Wednesday

This morning's walk to work included two fun songs--
Secrets by OneRepublic and The Power is On by The Go! Team.  Add them to your green room/hallway of Nola Studios playlist.  They're so uplifting.

I had a coaching yesterday on a bitch of an aria-- "Amour ranime mon courage" from Roméo et Juliette.
It receives this distinction not because it is really challenging vocally, but because it has this accompanied recitative that requires being really secure rhythmically and with the text, and I am having to work harder than I am used to to get it to not be a hot mess.  Oh hard work and metronome.  Hello again.

While I consider Juliette to really be a lyric role, it has enough florid and high singing to make it feel like my first real venture back into what I am calling Coloratura Land.  Not this aria, really, but certainly the other one.  And I've always felt that you have to check out the whole role before you can really put an aria into your package-- only if it's all something you could do well should you touch it.  I've always wanted to sing "Du bist der Lenz"  but I really don't see it happening based on the rest of the role. :)  Unless I was being accompanied by toy piano.

Yesterday my voice felt so thick and tired, and so instead of practicing-- I made wontons.  I made a ton of them, we had wonton soup for dinner and I froze the rest.  It made me feel so good.  I don't know why.  I think because of some of the less fantastic aspects of my past, I really feel best when there is lots of food in the house.  Having a full refrigerator and freezer make me less stressed, so knowing there are delicious pork wontons ready to defrost is oddly comforting.  Another fun fact about me.  Oh my.

Also, I was thinking a lot about the whole true voice thing yesterday while making wontons.  Repetitive motions like folding wontons gives you time to think.  Another reason I probably loved it so much.  Anyway, I have found that as I embrace and give way to my own true sound, I am becoming way less judgmental of other people's.  I think that within the operatic genre, it is becoming easier for me to recognize those who have it and those who don't, so in that sense, I long for real resonance when I hear singers rather than precious musicianship (that which I find is mostly fostered in conservatories and universities, when there is so little time to nurture true technical proficiency, and the focus is on the recital, or the "product.").  But more and more I find myself appreciating vocal honesty in other genres-- jazz, broadway, country, hip hop.  I am less likely to think of those folks as untrained, undisciplined singers (which sounds so snobby and is embarrassing to admit), and more like people who are using their true voices in a very different way.  The difference is amplification, really, when it comes down to it.

Any way-- I better get back to work.

Oh, and check out my latest style inspiration-- The Kate Middleton LookBook!