Album Cover

So here's the latest "Still Falls the Rain" update - we just chose an album cover yesterday!

  

I'm very excited about it!  Now that this step is done, we can start progressing with the rest of the CD booklet design.

To those of you who have contributed to the album's Kickstarter campaign: Many, many thanks for your continued support and generosity!  We are half way there with five days to go!  If you think about it, only 100 more $50 pledges, and we will have hit our goal - so please keep spreading the word!  If you haven't pre-ordered your advance copy of the album by pledging your support you - do so now before the campaign is over!

In the meantime - have a great weekend!

Happy Independence and a Plea For Help

Happy 4th to all of you who are celebrating Independence Day today!

I hope you are all enjoying fantastic fireworks and grilled meats of every variety.  I'm celebrating in Eugene, Oregon, in between moments of frantic St. Matthew Passion studying...

In case you haven't had a chance to pledge your support for the "Still Falls The Rain" Kickstarter campaign yet, we are only 6 days away from the finish line now and about 40% of the way there! The catch with Kickstarter is that if we don't raise 100% of the fundraising goal, we will lose ALL of the money pledged so far.  So it is important that we reach that finish line in time!

Pledging your support is not only a fantastic opportunity to help bring some extraordinarily moving music to the world, but it's also a great opportunity to pre-order your own advance copy of the album.  In case you haven't checked the album's Kickstarter page out yet, every pledge-level reward includes an advance download or advance CD - a pledge as low as $50 includes both!  We're only 120 $50 pledges away from reaching our goal, and this blog gets about 100 visits a day.  If everyone who visited this blog in the next 24 hours stopped by Kickstarter and pre-ordered a copy of the album by pledging their support - just imagine how much closer we would be towards that goal and bringing this album out into the world!

To those of you who have already pledged - I cannot thank you enough for your support and generosity!  Please help to continue to spread the word!  Many, many thanks and Happy Independence Day!

Alan Cumming and 8 Days To Go

I just thought I would check in here with a little update about my latest recording project!

Let me start off by saying a big THANK YOU to all of the backers who have pledged so far to the Kickstarter campaign for Still Falls the Rain!  We're just short of 35% of the fundraising goal with a little over a week to go - so if you haven't joined the list of people who have already pre-ordered an advance copy of the album by pledging their support, there is still a little time left to do so.  If we don't raise 100% of the fundraising goal - we lose all of the money pledged - so it is imperative that we get there in the next 8 days!  No pledge is too small, and every little bit helps!

photo by Francis Hills

The latest update regarding the album is that last Friday, we recorded the final tracks of the album!  There are a few readings of Edith Sitwell's poetry that are interspersed throughout Britten's piece, The Heart of the Matter. I am excited to report that the phenomenal actor, Alan Cumming, was kind enough to do the readings for the album.  Alan is currently performing a one-man production of Macbeth at the National Theater of Scotland, and was generous enough to take some time out of his busy rehearsal/performance schedule to record the tracks in a studio in Glasgow, Scotland.  Through the wonders of the internet, the album's producer was patched in to the Scottish studio from a studio in NYC, and we were able to quickly get the final tracks of the album down.  Alan's readings of this poetry are incredibly moving - it's stunning poetry, and even more stunning to hear Alan's expressive delivery of the text.  Now that this final piece of the puzzle has come into place, I am even more excited for you all to hear the finished piece!

Again - I am so grateful for your support of this project.  I am so excited that we are nearing the finish line, and it is YOUR support that is nudging us closer and closer to our goal.  In the meantime, if you have already pledged your support, please keep spreading the word about this campaign by posting about it on your Twitter feeds/Facebook pages, etc., I would be eternally grateful. This is a fantastic chance for any Britten-lover you know who will enjoy this album to pre-order their advance copy of the album!

Walpurgisnacht

Just as I was starting to prepare myself for some serious summer downtime, life took one of it's usual unexpected turns, and I am off now to step in for an ill colleague at the Oregon Bach Festival for some Bach and Mendelssohn over the next few weeks.  So, while I had initially planned on spending this week exploring new recipes in my kitchen and catching up on entire seasons of TV that I've missed via Netflix in between casual study sessions of Brahms and Schubert, I'm instead hurtling across the country in a flying steel tube with wings a few weeks earlier than I expected.  While I am already a little homesick (a perpetual state of being bittersweetly combined with gratitude for the fact that I get to sing for a living), I'm very much excited to get to spend some extra time in the Pacific Northwest.  I think it is one of the most beautiful places on Earth, and I can't wait for some time to explore and enjoy it a bit more.

The Mendelssohn piece I'm jumping in for this weekend actually is providing me with an opportunity to sing a piece that I have been dreaming of performing since college.  Die erste Walpurgisnacht is a secular cantata that is a setting of a Goethe text that Mendelssohn set in 1831.  The piece completely captured my imagination, hitting all of my sweet spots when I was as a 19-year-old sophomore in the University of Michigan Chamber Choir.  Between singing about druids and pagan rituals and the fact that it is German Romantic music at it's most exciting and dramatic - both the history nerd AND the angst-ridden, teen drama queen inside me were having a heyday. There is a nice tenor solo in the piece - at first, the tenor portrays one of the druid priests calling for the start of the Walpurgisnacht rites that everyone is there to celebrate.

When I first saw how beautiful and exciting the opening tenor solo was at our first read through of the piece in college, I fell in love with the piece and ran straight to a practice room to properly learn it so that I could start working on it at my next lesson and sing it for the upcoming audition for the solo.  In the end, to my great disappointment, they gave the solo to one of the fantastic Doctoral students that were studying at Michigan at the time (there was a plethora of very talented tenors studying at Michigan while I was there).  Being a 19 year old with a very limited perspective on life and music, I remember feeling so sure that I would never have the opportunity to sing those fantastic opening lines ever again.  I swallowed my disappointment and sang my heart out in the chorus for the concerts, nevertheless enjoying the chance to get to know the piece during the weeks that we rehearsed it that semester.

Since getting the call to jump in at the Bach Festival, it's been great fun to reminisce about my college excitement about the piece and be reminded about the passionate curiosity for music that drew me to this wandering minstrel's life.  I wish my ailing colleague a very speedy recovery, and I offer him profuse thanks for giving my disappointed inner 19-year-old self the opportunity for a bit of delayed gratification.

Miscellaneous Catch Up

When I went to repost my latest guest post from the Ecstatic Living Room here, I took a peek over at my blog archive and realized that I've been a bit neglectful of this blog during the first six months of this year.  It was completely unintentional - life and music just overtook me, as they can do sometimes, and there just hasn't been much opportunity to write about it.  It's summertime now - so I'm hoping to jump back on the bandwagon...

One of the projects that has kept me a bit busy has been recording my second Britten album for Avie.  You can see a bit of footage from our recording sessions in the video above.  After recording Winter Words, which focused mainly on the music the resulted from the relationship between Benjamin Britten and Peter Pears, I felt that the next step was to explore some of his other relationships that inspired his composition.  After becoming fast friends and exploring Britten's music extensively together during our summers at the Marlboro Music Festival, the harpist Sivan Magen and I decided to record all of his harp/tenor compositions for the Welsh harpist, Osian Ellis, and Pears from the end of his life.  And after performing Britten's Serenade for Tenor, Horn and Strings a few times over the past couple of years, I found myself also fascinated by his musical friendship with the horn player, Dennis Brain.  Horn player, Jennifer Montone, and I became friends after performing his Canticle III: Still Falls the Rain a few years back on her Carnegie Hall debut recital, and it seemed a natural fit to record the piece together along with some other music he wrote for Brain and Pears to round out this album about Britten's other muses.

I've recently launched a Kickstarter Campaign to help raise some funding to ensure the album is finished properly in time for it's release date this fall.  You can read more details about the recording project and the concept behind the album there, as well as basically pre-order a copy of the album.  A kickstarter pledge as little as $25 will not only get you an advance copy of the physical CD of the album, but it will also make you an important part of bringing this music to audiences around the world.  Sivan, Jen, and Myra (my good friend and beautiful pianist-collaborator from Winter Words) are all incredibly proud of the work we did at the recording sessions in January, and we are very anxious to push this album to the release date finish line.  We are incredibly grateful for your generosity and any support that you can give!

In the meantime, I promise that my accidental blogging hiatus is over, and I look forward to being back here on a more regular basis...

Robert's Romance and the 19th Century iPod

My latest guest post at the Ecstatic Living Room blog...


At a concert I gave with the pianist, Jeremy Denk, about a week and a half ago in Chicago, Jeremy described the piano as the "iPod of the 19th century".  In the days before iPods, CD players, cassette tapes, 8-tracks, record players, and phonographs - the days during which the majority of the standard classical repertoire was written - if one wanted to hear some music outside of the concert hall, one had to make music themselves. Pianos were the primary way of doing that and experiencing in one's home.

My partner and I recently purchased a new upright piano for our apartment, and it has been a fun opportunity to pretend like we're back in the 19th century, playing our 19th century iPod in our home and making music together, mostly sight reading through songs as we laugh at our silly reading mistakes along the way.  Perhaps because Jeremy and I were so focused on Schumann for the past couple of weeks in preparation for our concert in Chicago, my partner and I have also been exploring Schumann's many songs, some of which I think are perhaps some of the most beautiful songs ever written.

In one of the more romantic stories in Classical music history, after a long and dramatic courtship, Robert Schumann finally married his great love Clara Wieck in 1840.  The two were madly in love, but were prevented from marrying for a long time by Clara's father, who disapproved of Robert, thinking him an unsuitable since he was a poor composer.  As the tension of their protracted and fraught engagement finally released, and they were able to be married, Robert suddenly had a flood of songs pour out of him - he composed 168 songs in 1840 alone, and in the process elevated the whole art form of song to an entirely new level.  Among the songs he composed that year are his famed song cycles Liederkreis Op. 24 and Liederkreis Op. 39, Frauenliebe und Leben (Woman's Life and Love), and his incredibly beautiful song cycle about a poet's infatuation and break up with his love, Dichterliebe (which Jeremy and I performed last week in Chicago).

In a ridiculously romantic gesture, Robert grouped together the first 26 songs he composed that year into a collection entitled Myrthen and gave them to Clara as a wedding present.  The first song, Widmung (Dedication), is perhaps one of his most beautiful compositions.  While I don't understand why there are Jellyfish floating around in the backgroud of this video, here is one of my favorite Lieder singers performing the song:

Du meine Seele, du mein Herz,
Du meine Wonn', O du mein Schmerz,
Du meine Welt, in der ich lebe,
Mein Himmel du, darein ich schwebe,
O du mein Grab, in das hinab
Ich ewig meinen Kummer gab.

Du bist die Ruh, du bist der Frieden,
Du bist vom Himmel mir beschieden.
Daß du mich liebst, macht mich mir wert,
Dein Blick hat mich vor mir verklärt,
Du hebst mich liebend über mich,
Mein guter Geist, mein beßres Ich!

- Friedrich Rückert

You my soul, you my heart,
you my bliss, o you my pain,
you the world in which I live;
you my heaven, in which I float,
o you my grave, into which 
I eternally cast my grief.

You are rest, you are peace,
you are bestowed upon me from heaven.
That you love me makes me worthy of you;
your gaze transfigures me;
you raise me lovingly above myself,
my good spirit, my better self!

Imagine getting that as a wedding present from your brand new husband -  we should all be so lucky...

I've linked to some of my favorite recordings of each of these cycles above.  If you're in the mood to immerse yourself in the results of Robert Schumann's romantic high in 1840 and experience the products of his honeymoon bliss, check out one of those recordings above.  In case of you are curious, here's a recording one of the songs that my partner and I have fallen in love with during our explorations at our new piano.  It's called Schöne Fremde (Beautiful Foreign Land), from Liederkreis Op. 39.

Es rauschen die Wipfel und schauern,
Als machten zu dieser Stund
Um die halbversunkenen Mauern
Die alten Götter die Rund.

Hier hinter den Myrtenbäumen
In heimlich dämmernder Pracht,
Was sprichst du wirr wie in Träumen
Zu mir, phantastische Nacht?

Es funkeln auf mich alle Sterne
Mit glühendem Liebesblick,
Es redet trunken die Ferne
Wie vom künftigem, großem Glück.

   - Joseph von Eichendorff

The treetops rustle and shiver
as if at this hour 
about the half-sunken walls
the old gods are making their rounds.
 

Here, behind the myrtle trees,
in secretly darkening splendor,
what do you say so murmuringly, as if in a dream,
to me, fantastic night?
 

The stars glitter down on me
with glowing, loving gazes,
and the distance speaks tipsily,
it seems, of great future happiness.

Mozart's Perfection and Imperfection

In honor of my first performances of Don Giovanni here in Atlanta, a reposting of my recent post at the Ecstatic Living Room on some of Mozart's Operatic Arias:

As I’ve started rehearsals for my very first production of Mozart’s Don Giovanni this week in Atlanta, I’ve been thinking a lot of about Mozart lately.  At every break in rehearsal, someone inevitably sighs, “oh….this music is so incredible…”, and it’s gotten me thinking about how Mozart was truly at his best when he was writing opera.  His music for the theater is perfectly balanced; it celebrates humanity’s perfection in its imperfection.  When you look at all of these situations and characters, they are so flawed and incredibly messy – yet Mozart’s music is so beautifully balanced. His music praises human imperfection, as if he knows that the beauty of being human is found in the patina of all our flaws.  It’s messy and clean all at the same time.

Being in this Mozart frame of mind, I thought this might be a good opportunity to share some of my favorite Mozart arias here.  Incidentally, they are also some of my favorite operatic arias, period.

As I am currently in rehearsals for Don Giovanni, why not start with one of my favorite moments – Leporello’s aria, Madamina, il catalgo è questo.  At this point in the opera, Donna Elvira, a Spanish noblewoman who has been seduced and then dumped by Don Giovanni, has followed (stalked?) Giovanni all the way from Spain.  Giovanni manages to evade her, leaving his servant Leporello to tell her the truth – that she is just one of thousands of women who fill his little black book of conquests.  Listening to Leporello, Don Giovanni sounds like quite the impressive stud…or a sex addict.

LEPORELLO:

My dear lady, this is a list
Of the beauties my master has loved,
A list which I have compiled.
Observe, read along with me.

In Italy, six hundred and forty;
In Germany, two hundred and thirty-one;
A hundred in France; in Turkey, ninety-one;
But in Spain already one thousand and three.

Among these are peasant girls,
Maidservants, city girls,
Countesses, baronesses,
Marchionesses, princesses,
Women of every rank,
Every shape, every age.

With blondes it is his habit
To praise their kindness;
In brunettes, their faithfulness;
In the white-haired, their sweetness.

In winter he likes fat ones.
In summer he likes thin ones.
He calls the tall ones majestic.
The little ones are always charming.

He seduces the old ones
For the pleasure of adding to the list.
His greatest favourite
Is the young beginner.

It doesn’t matter if she’s rich,
Ugly or beautiful;
If she wears a skirt,
You know what he does.

Next, let’s move to perhaps one of Mozart’s most famous arias: “Der Hölle Rache kocht in meinem Herzen” from The Magic Flute.  I’d venture to say that it’s one of his most favorite compositions simply because it is fierce music – it’s insanely dramatic and when you hear a woman sing it (or a boy), its just simply astonishing that a human voice can make those sounds.  At this point in the opera, the Queen of the Night is imploring her daughter Pamina to murder the high priest Sarastro, threatening to disown her if she doesn’t follow through.  Whenever I see this, I always hope for Pamina’s sake that she has a good therapist waiting for her in the wings, so she can work through all the inevitable mommy issues she is bound to have after hearing that aria being screamed in her face.  Here’s my favorite recording of this aria, sung by soprano Edda Moser:

QUEEN OF THE NIGHT:
Hell’s vengeance boils in my heart;
Death and despair blaze around me!
If Sarastro does not feel the pain of death because of you,
Then you will be my daughter nevermore.

Disowned be forever,
Forsaken be forever,
Shattered be forever
All the bonds of nature
If Sarastro does not turn pale [in death] because of you!
Hear, gods of vengeance, hear the mother’s oath!

My third favorite aria is perhaps my favorite aria that Mozart ever wrote, “Un’ aura amorosa” from Così fan tutte.  At this point in the opera, the soldiers Ferrando and Guglielmo have placed a bet with Don Alfonso on their girlfriends’ fidelity – in order to test their girlfriends’ faith and love, they disguise themselves as traveling Albanian soldiers and attempt to seduce each others’ lovers.  Sure that Don Alfonso is going to lose, Ferrando daydreams about what it will feel like when this prank is over, and enjoys the beauty and strength of the love he feels.  It’s perhaps one of the most tender and sweet moments ever composed in opera.

FERRANDO
A breath of love
From our treasures
Will afford our hearts
Sweet sustenance.
A heart nourished
On the hope of love
Has no need
Of greater inducement.

Collaborative Works Festival

Today is an extremely exciting day for my colleagues at Collaborative Arts Institute of Chicago and I, as tonight is the very first concert of our first ever Collaborative Works Festival - our new, annual Festival devoted to the art of song and vocal chamber music.  My colleagues at CAIC and I have actually been dreaming of this Festival since 2005, long before CAIC as an organization was even an idea.  We have had this vision of building a showcase for the art of song and promoting this incredibly rich repertoire that we are so passionate about - from that vision, CAIC was born, and now, the pinnacle of that vision - the Collaborative Works Festival, is about to begin.  Below, you can read more about my thoughts on our vision for this annual series of concerts in my Artistic Director's note reprinted from this weekend's program.  Tonight is a major milestone for us at CAIC, and there will be much to celebrate.


Unfortunately, the life of the traveling artist forces one to miss many important milestones - it's the one aspect of this life in music that I find most difficult.  Tonight is one of those nights in which I have wished in vain that I could clone myself or divide myself in two, and somehow pull off the impossible feat of being able to be in two places at once.  When the opportunity arose to be able to present Martin Katz and Jesse Blumberg as our inaugural festival artists, we at CAIC knew that this was not a chance to be missed. Unfortunately, though, due to the complexity of calendars, I wasn't able to coordinate my own schedule to match with theirs in order to be there for this momentous event.  So, while I will be singing Bach with David Robertson and the Saint Louis Symphony this weekend, Jesse and Martin will be launching this Festival which has become so close to my heart and has become one of my primary passions.  My heart is with them and my colleagues at CAIC this weekend, and I am forever grateful for their integral part in getting this vision of ours off the ground in such classy and spectacular style.  


Tickets are still available for both concerts of the Festival, which are both at the the Cindy Pritzker Auditorium at the Harold Washington Library in downtown Chicago, and there are still spaces available for tomorrow night's Master Class on Schubert songs with Martin Katz, which will be held at the Pianoforte Salon of the FIne Arts Building on Michigan Avenue.  If you are in Chicago, please be sure to catch both of these amazing artists perform these all too rarely performed masterpieces, and celebrate the launch of this new Chicago tradition with us.  I will be celebrating with you all in spirit.

A NOTE FROM THE ARTISTIC DIRECTOR OF CAIC:

The simple act of a human voice telling a story through song has a way of piercing to the core of our hearts, inciting reactions from laughter to tears. Something aboutadding music to text makes the story a universal one: Music's universal language draws us together, allowing us to hear someone sing their story and feel, "Oh my gosh - that's me...I've lived that, too..." While the grand forms of musical theater and opera are incredibly powerful and moving, they can feel like blockbuster movies, sweeping up their audience with the staggering weight and momentum of the many dramatic elements involved: orchestras, soloists, choruses, sets, costumes, wigs, make-up, imaginary fourth walls, and gigantic theaters make for a big show. When it comes to songs, there are only the performers and the audience, and the atmosphere created is one of direct communication and personal expression. For me, a song is a special type of conversation that gives me the opportunity to see inside the performers' heart and soul. Because of its direct nature, the art song has an unlimited potential for real vulnerability and intimacy in the relationship created between performers and audience. As powerful as the song is, it is an art form in peril. There are so few that present performances of song, and even fewer that seek to preserve the art form and cultivate an audience for it. Part of the mission of Collaborative Arts Institute of Chicago is to promote the art of song and vocal chamber music. It is our passion for this niche of the vocal repertoire that inspired Shannon, Nicholas, and me to pursue lives in music. We have experienced the transforming power of song as both performers and as listeners, and our lives have been forever changed for it. CAIC has created the Collaborative Works Festival to be Chicago's showcase for this repertoire, and we are excited to be pursuing this part of our mission with such fervor. This music is too powerful to be ignored or forgotten, to be left unplayed and unsung. It is music that is truly for everyone, and it should be enjoyed by all. It just needs more opportunities to shine! I cannot imagine a more fitting way to kick off this annual Festival than with performances of Franz Schubert's song cycles. Schubert truly is the 'father of the German Lied', and his virtuosic song settings have inspired song composers of every generation and every nationality. This combination of performers is perfectly apt, as well. Martin Katz has mentored countless musicians in the performance and study of song, as well has having accompanied some of the world's most famous singers for nearly half a century. Jesse Blumberg has established himself as a leader of his generation in championing the art of song, both as a performer and a presenter; in 2007 Jesse founded the Five Boroughs Music Festival in New York City, which has become impressive platform for song and chamber music. I sincerely hope you enjoy the 2012 Collaborative Works Festival's 'Epic Journeys'. We're excited to have you with us on the beginning of our own epic journey, as we inaugurate a new Chicago tradition!

A Passion for the Passions

I've been graciously invited to be a new regular contributor at the classical music blog, The Ecstatic Living Room.  Below is a preview of my first post there, about Bach's Passions.  If you enjoy the preview, please feel free to check out the rest of the post at the Ecstatic Living Room's site.  Also, take a moment to browse through some of my other colleagues' posts there.  It'll be a fun time, I guarantee it...


A PASSION FOR THE PASSIONS

Mardi Gras, or Fat Tuesday, just passed by us, so for much of the world, now that the copious alcohol consumption, Paczki eating, parading, and bead-necklace tossing is over, and Guys/Girls Gone Wild has enough flasher footage to finish their 19th installment in their series, Lent has begun. I was raised Greek Orthodox, and as a result, our Easter often tends to fall at a slightly different time each year, so I actually wasn’t raised with the tradition of Fat Tuesday. Instead, while the ideas behind the holidays are the same, Lent for us always began on Clean Monday – which entailed a day of strict fasting, and was much less fun than Mardi Gras, I assure you.

On the few times my mother insisted that we strictly fast in observance of Clean Monday, it was explained to my younger brother and I that the reason for enduring the throbbing headaches caused by our hunger pains was so that we could understand the sacrifice that Jesus made for our sins by allowing himself to be crucified. It was then explained to us that the idea of giving something up for Lent continues the meditation on this particular theme. Of course, this was lost on me as a child, and I just continued to whine about not being able to eat Chicken McNuggets for 40 more days.

For singers, the Lenten and Easter season (which I can hardly believe has arrived already – where does the time go?) proves to be a time in which there is a lot of extra work singing about the Passion of Jesus Christ, as well as the Easter Story in general. The pieces that seem to get the most traction around this time of year are Bach’s two Passions. While it is pretty clear that he wrote or at least drafted four versions of the Passion story (one for each gospel – Matthew, Mark, Luke and John), only two seem to have survived in a complete form to the present day: the Passions according to St. Matthew and to St. John. The way Bach conceived of both pieces is pretty extraordinary, and while they are clearly pieces of sacred church music that was not meant to be staged, both works are quite theatrical in scope. Each piece has a narrator – the Evangelist – who is like the voice of an angel, narrating the action of the story in a very simple, speech-like musical form called recitative. A baritone plays the role of Jesus in these recitatives in both pieces, and the chorus members play the other various characters in the story through their many choruses. Yet, for me, what are most compelling about both passions are the four soloists (a soprano, an alto, a tenor, and a bass) who comment on the action of the story as timeless, human observers with haunting and meditative arias. This story is one that many have heard told yearly in church – Jesus was arrested and tried under Pontius Pilate, sacrificed himself for our sins, was crucified, and was buried. The commentary of the soloists, though, is heartbreaking – relating the story to us as believers, meditating on what the various aspects of the story mean. It’s like listening to sermonizing on the lessons of the Gospel, but in a way that actually compels us to listen, and can actually move our hearts — unlike when we tune out the priest’s homily in church, patiently waiting for the offering tray to be passed our way and the post-church-service fellowship hour to begin...  (read more)

What's Important

There has been much talk (and screaming and shouting and general drama) about the plight of the New York City Opera over the past year or so.  I’ve heard musicians and singers debating hotly about it during rehearsal breaks, FaceBook pages and groups have been set up at which people write angry and pointed statements about whether City Opera should continue, and there has been much written about it in the press, as well.  As one of the many American singers who got an early break on the New York City Opera stage, I care very deeply for the company and the people who have devoted their lives to it.

On Valentine’s Day, I journeyed down to Brooklyn to see the company’s production of La Traviata, going not only show my support for the company, but also my dear friend Laquita Mitchell, who after years studying at the Manhattan School of Music and in the Houston Grand Opera Studio together, has become like a sister to me.  As I rode the train to the Brooklyn Academy of Music, I felt a bit of the usual resentment that it takes so long to get to Brooklyn from Manhattan (and, yes, I realize that I’m offending many Brooklyn-fans by saying that out loud…I just have yet to fully embrace the boroughs…forgive me!), and I tried to pass the time by listening to music on my iPhone, and watching the other subway riders around me.  Glancing at the time as my train rolled into Atlantic Station, I realized that I was a bit late, and sprinted up the stairs and around the corner to the theater, opening the doors to mass chaos.  BAM was so crowded, I could barely find the box office let alone the entrance to the theater.  People of various young ages and in various states of dress-up were milling around, desperately trying to find the end of the Will-Call line, jostling each other impatiently in an effort to get to their seat before the curtain rose.  I felt suddenly as if I was at something that was hip, cool, and vibrant, and despite my irritation at being pushed about in a crowd – I was overjoyed to see that there was a crowd there.  I took my seat, and I saw that the house was packed – there was barely an unoccupied seat anywhere to be found.  As I settled into my chair, waiting for the show to begin, I thought about all of the shouting and screaming about trying to shut the City Opera down, and how the Opera is a shell of it’s former self, replaying all of the debating and infighting that I’ve observed from afar this past year in my head. 

Just as the house lights dimmed, and the conductor made his entrance in to the pit, I heard the young couple behind me whisper to each other:

“Have you ever even been to an opera before?  

“No – I haven’t.” 

“Neither have I – and I’ve always wanted to go…I’ve always been curious to see what it’s like.” 

“Me too – this is exciting!” 

“It sure is!”

And then I thought – THIS is all that is important.  THIS is why we need a City Opera.  No matter where the show is. 

The conductor raised his baton, and the violins began the show…

Martin Isepp

A friend was saying to me recently over the holidays that it seemed to her in our current fast-paced age, true mentors are hard to come by.  In some ways, I felt a bit of truth to her words, and if that is truly the case, I feel incredibly lucky to have had so many people who I would consider mentors throughout my years as a musician so far.  One of the greatest of these for me would most definitely be the pianist, coach and conductor, Martin Isepp.

I’ve often said that my four summers at Marlboro saved my relationship with music.  After a few years of hustling to carve out a beginner’s foothold in the tough and competitive operatic world, I arrived for my first summer at Marlboro burnt out, somewhat jaded, and a tiny bit unsure why I was going there in the first place.  Hindsight being 20/20, when I look back at that version of myself standing perplexed and terrified at the threshold of my first, rustic dorm room on the Marlboro campus, I strongly believe that the main reason the fates had brought me to Marlboro that first summer was because I was starved for inspiration.  Martin was one of the main people in whom I found that inspiration which I so desperately needed.

Over the course of my four summers at Marlboro, I explored with Martin the many complex layers of the songs of Britten, Schumann, Vaughan Williams, Brahms, Wolf and Mozart.  As Martin guided me through the twists and turns of all this music over the course of our many sessions at Marlboro together, I came to understand that his approach to music came from a place of deepest respect and love for the art form.  A tough and demanding coach, he never let one note of music be poorly sung, nor one phrase pass by unexamined or unstylishly turned. Yet, despite being so rigorous and exacting, his manner was, for the most part, very gentle.  If he didn’t like something one did, he would sigh as if disappointed that you had broken his favorite piece of china and then begin to go about gently prodding the musician he was working with in a different direction, gradually cajoling them to approach the phrase or note in a way that would suddenly unlock the mysteries of the music at hand. At the end of these moments, the “eureka!” light bulb would shine brightly, and the cobwebs of confusion and musical befuddled-ness would disappear.  The music would flow again, and the composer’s intentions and the musical drama of the moment would suddenly be crystal clear.  Always expecting the best, and constantly pushing those that worked with him towards the highest levels of excellence, I found myself in our sessions reaching again for greater heights for the first time in years.  I experienced some songs I had known for years in a completely different light after bringing them to him – for instance, Schumann’s “Schöne Wiege” will never been the same for me after our sessions on Schumann’s Liederkreis, Op. 24.  Martin revealed the profound depth of the song's protagonist’s pain at leaving the town where he met his beloved by simply adjusting the tempo of the song in one of our sessions, transforming what I once thought of a simple, pretty, melancholy song into a richly layered, complex, heart-wrenching piece of music just as dramatic as any operatic aria ever composed.  After years of neglecting the world of Lieder and Art Song while running the beginner’s operatic rat-race, through our sessions together I rediscovered my passion for the music that made me fall in love with the art of singing.  At a time in my life when I felt that I was starting to lose touch with my wonder, respect, and love for music, Martin rekindled the fire inside of me, reconnecting me with the calling that pushed me to pursue a life in music in the first place.

The news of his passing on Christmas day is a true loss for our musical community, and he will be sorely missed.   As the person who delivered the sad news to me on Monday said, “it is difficult to imagine a person with greater integrity, musical instincts and knowledge, and kindness. There is quite simply, no replacement for him.”  I could not agree more.

Martin, I cannot thank you enough for the inspiration, encouragement, and mentorship you have given me and the musical world around me.  May you rest in peace, and may we remember you forever in our world of song.

Courtesy of YouTube, one of Martin's performances at Edinburgh - with Frederica von Stade: 

Merry Ho Ho 2011

To all those celebrating the holiday today (and taking an online break from the festivities), a very Merry Christmas to you!


As my final concert of 2011 included an ondes martenot last week at Carnegie Hall, it only seems fair and hilarious to celebrate with these youtube performances of some carols on its sister instrument, the theremin:


Silent Night:





O Come All Ye Faithful:





Hark! The Herald Angels Sing:





And on a more serious note, here's a beautiful performance of one of my favorite carols:





Happy Holidays to all!

The Rules

A few years ago, I was rehearsing with a pianist for an upcoming concert, and I couldn’t remember what the rule was regarding whether to approach a trill from above or directly on the note when singing a certain composer’s music.  I asked her if she remembered the rule, and she said to me, “I don’t do rules.”

While her response seemed hilariously rebellious at first, I came to see a lot of logic to her point.  Much like Italian cuisine, which varies so much from region to region, so do people’s ideas of “rules” in music.  Encounter an Italian from one region of Italy, they will tell you that unequivocally you do not use garlic when preparing a certain sauce.  Travel just an hour south, and ask an Italian from that region about said sauce, and they will tell you unequivocally that you MUST use garlic when preparing that sauce.  Both are equally convinced that they are telling you the rules, despite the fact that they are telling you the opposite.

Much the same thing happens in music, particularly when musicians speak of the music of the dead.  After my pianist friend’s comment above, this strikes me as also hilarious, because let’s be reasonable – how can we really know?  I always want to say, show me your time machine and let’s go talk to those composers.

Now I understand that we do know some information about how this music was performed – most composers that are in the standard canon of performed classical music have left writing and documented evidence of their tastes.  Rossini wrote often of his distaste for his singers ornamenting his music, and he is documented as being highly critical of what has become the standard, modern-day technique of tenors to carry our chest voices up to the very tops of our ranges.  Nevertheless, when was the last time you heard Una voce poco fa without any ornamentation or a tenor singing Count Almaviva without heroic high notes?  These things are generally accepted as “rules” today and are expected in performance.

Then again – these dead composers were once flawed, imperfect human beings, too, and often contradicted themselves.  Handel was also a bit critical of singers overly ornamenting his arias, but then again, you look at some of the ornaments he himself wrote, and you get a mixed message in terms of “performance practice”.  My colleague, Ann Hallenberg, showed me some of the ornaments he wrote for her arias in Ariodante while we were on a concert tour of the opera this summer, and I tell you, they are crazy.  Sure, they are beautiful and exciting to listen to, but they look slightly insane at first glance.

Handel’s Messiah is one of these pieces that is often subject to “rules”, yet interpretations of it widely differ. To say that the piece is performed in a wide variety of styles is an understatement, and it is performed in many different versions with different cuts and different singers singing different arias.  Just to give you a taste of the wide range of possibilities, here are two examples of the many ways the first tenor aria can be performed:








The first time a younger version of myself encountered a version of Messiah that didn’t conform to my expectations or the set of rules of the piece that I had in my hot-headed, young noggin, I reacted initially with a very closed mind.  But what I quickly noticed is that whether a particular style or version is to my taste or not, each one, when performed with conviction, brings out something new in the piece that I have never heard before.  I’ve sung the piece in so-called “authentic, period-style” performance with period instruments, and I’ve sung performances of the piece with modern-instrument orchestras that approach the piece with more of a romantic flair, and what I can say is that the piece is never the same for me.  This weekend with the Baltimore Symphony, I experienced yet another interpretation, and yet again, there were new aspects of the drama of the piece that the conductor brought out that I had never heard in the piece before.  The piece was yet again kept fresh for me – this is part of what I find so amazing about this music.  There is so much in it to be brought forth and emphasized, and there are so many ways to interpret it.  In the end, whichever "set of rules" the performers choose to subscribe to, the performer has to decide what is to their taste and commit to it.  The point isn’t the rules, but what it is that you want to say.


Just for fun, here's a video of one of my favorite moments in the piece: