When I sing, I feel like when you’re first in love. It’s more than sex. It’s that point two people can get to they call love, when you really touch someone for the first time, but it’s gigantic, multiplied by the whole audience. I feel chills.
- Janis Joplin (via cityyandcolour)
(Source: loluum)
Jenna Fischer’s Advice To Actors
Opportunity meets Readiness.You cannot always control the opportunities, but you can control the readiness.So, study your craft, take it seriously
So my super cool, uber talented friend Elena and I have been dying to sing a concert together. We’ve been talking and talking about it, and then finally just decided to program our own concert. We found this awesome venue in Greenpoint (that’s in Brooklyn folks) called the Manhattan Inn. My boyfriend and I actually go there all the time for brunch, lunch, dinner and most importantly UH-mazing cocktails. We love going there particularly because there is a piano in the middle of the room AND (surprise, surprise) a pianist. It’s a lovely place, young and chill, great food..and it gets even better…they have a CONCERT SERIES.
so wham, bam, Elena and I book a concert for April 15th (which is coming up super soon). As operaworks alums (http://operaworks.org/), we were inspired by Ann Baltz, opera-artist-guru-goddess, to put an out-of-the-box program together.
Having both experienced living in New York as single women, we thought what better topic to sing about then DATING! Even better…online dating. I’ve never done it myself, not that I have anything against it. I suppose I just never had the time. BUT, needless to say, it seems to be the most efficient way to “meet” someone and a lot of people are doing it.
So….we’ve chosen music that share our sentiments, and then some music that fit within certain standard encounters like “THE PLAYER”, “THE WALL STREET GUY”, “THE STALKER”…you get the idea.
Hopefully we can get people to come out since it is a Sunday night. But hey, its Spring and warm weather is just around the corner. People should want to come out!
(my boy made the poster for us :))
So you want an opera singer for a friend,
for a lover, for keepsMy opera singer’s name is Leah, I recommend her.
Men fall in love with her when she goes to get the mail,
and not just mailmen, men from across the street,
men who have been following her for four days and want her
address to be their address, they would take her last name,
and just because of her humming. When she gasps,
hearts break. When she snores, marriages fall apart.
With Leah, I am always backstage. Still—Everyone should have an opera singer for a friend, because
she’ll make you feel classy, and guilty for smoking.
She’ll always have water, she can order in French, and
whenever she’s drunk, it’s a concert.
Everyone should have an opera singer at their wedding,
preferably three, for the harmony. At every birthday
you’re special, at funerals, you’re never bored.
Everyone should have an opera singer for a friend, but—One day you’ll want more. The best way
to court an opera singer: buy her a mansion by the sea,
with a balcony, (this way, she’ll serenade you),
with a lemon grove nearby, for her throat, and a servant
for every note in her range. Buy her a grand piano,
(if she already has one, buy one grander).
Hire an accompanist, half as attractive, a live-in,
hire a teacher, but make sure he’s gay. Be persistent—Buy her vases, never flowers, show your love outlasting
the others, frame programs from every show, sit in front
of the front row, and clap as loudly as she sings.
Most importantly: remember you will never be her true love.
And know, know, she is as jumpy as a coloratura.
Sneeze once, cough, or struggle to clear your throat,
and you’ve lost her: running to her coach, singing her exit,
conducting her own goodbye, and even to this you will cry
“Brava!”- Siobhan Brannigan
Loneliness is the human condition. Cultivate it. The way it tunnels into you allows your soul room to grow. Never expect to outgrow loneliness. Never hope to find people who will understand you, someone to fill that space. An intelligent, sensitive person is the exception, the very great exception. If you expect to find people who will understand you, you will grow murderous with disappointment. The best you’ll ever do is to understand yourself, know what it is that you want, and not let the cattle stand in your way.
- Janet Fitch, White Oleander (via therainyresistance)
In search of incredible
end of march: weissewiese: Reasons to leave:This place is too fast, things change...
Reasons to leave:
- This place is too fast, things change too much, things happen too often. I would like a space where I can just sit and soak up syllabic sunlight and sentential starlight without worrying about passing traffic or seagulls that might steal my chips.
- This place…
Beirut - Elephant Gun
Me and my piano.
Posted by becauseiamastarvingartist
For the past three months, since I’ve been back, I felt as if there was something missing in my life. Nature, solitude, culture, and oddly enough, music. Even though I wasn’t performing in Switzerland, I was completely immersed in it. I taught it, on my spare time I played the piano in that beautiful apartment, or in the lobby of Hotel Cresta, or I was listening to yes, my ipod on my walks, when I wasn’t busy lavishing in the silence of the Alps. At times though I remember feeling frustrated with the lack of performance while I was out there and I thought surely it wouldn’t be the case when I got back to the states. Well I came back here, and within a week I had a performance in Baltimore and two auditions back to back. Not bad for only being back in the country for two weeks. And then….niente. Nothing. No performances, no auditions, because of course, I wasn’t here in New York during audition season last year. So this summer, I was busy…working my day job and trying to conquer this damn aria that I am determined to learn. But that was it. No singing, no audience, no collaborations. I felt as if I was drowning in my own solitude. Yet, I didn’t have any desire to be around anything or anybody else but myself. Clearly, not performing was getting me pretty down, not even having auditions was disheartening. Luckily things are starting to turn around. I’ve got a Hansel and Gretel, the Messiah and the Christmas Oratorio to look forward to in December and maybe some self-produced concerts here and there in the fall. Audition season is starting soon which I’m certainly looking forward to. But the best thing that has happened to me thus far since I’ve been back, is having a piano all to myself in my apartment.
A new friend of mine is lending me his Clavinova piano and last night, we took the thing apart, managed to fit it into his car after a huge trial and error process, and drove it across the Pulaski bridge from Long Island City to my apartment in Brooklyn.
I haven’t felt this happy in months. Today all I could think about was getting back to my apartment and playing that piano. Of course, I forgot the piano bench at my friend’s place so today after subbing at a church in Harlem, I decided to stop by LIC to pick up the bench. This is me waiting for the G train, sitting on my piano bench.
So after awkwardly carrying my piano bench through the subway and Greenpoint to my apartment, all I could think about was playing that piano. And I did. I played for about two hours straight. I felt as if a huge weight was being lifted off my shoulders. I could finally breathe again.
I think everything is going to be quite all right now. I’ve forgotten that playing the piano has always been my meditation.
I am home again and it’s never felt better.
Although perhaps now I’m going to be even more of a recluse. Just me and my piano.
How lovely it is here to dream away
the night in the quiet woods,
when in the dark trees
the old fairy-tales echo.
The mountains stand shimmering in the moonlight
as if deep in thought,
and through the tangled undergrowth
the stream rambles, lamenting.
For wearily upon the meadow,
Beauty walks now to her rest,
and with cool shadows
Night covers up the dear one.
There is an eerie lament
in the quiet splendour of the wood:
the nightingales sing
about her the entire night.
Josef Karl Benedikt von Eichendorff from Wanderlieder
but not really. This blog chronicles my adventures as a young opera singer.
