Took my time this morning before going to my final coaching, with Matthew Morris. I took in "Will You?" from Grey Gardens. We mostly talked- again, about images for me to access behind the words, but not getting so internal that I'm not sharing with the audience. Matthew is young, but wise because he is so thoughtful. I had some questions for him, and I'll summarize the answers here.
How do you reconcile moving back and forth between song, musical theatre, and opera? Renee Fleming said in an interview that she feels the voice has a huge spectrum, from here to here (spreading hands apart) and when she is preparing a role, she is sure to take the appropriate amount of time to adjust her voice to the part of the continuum that the role/genre/style requires. But it is all one voice.
On his eclectic recital programming: he has come to realize that people have come to see what HE has to say in a recital, not for the specific repertoire. And he needs to show WHO HE IS in his performances and part of that is the selection of and ordering of repertoire. Why do people go to performances when they can hear far better versions of every song on the program on Youtube? To see YOU and what YOU have to say and how the music fits with other music. He also says the iPod "Shuffle" generation likes to hear vastly different music back to back so he uses that type of contrast in his programming rather than the conventional fast-slow-fast, contrasting languages, contrasting periods, chronological type of organization.
On "getting your point across to the audience": he is learning that you can't tell the audience what to think. You need to open yourself up, put out there what you want to say, and some of the audience will take it in and others won't. And you have to be OK with that. You can't MAKE everyone understand, or enjoy it, or be exposed to something because it is good for them. This goes hand in hand with some of my self-discovery of the past few months. You can't control those around you, even if it would be for their own good. I have realized that I never try to control people to increase my own power, but that I have a tendency to want to control people into doing what I think is GOOD FOR THEM or will help them--even though it is well-intentioned, it is still controlling. Now, as a teacher, I do have a responsibility to teach, but I do need to realize that whether the students take it in or not is up to them, and not up to me. Which means it is neither my success or my failure if they do or do not. Brain blowing up.....
That may be one of the most valuable things I learn here. Thanks Matthew.
So, a great session with Matthew. Wish I had more time to talk to him.
Caught the end of Katz' class on "My Garden"- all songs with flower texts. I loved "Rote Rosen" by Strauss. Katz told us that he was the first person to play Strauss' song "Malven" which was found in the papers of Maria Jeritza (soprano who created many of his roles). It was brought to his apartment in NYC in an armored van, and the guards sat in his apartment as he learned the song! He eventually got a copy before he played it with Kiri TeKanawa in concert, but man was he beaming!
For lunch (I wanted to use up all my meal dollars since I already paid for them and Colburn is a rich school!) I bought Lock's lunch, and all this food as well:
My final mentor class with D'Anna Fortunata at 2:30 on "The Singer's Breath." She gave us some exercises, including a meditation exercise and some stretches, and then two of us sang pieces with difficult breath lines--I sang "V'adoro pupille" and after the first A section we stopped and Rob held my ribs and back so that I would breath more fully rather than slightly laterally, and we worked on the breath continuing to move forward as the phrase continued. It was fun and I'm glad I had a few more minutes with D'Anna, who I really like. I gave her a book of Musto songs that I had and she seemed really moved. She actually emailed me yesterday and wants my address to send me something- awesome!
At 4:00 began a long concert of repertoire coached by Katz. Like Glyndebourne, we had a dinner break in the middle so we could eat before the cafe closed. I realized that I hadn't checked into my flight or booked a shuttle, so I gave my meal card to Jihae and asked her to buy a bunch of snacks, and I ran upstairs to take care of business. It is amazing what you can do online now, and the online checkin and baggage payment saved me ALOT of time the next morning. Heard the rest of the concert and then went to my final masterclass: John Musto and Amy Burton working on Musto songs. Loved the rep, loved to hear them talk about it, especially liked "Sea Chest" and "You Came as a Thought," both of which are accessible to undergrads for sure. "The Hangman at Home" is also very clever, It is part of "Dove sta amore" which is a cycle I am going to tackle at some point. Learned more about style- Burton suggested that instead of playing complete breakdown in the face of tragedy, an audience is more moved to see someone trying to COPE with a tragedy (even if they break down while coping, it works)--a well-placed smile and a drained demeanor at the end rather than over the top will be more touching. This was in reference to "Lament," a song in which a mother struggles with how she is going to tell her children that their father has died and won't be coming back. Sad.
Mentor Rob kicking butt on "Receurdo"
I have learned a lot at SongFest. It has been a good experience. I've made friends, made some connections, learned some repertoire, experienced LA (or the tip of its iceberg anyway), and have lots of new ideas about all kinds of things both musical and non. It has been so worth it. Now, on to Orlando!
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