had a little bit of Wanda's calamari because it had a wonderful curry to dip it in.  Wanda and I had a great conversation and are really getting to know each other, though we have known each other 15 years.  I said from the beginning if I learned some things and made one good friend then it would be worth it.  So it is already worth it.  

Believe me, I slept hard that night!  I picked a gardenia from an outside garden and it perfumed my sleep.  Delicious.

Now, Sunday June 10.  A good day, though we were all a little tired.  Masterclass in the morning with Gwen Detweiler from CCM.  She is a wonderful teacher and a total blast to hang around with!!!  She is in our goofing pictures with Jake.  She modeled vocally a bit and has a stunning sound.  I really liked how she was able to adjust her teaching to the age/ability level of each singer.  Every singer left smiling with the information and encouragement she gave them.  My friend Kristine sang Mahler and did really well!  By the way, this is another really nice recital hall- what a fantastic facility...

Kristine and my roommate Jihae at the keyboard.

Lunch with the girls, Gwen, and JAKE HEGGIE!!!!  He left that afternoon, so I feel so lucky we had the chance to talk with him.  We talked shop, we shot the breeze, and we laughed and laughed.  I got his autograph, and we took some photos.  The pointing photos were his idea!!!!

What a fantastic composer and man.  My students--announcement: you will ALL be singing Heggie next year!  Following our Heggie lovefest in the cafe, he had his last masterclass.  We heard "Facing Forward," "Hummingbird," "Paper Wings," "Deepest Desire" and others.  Every single piece was a gem.  Just like hearing Ricky Ian Gordon at the NOA conference talk about his music, hearing Jake talk about his music totally changed it for me.  I liked it before. I love it now.

 The picture with the flute is them working on his song "Primary Colors" from "Deepest Desire"--the text is a meditation by Sister Prejean (author of Dead Man Walking) on reconnecting to the earth though you know you have important work to do.  Very poignant, and timely for me.  One of the most important things Jake told us was

Sing for Fun, for Joy, and for Connection

He is so right.  He definitely brought that out in all the singers and pianists that he worked with.  If I knew how to post video, I'd share with you him eloquently talking about how important it is that we make and share music.  Some highlights from Heggie's thoughts on song.

• The composer is your friend!
• Observe and execute proper note lengths, including phrase endings.
• Allow air/breath within the pulse of the music.
• Always sing with core sound.
• Get the information of singing in other styles.
• Make a connection with your texts.  Find the humanity.
• Know the poem, the poet, the story, and its background.
• Move out of the "dead spot" in the crook of the piano and move the song.
• Have fun singing!

My students- you knew a bulleted list was coming at some point, didn't you?  I did pretty well waiting until this point!

But wait, the day isn't over yet!  At 4:00 (if you want to see our entire schedule, go to the SongFest webpage and there is a link there) we enjoyed a wonderful concert by three SongFest participants on "Babar and Friends--Music for Children by Francis Poulenc."  We heard the cycles "Le Bestiaire" and "La Courte Paille" with the poems read in English right before each song (read from an iPad--Apple has infiltrated SongFest!) and then saw a staged performance of "L'histoire de Babar, le petit elephant" which was wonderful.  Now I know I've said wonderful a lot, but this was right up my alley.  The two singers (Sophie Wingland and Mario Diaz-Moresco) spoke the text in a mix of French and English and danced/moved the entire story as Jasper Jimenez created a full orchestra at the piano.  The two singer/actors played all the roles with simple costume changes and dance-everything happened right on stage, and it was charming, professional, touching, and inspiring.  I loved the elephant ears on a hat and a headband, and the pink old woman's hat that Babar's patroness wore.  So innovative (although I guess I don't know if it is usually done that way or not).  I want to do something like it!

After the concert, Wanda and I ran across the street and purchased tickets for the performance at the Walt Disney Concert Hall- more on that in a moment, and I purchased a CD by the LA Philharmonic and Zubin Mehta's Autobiography "The Score of My Life" which I am really enjoying. I brought three novels, Lamperti, "Inside of a Dog" and a travel guide to Spain, but I'm reading Zubin!  Who would have guessed!

5:30-6:15 the mentors had a breathing class.  Lock skipped, and I gave him an appropriate hard time the next day!  We do floor work on breathing--a green light moving to different areas of tension as we notice our breathing and then phonated on different sounds.  I had a hard time phonating sometimes, leading me to realize that I often have a quite muscular onset which I couldn't do while I was coordinating the breath, so the cords weren't coming together.  We stood up and did the monkey, and I asked Audrey about the place until my ribs that has been hurting for the last year, and though she is going to look into it she mentioned it could be where the abs attach and I could be over-engaging it.  Just as my voice teacher Connie says, I'm working too hard!

Then, to the Walt Disney Concert Hall for the Los Angeles Master Chorale's concert entitled "Tribute to Gorecki."  Wanda and I had a great time--there is 360 degree seating in the hall, and we were on the side so we could see the conductor's face but also many of the chorister's faces as well.  There are hidden gardens outside that contain a large flower fountain made out of pieces of Delft china (Mrs. Disney's favorite dishes!) and we made friends with a pierced dude who had just gone to a bad Van Halen concert at the Staples Center and his rich date with a Chanel purse and a chinchilla wrap (which I asked to touch and did touch!)--Wanda and I guessed that relationship would be over shortly!  Anyway, they took this picture for us.....

The hall is magnificent, and the organ looks like a box of french fries (it is rumored to be inspired by McDonalds!).

That photo also shows the seating behind the choir- cool, huh?  The concert itself was stunning, which is saying a lot coming from me as those of you who know we well know.  A smaller chamber group (56 people!) of singers performed "Lobgesang" and "Piesni Maryjne" (in Polish) by Gorecki (pronounced go-RET-ski) and "Schaffe in mir, Gott, win rein Herz" by Brahms.  Then on the second half, 120 singers (yep) sang the 30 minute piece "Miserere" by Gorecki.  Amazing.  The piece starts with just the bass 2 section standing and singing.  About 4 minutes later, the baritones stand and there is two part harmony.  4 minutes later, tenor 2s join in, etc.  By the time all the singers were singing, the sound was so full, layered, rich, and overwhelming that it was hard to breathe.  Wow.  I will never forget that performance.

Afterwards we met Alice the chorister in the gift shop-they were proud of their performance, which they *(&(*&(*& well should be.  They are recording the concert later this week, to be released on Decca in the fall!  Kudos to the Los Angeles Master Chorale and conductor Grant Gershon.

Ate salad outside at around 10- the weather is glorious- by a fountain and magnolia trees.  California is magical folks.  And the people are friendly.  And it isn't too expensive.  And so far, I have felt completely safe in downtown LA.  I may never come home....

I stayed up late finally putting away my clothes and organizing my small but comfortable room so that it feels kind of homey.  That night out my window, I could see that there was a movie (or maybe TV show) being shot on the street outside my window.  Complete darkness, but huge lights were set up so that it looked like daytime on the street.  That way they can shut down traffic on Grant Ave., a major road, without shutting down LA traffic.  I wonder what it was....

And FINALLY!!!!

Monday, June 11--TA DA!!!!!  Today.

Kinda slept in this morning and frankly woke up a little grumpy.  All this open-hearted stuff gets tiring--as Jake Heggie said Susie Graham says--"I HATE feelings!"  :)

Masterclass with Martin Katz at 9:15- it was all Romantic Lieder and wonderful repertoire.  Old friends "Immer lieser" and "Ich schebe" were stunningly performed and I learned two new to me wonderful songs, "Sehnsucht nach der Waldgegen" by Schumann (I have to tell you that spellcheck changed nach to nacho--ha ha ha ha ha!!!!!!) and "Liebesbriefchen" by Korngold.  I'll summarize Katz's teaching style later, but suffice it to say I don't think two collaborative pianists could be more different than he and Margo.  I know that I will learn much from both, though.  One good thing from today:

Musical style is knowing what to do with what you see.

Sent the new student voice studio placements to UWEC over lunch and had a yummy Indian curry which was wonderful to eat but I regurgitated this evening :(   A bit of a flu or something, probably explaining why I was grumpy today.  Watched part of a masterclass with composer Libby Larsen--such an insightful, waif-like woman.  Again, fascinating to hear a composer talk about their own music.  She mostly talked about the meanings of musical gestures or specific pitches and stressed guess what?  The words and understanding them!!!!!  That I think will be the theme of SongFest this year!  The featured works were "Try Me, Good King: the Last Words of the Wives of Henry VIII" which I have sung most of before.  I actually listed "Ann Boleyn" for SongFest but it was not selected as part of my repertoire list.  I left the class early to go lay down, as I just wasn't feeling well.  I then practiced my Handel aria--"Piangero"--though we didn't get to it in class with Lisa Saffer.  We discussed Handel ornamentation, and hopefully I will have a private coaching with her later to work through the song, though I showed her my ornaments and she thought they were good.  She gave us some handouts and this laundry list of ways to ornament.

Bullet point list #2

• Start from a place of creativity
• filling in notes in between melodic notes
• changing rhythm
• displacing octaves
• changing direction of ornament
• taking notes out--"cleaning out" the line in an exciting way
• trills (starting slowly and from above0
• Don't put a big cadenza at end of aria- make sure you can do it in one breath.

AND, at 6:30, a Martin Katz masterclass on Spanish song.  Yes, the one in which I was blogging earlier!  I didn't take many notes but mostly just enjoyed the singing and learned from Katz's look at Spanish folk poetry and his summary of Spanish diction (not my strong suit).  Afterwards took a peek at tomorrow's schedule and headed off to my room for some down time.  Called Mom (hi Mom, Monte, and Johnny!) and am FINALLY caught up on the blog!!!! Yippeee!!!!! I'll try to keep it up each day so I can capture the details.  Let me know if there is something you want to know!

A few more moments to share in pictures...

Notes and program!

Robert my collaborative partner

Still life with gardenia

Choir!

Choir?

Las Vegas from the air!

Doggie!

                                           My birthday party in IA

Look, it's Jake Heggie!!!!

Reverie in a reverie

D'Anna Fortunata and the back of Reverie's head

Walt Disney Concert Hall, by Frank Gehrey and home of LA Philharmonic

The Music Center Plaza

My dorm room.  One of four bedrooms in a quad suite with two bathrooms.  I share mine with the outstanding pianist Liza Stepanova.

True love

Dog on wicker

My dorm room

My dorm room