Sunday

Yay! I realize this does not make for riveting reading...but it feels good to know I know this music better than I thought and that finallllllyyyy I am starting to get it.  Also, it would suck to get fired :)

Sorry, I had to share.  Good coachings are cause for celebrations, I think.  Pop that bottle of Cristal.

Saturday

Today was too fun. It felt great to sing again...after a week.  Then a birthday party with lots of little kids and some great adults too.  Kids have such an amazing way of reminding me to just cut the crap.  What am I bitching about that is really that important?  Seriously.

Oh, and two year olds are even more delightful when there is wine!

Happy weekend!

Friday

Back in the saddle again?

Kind of?

The flu will knock you out, people. Do not get it. And, let me just say that getting the shot didn't really seem to help me. Which is a rip off, because, despite the fact that it cost me nothing financially, emotionally...well. I am such a horrible baby that I have to psych myself up for hours to get an injection.

At any rate, the phlegm is my last remaining problem, and my gig tomorrow morning will be interesting. But this is what we pay the teachers to teach us...how to sing in adverse circumstances. How to rely fully on what we know about singing, versus how it sounds coming out-- one of the most challenging things for me, and a skill that comes in handy not just when you're sick, but in situations with bad acoustics. Takes me back to an audition in the fall that I did...not my proudest moment. In a church that was literally, and I kid you NOT, carpeted from floor to ceiling. It had to have been intentional on the part of the auditors, because it certainly did separate the men from the boys. And when I say that, I mean, it wedded me out, that's for sure. I was vocally tired from several days of rehearsing, had just sung at church, and when I opened my mouth to sing and heard nothing come back to me...oh my...I was thrown. Even in my second piece, I barely recovered.

So tomorrow, I'll put myself to the test again, still suffering PTSD from church last week when my vocal cords felt like they were flapping in the wind.

Here goes nothing.

Monday

Well, the plague has been fun. Actually, no, it hasn't. And yesterday's experience with singing on swollen vocal cords...well, I wouldn't recommend it. It felt like trying to walk with a broken leg. Everything was all floppy in there, and I couldn't get the cords to approximate and well, anything in the passaggio sounded much like a dying animal. Luckily, the first reader was very supportive, and I think it might not have been as bad to them as it sounded in my head. Maybe? Because to me, it just sounded like I was doing damage. So today, I will be quiet and continue the salt water gargling. I think nothing is as harmful to singing as coughing-- and when you are coughing and can't sleep-- it's a recipe for disaster. That codeine I had left over from my wisdom teeth debacle came in very handy last night when the robitussin didn't stop the coughing.

But enough of that.

I watched something yesterday that was amazing-- Maya Angelou's Master Class on the Oprah network. She is incredible. If only there was a way I could have a recording of that on loop in a set of earphones that were glued to my head. I think I would be a much better, more grounded person.

Saturday

Ughhhh. I had better be over this cough before tomorrow when I need to sing so that eventually I can get paid.

Friday

Singers are headcases in every sense of the word. Self-doubt, fear of failure, hypochondria, type A perfectionism (I don't know, correct me if I'm wrong, but this is mostly a soprano thing), and oh my god, do I see a lot of ENVY. I can't believe I'm saying this, but at my ripe old age I think I am FINALLY learning not to compare my career path to other people's, but it is hard. My husband is a brilliant pianist who just won a fantastic grant from the government to further his career. I love him, I live with him, I know him. He DESERVES it. He works harder than any other pianist I know. But did I have just the tiniest tinge of wondering what is wrong with my singing that no one is handing me money to help me promote myself? I have to admit I did. I've talked before, actually nagged, before about the girls I can't stand, the ones that grill me about everything I am doing, but not because they are concerned about me. Instead, I always get the sense that they are thinking "Well, if she could get a role with that, then I FOR SURE could."

The other thing I have to say before I go on is that I love singers. They are way more fun than regular people. When you have gone to singing school, you go out into the real world and think to yourself, good god these people are not exactly a laugh riot. Compared to us, they have absolutely zero personality. The problem with that is that the rest of the world finds us supremely annoying. And so freaking LOUD.

But come on, people. Ladies, gentlemen, gentlemen that wish they were ladies...etc. Can we please stop it with the whole thing where we try to make each other feel about one inch tall. Can we stop with the barbed suggestions such as "You should definitely apply for this competition-- I think you might have a good chance-- it's really small-- not many people were there last year." I mean, is that supposed to make me feel like you are trying to be helpful? I actually had someone say something like that to me recently. The sad part for me is that I always think of awesome retorts several hours AFTER the fact. Now, that isn't to say the whole system seems kind of designed to to make us suspicious of each other, envious, and critical.

On that note, and because I have probably already pissed a lot of people off, I will go on. I think it's time we stop assuming that we deserve to win competitions or get roles every time we audition for something. No, the fact that you didn't win doesn't really mean that the competition was rigged. Maybe it was, but you are not doing yourself any favors going around telling people that. Have I done it myself in a moment of weakness, or after I have been horrifically demoralized when yet another 19 year old tenor wins and I cried the whole 2.5 hours home? You better believe it. But I really do know better. I know in my heart that he probably deserved to win too. And god bless all the things I have won in the past when I may or may not have deserved them. God bless all the people I somehow convinced to pick me! So, good for the 19 year old tenor singing Don Jose. He must have struck a chord with somebody.

Okay. And now, that I have gone there, I will return to my regularly scheduled positive and uplifting bitching about my life. Happy weekend!

Thursday

Off to rehearsal! Nervous...none of the notes quite make sense yet.

Wish me luck :)

Tuesday

Wow. Intense weekend, intense yesterday, but when I got home...chicken fajitas and beer.

It's scary how much better a little thing like that can make you feel.

I have my first coaching Thursday night for a role that I am creating in a new opera! I'm nervous. It's much more artistically fulfilling, in some ways, than being the one millionth person to sing Mimi or Micaela, because I am blazing a totally new trail. Making this crazy biatch Ekaterina into whoever I think she should be... And then there is the part where the music is incredibly tricky and there is no recording to get ideas from, and help with musical cues. BUT the thing I love about this kind of a role is that the notes themselves are such a task to learn, that once you've got them, the role is pretty much memorized. It's exciting, and the music is very good.

Today, I slid to work in my cute new rubber boots, and I feel pretty glad to be alive. Could've broken my neck, actually. So it's already a fabulous day.

Thursday

It couldn't have come at a better time. I LOVE snowstorms. Because there is no school today, I am checking email from home and teaching my stalwart Thursday private lesson student because she is unafraid of snow!

This morning I made biscuits and sausage gravy and watched old episodes of Parks and Recreation and laughed a lot. I have a much more ready giggle when I have the day off. :)

Other projects today include making focaccia, practicing, doing crafts, drinking, and watching Sex and the City intermittently with Anne of Green Gables so that I can be totally morally, socially, and historically confused. It would also be an excellent day for shopping, but I am broke. It's so depressing that at my age that still happens, but hey. I am technically supposed to be studying a great deal of music, and so I will try to be good with that too. But in any case, I intend to take advantage of today altogether.

Tuesday, part the second

Do you ever look down at your hands and think, good God, I haven't had a proper manicure since 1992. I could wrap my cuticles around my wrists. And then I think, what am I coming to? What has the world come to. I used to be so delightfully high-maintenance and "fancy." As the song says. I don't even have fake blonde hair any more, I don't eat lean cuisines at every meal, and I don't burn myself to a crisp on tanning beds or slather in smelly fake tanner! I must be letting myself go.

These are such random thoughts. I often wonder why I am writing them down for all the ether to read. But then I think, why the hell not.

After dealing with major dramas, sometimes you need to focus on insignificant minutia. And go home and make jambalaya and drink shiraz with it.

Tuesday

When you are eating your english muffin and drinking your coffee, the day somehow looks so much brighter than when you get to your office and the phone is ringing off the hook and everyone has a problem. Probably because I was watching the Piers Morgan interview with Oprah (I DVR'd it! Best invention EVER) this morning over breakfast. Everyone has such strong opinions about Oprah, I know. But I happen to think she is really swell and inspiring.

So, he asks her: "What is your brand?"
She says: "My brand is love."

And while part of my brain wants to snicker, in my current jaded state of mind, the other part is like YES. YES. My brand is love.

I want my brand to be love.

And of course, a very fierce singing voice.

Friday

Didn't sleep last night, not really. Hoping to look outside and see snow. Somehow snow is so soothing.

But today is so much quieter and I am feeling like I can cope! :) Also, I discovered last night after a great practice session that assured me that voce divina did not go AWOL, since for a few frantic days there it was almost like I could FEEL it shriveling up inside my throat.

Which of course makes no sense at all. I am a crazy person.

Tuesday

First day of school. DYING. So much to do. Methinks it is time for my Malbec IV. Can I get a drip going?

And my voice? I have no idea where it is or how I am planning on getting it back today...all I can think about is it going away and never coming back.

Thursday

Knee deep in Micaela and Messiah, of all things, and a new piece by a great new composer. Fun, fun, fun. Also, I'm looking for a "fast and furious" audition piece to add to all of my other arias which fit into the categories "dying of consumption and love-lorn," "scared of wolves in the forest and love-lorn,"and "silly and crazed." I think I may have found one...

Wednesday

I am hereby declaring today Hug a Cat Day. In honor of one very special cat named Gally, who we lost last night.

If I were to begin to rhapsodize about cats, and to tell you everything I think and believe about them, you would all get together and commit me to an asylum. However, sufficed to say: I would have done very well in ancient Egypt where they were considered deities.

Here are a few of my favorite pictures of my own sweet children, Pete and Mimi. It seems whenever anything is the matter with me, they are the first to know, and come, purring, to my rescue.

Monday

Another week is beginning. And I can't believe I am as optimistic as I am! I think it had a lot to do with all the fun I had this weekend with lots of great people and some fantastic music at a friend's wedding.

No one could deny that I have some really remarkably skilled singers as friends, and this weekend I feel like I had the chance to really revel in their fabulousness. I love singing with talented people-- one of the major reasons why opera is such a rush in the first place! All of that balls-to-the-wall wailing really turns me on...ooh ahh.

I felt great about my own collaboration with Joe and it seemed well-received. I guess, to sum it up, it was just one of those experiences that reminds one why we chose singing in the first place: Because, despite the stress of preparing a performance to suit my rather high standards for my self, it is so damn fun, and I absolutely love it.

Thursday

Yesterday I was sure I had pneumonia, because, well, it hurt to breathe. And then I realized it was just my first day back to work.

Sigh.

However, I still have all of this phlegm swirling around in there that is really scaring me especially since I have quite the singing extravaganza this weekend...yesterday, while rehearsing, I broke into a spasm of coughing. Never my favorite thing to have happen, since, basically, I freak out that it could happen in the performance.

Then I think, well, what is the worst thing that could come of it? I would stop, take a sip of water, and start over. No one would die, no one would go to jail. It's not really that big of deal...right?

Wednesday

News Flash:

I got the Pioneer Woman Cookbook for Christmas, after being obsessed with her fabulous website for a long time.

So far I've made two of the recipes from the book (although I have cooked many from the website) and they both turned out smashingly. EVERYTHING she makes is home food-- nothing hoity-toity. Which, I maintain, is usually the way to go around our house. If I'm in the mood for a fancy meal, I'll probably go to a fancy restaurant where a well-trained chef can make it for me.

But, in a rare moment of non-singing bloggery, cook something off this website and you will be glad you did. Among my favorites include the unreal steak salad with fried onions, the mozzerella sticks, the sherried tomato soup, pasta with pancetta and leeks, the pot roast, a fabulous pots de creme and next on my list is her cajun chicken pasta!

Run, don't walk!

Tuesday

I just got back with having drinks with Miss Bohemus...as Pierce used to say. Wow did we have a great time.

Oh my, all our friends are having babies... and twins, yet. It is so perplexing. And yet, I suppose, if I were having a baby in general, I would choose to have twins because it is more efficient.

I don't know. I would miss wine and coffee a great deal.

And sharing Joe with anyone, even a seven pound child, would not be my idea of fun.

But I do love babies. And I make an excellent Auntie/Godmother. I am great at present-giving and holding/calming/diaper-changing/baby-sitting.

I have heard others say that it is vital to have children because you need someone to take care of you when you are old. This is sensible, really. But I suspect that something beyond sense is important when making these types of decisions. You need to WANT to do it. I'm not there yet. Maybe someday I will be.

Monday

Today is the day I get down to real brass tacks with this music.

It is also the day I make a pot roast with carrots and potatoes.

AND this morning, when I was supposed to be dropping things off at Goodwill, I went in, and found a fabulous picture, that just needs a litle paint on the frame. So I went to Walmart (yes, Walmart) and bought paint and now I have a fun craft project.

Oh there are so many potential distractions when one is off from work.

Lovely.