RichardtheTenor

Never Look Back!

2011-10-03T17:37:00.000-05:00

If ever a musical warranted constant comparison with past performances that musical would be Follies. Just as its cast of characters comes with a companion set of all their younger selves a revival comes with the expectations raised by past experience: Alexis Smith and Dorothy Collins, Barbara Cook, George Hearn and Mandy Patinkin, Elaine Stritch, and all those divas who have made “I’m still here” their own. So there was a cloud of memory all around me as I sat in the Marquis Theater, ready for my next immersion in my favorite show. And much that followed was engrossing enough to suspend or even triumph over past competition, though there were some debatable moments.

The Theater was set up as a wreck, with decaying walls and cloths hanging above. And there was a sound, wind whistling through the broken windows perhaps (although it also suggested an ultrasound!). If there had been a chandelier we could have gone right into Phantom! The overture started and the ghostly showgirls began to float around the stage. And then there she was, the star: Bernadette Peters as Sally. For me she was instantly an obstacle, her mannerisms and unique (and now debilitated) voice making the creation of a character impossible. She gave a thoroughly thought-out, intense and self-defeating portrayal of herself as a psychotically depressed recluse. But then the rest of the cast came streaming on, an army of vibrant character actresses. One jolly fat lady stepped onto the stage and I said to myself, she’s going to sing “Broadway Baby” and I and going to love her (she did and I did!). Dimitri Weissman (David Sabin) gave little sign of connection to his name; he seemed a hale American and nothing like the ethnic producers who abounded on Broadway long ago. Roscoe (Michael Hayes) looked good in his plum tuxedo and sang well without capturing the style of an elegant ’30s lyric tenor. These parts bring up a major issue with the nature of the show and how to cast it. Every number depends on a sense of how these things were done back when, and that includes appropriate diction and vocal technique. All legit singing is not equal, and a singer with Otello in his bio is not going to recall the style of Kenny Baker. And some of the styles evoked by this string of pastiches are now so arcane that almost nobody knows or cares if they are correctly recalled. Even so, the song itself – “Beautiful girls” – and the grand ensemble into which it crescendos, with the parade of matured but still so grand showgirls, earned every drop of the ovation that followed.

The remaining trio of main characters contained two near perfect successes and one misfire. Buddy (Danny Burstein) was miraculous, energetic and charming yet still slightly schlubby – and he mastered that main trick of the whole show, how to wear his public persona for audience and rest of cast to see while revealing the other side which he mirrors for his partner. When he spoke with Sally we could see what she saw: a cruel control freak. He sang well and danced with boundless energy. Phyllis (Jan Maxwell) had her icy irony down to a science, balanced with pity for Sally and a huge dash of her own disappointment. “Lucy and Jessie” was excellent, brimming with nervous excitement. I found “Leave You” to be too vicious, too open and vulnerable: I wanted her still to be in command of what she was showing Ben (Ron Raines). But Ben – all he was showing was ennui. It is surely a large part of him, but we have to see what Sally sees: charm and drive. There was no continuity between young Ben and his older self. And there was no arc from first entrance to breakdown, which hobbled the climax of the show. His dialog scene with Carlotta fell flat; he made no attempt to rally his seductive charm so we couldn’t even pity the fading of his powers.

Carlotta… was a star turn. As such she fell into the same problem faced by Peters as Sally. Too much Elaine Paige, not enough actual character. Her uppermost notes are far too harsh and her rage-filled delivery seemed too cheap a reading of the song. Carol Burnett remained firmly in my mind throughout.

The younger main quartet was quite fine. Young Sally (Lora Lee Gayer) was brassy of voice but credibly romantically deluded. Young Phyllis (Kirsten Scott)was lovely. Young Buddy (Christian Delcroix) was an organic root of his later self and young Ben (Nick Verina) had all the makings of… George Hearn as older Ben! “Too many mornings” was heart-rending, mostly for the way the older and younger versions of Ben and Sally drifted toward and away from each other.

The Whitmans (Don Correia and Susan Watson) were charming. Fifi, oops, I mean Solange (Mary Beth Peil), had the figure (Frenchwoman kept skinny by cigarette smoking?) and the poses for the role, but not much voice or accent. The whole Follies Bergere style is almost as foreign as Dutch comedy now, so this may be the best that could be done. Then out came Hattie (Jane Houdyshell) to win all hearts.

It seems to be traditional to cast Stella as a black woman now. I think it must be anachronistic – could a black woman have triumphed in a theater south of the Apollo before 1940? And the bits about being on radio in Philadelphia? Apart from that quibble this Stella (Terri White) was terrific, leading a stunning mirror number. The choreography (by Warren Carlyle) was clever, though much less clear than previous versions. Instead of a clean changeover from older to younger there was intermingling, most poignant when the two generations faced in opposite directions. And the opening section, with various mishaps due to age and faulty memory, was amusing without being cruel. The miking made it possible to hear the belted solo through the massed voices and orchestra (conducted by James Moore). I found the sound too loud in general. The cast tended to lag the beat, even as the orchestra provided slightly broadened tempi throughout. And there were far too many pauses and fermatas for music that is all dance in origin. Even “One More Kiss” developed a case of hesitation step.

“One More Kiss” also brought back the issue of proper style. Rosalind Elias was utterly admirable, solid of voice and poised of appearance…and completely wrong for the role, a solid mezzo soprano where a light soprano is wanted. Carmen does not sing Viennese waltz songs. Marta Eggert is still alive at 99 and would know the style and bring the right girlish quality of voice. What a pity Anna Moffo never got to play the role. It would have been great for Dorothy Kirsten. And Licia Albanese did a splendid job. By contrast, young Heidi (Leah Horowitz) was absolutely perfect, so utterly pure of tone and gentle of demeanor that she could even do the spurious high D flat at the end and make it sound like a delicate overtone to the main tune. Her dress was a bit much, more Lucia at the wedding than was really necessary. The number was staged most effectively, the two avatars of “never look back” advancing on either side of the doomed romance center stage. But I would like a nice slow portamento at “all things beautiful must die….”

Loveland was a series of rose-laden arches. Out came Buddy in a stunningly tacky tux, with two vivid foils (“Margie” and “Sally”), to give a riveting version of “Buddy’s Blues.” At the end he gave one look of tired despair – and this is the key to the direction of the show (by Eric Schaeffer): for the Follies-within-Follies numbers it seems to me that the characters should stay within what they are trying to present and not let the façade crack until Ben falls apart. This bleeding of pretense into reality made “Losing My Mind” a disaster. Sally imagines herself as Julie London singing “The Man I Love,” so irresistible in her romantic sorrow that surely Ben will rescue her. She cannot show the true psychotic anxiety behind the song or she becomes unattractive, which she did, breaking the song into shards almost to the point of parody. The last note was breathtakingly lovely but the damage was done. (And surely her “Folly” should be played in the green dress she refers to early in the First Act?) Phyllis’s next song wiped all that away. I think “Ah but underneath” goes more truly to the heart of Phyllis’s problem but the sheer energy of “Lucy and Jessie” is totally necessary at this point. Ben did not come close to topping what his wife had just done and his collapse was so poorly motivated and timed that it was hard to figure out how the stage was suddenly clear, except for a puddle of confetti. Phyllis handled her rescue of Ben and her checked impulse to comfort Sally with quiet style. And the exit of Sally and Ben, with Ben’s realization that he couldn’t put his arm around Sally, was truly black. The last showgirl closed the door and the past was closed off. No idea what the future would bring….

September Songs

2011-09-10T20:01:00.002-05:00

I wrote this at the end of September 2001. I didn't get as far as the week after, when I ran an exit drill at Synagogue (things I NEVER thought I'd do). We were all pretty freaked out...

September Songs

September 29, 2001. Today was a brilliant early Autumn day, as bright and crisp as I could ever desire. I drove down to Penn Yan, a town on the west side of Seneca Lake, whose downtown was an unchanged image of the 1890s. I walked around, visited the two used book stores, and drove back north along the lake. I stopped at a "fruit outlet", the clever name for an orchard’s store, and bought sweet golden apples. Then I returned to the motel where I am staying during this brief production of The Magic Flute at the Smith Opera House in Geneva, NY. There was nothing to remind me that this September is different, nothing but the new unease of my heart and of course the wall-to-wall TV coverage which leaps at me as soon as I turn the set on.

The last evening of carefree America was September 10th. I had a rehearsal with The Western Wind Vocal Ensemble that afternoon and then rushed (with two colleagues from the Western Wind gig, Kristina and Eric) to Sutton Place Synagogue for a rehearsal with my High Holy Day choir. The bus across 86th Street and the #6 train down Lexington Avenue got me there with time for a bite to eat. Rehearsal was stressful, because the music is so intricately dependant upon the musical mood of the Cantor, and my job is to steer the choir after him, no matter what beats he skips or adds. I love conducting, but sometimes the fact that my position is that of follower, not leader, gets to me a bit. And that evening the Cantor decided to cut a piece of music I like and replace with a different version of the same prayer, with music I care for a great deal less. I conceded the point, but it didn’t help my mood. I went home annoyed, and slept. Bad rehearsals there have a way of being followed by pleasurable ones, so Wednesday evening was bound to make up for things.

On Tuesday morning the 11th, Cynthia (my wife) decided to try out the new local gym. So when I had gotten both kids to school I had the house to myself, a rare treat. I went into the kitchen to make a leisurely breakfast, tapped the radio’s on button, and hoped to hear the end of Morning Edition while I cooked. But WNYC was only static. I was confused, but found music on WQXR and set about grating a potato. For all I know they had a news break while I made an omelet, I wasn’t paying too much attention to the radio. I took my breakfast and the New York Times to the dining room and settled down for a while. After the meal, the paper, and the tea, I went upstairs and logged on to AOL. And there I saw what was going on. Just as when Princess Diana died, I saw it on the web and then went right to the TV. No NBC, no PBS, no CBS -- it wasn’t just WNYC radio that=2 0was reduced to static that morning. I found the BBC on Long Island Public TV and sat on the sofa watching Rome burn for 20 minutes or so. Steve Vasta called. He had heard something was going on, but having no TV needed information. I sat for a while watching, sharing with him over the phone. When Cindy came home she was she was crying and shaking. And as she joined me on the couch, we both saw the buildings come down, one at a time. My response was cold, shocked; hers was warm and hysterical. I did not believe that the whole tower was falling, I was sure that the upper floors had crumbled leaving 60 floors upright below. I just couldn’t accept a total structural catastrophe. By the time the second tower fell, I knew what was going to happen as it started to go.

I had several events scheduled for the day: teaching at Brooklyn Queens Conservatory in Flushing from 2:00 to 4:30, a Magic Flute rehearsal at 5:30 on the Upper West Side, and the first meeting for the Fall of my little chamber choir, Jubal’s Lyre. I called Brooklyn Queens, knowing that the bridges were all closed, and before I could tell Gloria that I couldn’t get there, she said not to worry, nobody is expected to teach today. By contrast, the Magic Flute people told me that the show must go on! It was going to have to go on without me, since there was no way for me to enter Manhattan, either by car or by train. I figured that nobody would show up for Jubal's Lyre, and didn’t worry about it.

The hardest thing about the day was the terror that other things could be happening anywhere. There were reports of planes unaccounted for, car bombs, who knows what else. Cindy and I discussed getting the kids home from school, but after calling both places decided that the children were fine where they were, and indeed that they should enjoy a few more hours of insulation from all the horror. So we sat on the sofa until almost 3:00 and then went to get Maddie at Pennington. [Did we then get Arlene followed by Julian?] We turned the TV off and told Arlene that the children were to see videos only, and went off by ourselves for a bit. We eventually settled into a news-gathering routine of checking things on the web or turning on the TV news after the kids were asleep.

We decided that we needed to eat out, where there were other people. So we picked up my Mother in front of her apartment building and went to the Athena in Fleetwood. We had to balance our need to talk about the disaster with Mother and our need to shield our children from too much knowledge. Maddie was starting to realize that something big had happened. But Julian was blissfully ignorant. Much of our talk centered on the fear of losing our civil liberties as part of a terror response. We could not even contemplate the possibility of another attack. Afte r we got home I called each of my choir singers to make sure they were OK. Jessica Marsten saw the whole disaster from the Queensborough Bridge, and was extremely upset, though alright. Phone calls and e-mails: "just checking to see if you’re alright" became a full time occupation. My group of Yale Whiffenpoofs all checked in on the New York and Washington residents, and it turned out that Jeff Knishkowy and his wife Patti had become the parents of Aaron Max that day.

How different Wednesday was. Cindy was supposed to go to Staten Island to teach a computer course at the SoftWise Office. But there didn’t seem to be a way to get there. She managed to arrange to teach by phone hookup. Rehearsal by phone was not an option, so I decided to face the city. MetroNorth had announced the return of (limited) train service, so I allowed a lot of extra time and set out for Manhattan. The train wasn’t as late as it might have been. I got off at 125th Street and went to the downtown subway, which was also not so bad. Then I caught the 86th Street crosstown bus, which detoured up Madison and across Central Park at 96th, since the 86th Street Transverse was closed, who knew why. I had time for lunch, and was lucky to have cash, since I discovered that nobody could take credit cards and all the ATMs were down. I ate at Ollie’s and still had time before my voice lesson. I walked to Starbucks, thinking to buy20a cup of tea, but all the Starbucks were closed. I wound up at a local coffee shop on Amsterdam Avenue, where I drank my tea while staring at a TV. They were raiding the Copley Plaza Hotel in Boston. I went to my lesson, where Conrad and I discussed the mess briefly and then set out to block it out with singing. We pretty much succeeded. Next was Western Wind rehearsal. Everybody was subdued, and many people were late, due to various transportation problems. First we cut one number from our program -- we were rehearsing for a concert of Jewish High Holy Day music to be narrated by Leonard Nimoy on the following Sunday. Nimoy was already in town, so there was no danger of his not making it. But we felt the Shehecheyanu prayer, a thanksgiving for making it to "this day", would be disrespectful to those who had not made it, and the jolly music setting was in unspeakably poor taste. Then we worked. Three hours later we adjourned, and I set out for Sutton Place again, with Kristina and Eric. This trip was rather different. The bus went across the park at 86th, which was now open, who knew why, and we transferred to the subway at Lexington Avenue. But the train we got on promptly went out of service, and we waited a long time for another. I took the express to 59th and walked the rest of the way. I called ahead and asked that the other choir members be warned that I would be late. No one could concentrate. We started 25 minutes late, worked for an hour and ten minutes,=2 0and then I sent everybody home. I walked to Grand Central, not even worried about whether the train would be on time, got on a train and went home.

Thursday was another day of coping with getting around Manhattan. Everything was easier, but nothing could be done without forethought. I saw my therapist, who wanted to know if I had cried yet (no), my voice teacher, and went to Western Wind rehearsal. Then I went downtown to Union Square and saw the holistic health counselor I have started working with. She reassured me that all her clients had reverted to comfort eating! I walked past Union Square and went to the Virgin Megastore and shopped for opera DVDs -- I bought the Berlin Huguenots production with Richard Leech. And then headed for Grand Central and home.

Friday was the dress rehearsal for the Western Wind concert. One of our Cantorial soloists had canceled, fearing that he would be able to fly in for a Sunday concert and then get back to Chicago in time for the start of Rosh Hashana on Monday evening. So we reassigned two of his numbers and cut the other two. Leonard Nimoy attended the rehearsal. He was quiet and professional, working through his narration and getting his cues. We were all even more careful than usual not to make any Star Trek jokes. Since the program included three items from the Yizkor (Memorial) Service, we decided to expand one to more fully cover the immense tragedy. The El mole prayer is often expanded to include a section about the victims of the Holocaust, so Rabbi Skolnik, who wrote the narration for our program, added a section in Hebrew about those who died in fire for our country. Our job: to sing it without losing it!

I went home and my student Jeanne came by. She didn’t want a lesson, just a cup of tea and some company. She had been a public figure in her own right earlier in the week. She was the spokesperson for the teachers’ union at three local Catholic schools where a strike was called, unfortunately on the morning of Tuesday the 11th. As soon as the disaster began, the teachers called off the strike, figuring that the students needed them. And Jeanne got quoted in the local paper. We made tea, as we always do anyway, and talked. She has a friend who is in such denial that cannot discuss the events of the week at all. Jeanne stayed to dinner and then joined us as we lit candles, along with our neighbors, at 7:00 p.m. Then I left for my regular Friday night gig at Temple Israel New Rochelle.

We had music to rehearse, but mostly we wanted to talk before the service. When the topic of how our leaders responded came up, I confessed how impressed I was with Giuliani and how disgusted but not surprised I was with the vanishing President. The sub alto got furious with me20and went off in a huff. Chris Mooney, the baritone, remarked, what is HER problem? The service went well and the Rabbi was comforting.

Saturday the 15th I was scheduled to sing a ballad concert at the Merry All Center for the Arts in New Milford, CT. I called ahead to see if they still wanted me to show up. They did, but were concerned, as I was, that the program might seem inappropriate. So I suggested that I could put together something topical, and maybe add a sing along at the end. In the morning I assembled a crazy program: an adventure in rage, grief, consolation and hope modeled loosely on Elisabeth Kubler-Ross’s "On Death and Dying." Then I went into the city to rehearse for the Magic Flute, picked up Steve Vasta (my accompanist) on my way back north, and stopped to fetch the babysitter, since Cindy was coming with us. Cindy had been longing for a cathartic musical experience, and was hoping that my recital might help her deal with her feelings.

We drove to Connecticut and stopped for dinner at a Boston Market on Route 7. Then we found our way through the trees and winding lanes to Merry All. It is a quaint little building in a quaint locale, but it is not winterized, and reeks of damp and mildew. A decent sized audience showed up and I started to sing. I launched into Sound an Alarm, from Judas Maccabeus, and then told the audience that they=2 0were right to notice that I wasn’t singing A Wand’ring Minstrel I, which was listed in the program, and explained what I was doing. Some of them had come for escapism, and were skeptical, but soon everybody was with me, as I sang and explained each number. The only problem was the mildew -- and probably mold -- which poisoned me more with each intake of breath. My high range dried out and departed, leaving me to survive on cleverness and some rearranging of the program as went along. I sang Avenging and Bright, a bloodthirsty Irish song of vengeance, and Ah, la paterna mano (rage over the slaughter of loved ones) and In Flanders Fields. I switched moods and did some ballads of love and loss (I hear you calling me) and of acceptance (Grieg’s The Last Spring) before leading into inspirational songs. As I started The Holy City I realized I no longer had a non-cracking high A flat, but I saw that many of my listeners knew the song, so I motioned them to sing along -- and each time we got to a high note they sang it for me! I led a sing along of Battle Hymn of the Republic and America the Beautiful, and stopped, relieved, while I could still speak!

I woke up on Sunday with no voice at all, but had to get one somehow, since the big Western Wind concert was at 3:00 p.m. I drank plenty of hot fluids and took lots of vitamin C, and went to the Unitarian Church in Hastings with my family. The pla ce was packed, and the mood was a mix of sombre and bewildered. At the place in the service where candles are lit for memory or hope, a girl got up and said simply, "Tuesday was my birthday..." We all sighed for her. Her parents got her a cake by Saturday. The minister preached tolerance, saying that we should no more blame all Eastern-looking people than we should blame people with blue eyes. Maddie reared back in her seat and covered her (blue) eyes in horror that anyone could think of blaming her for anything, and I explained to her that that was exactly the point.

We went home, left the kids with a baby sitter, and drove into the city. Cindy got roped into helping set up the reception while I did some frantic last-minute rehearsing with the group and our guest conductor, Mati Lazar. I had not had time to eat, so Cindy sent me a care package backstage: vegetable fried rice and hot & sour soup, just what I love when my sinuses are giving me trouble. The concert went well. We had a large audience. The intensity of the music, the words, and the situation locked us all together. When Nimoy got to the place where he read the text of El mole, with its added section, he developed a lump in his throat. Slowly he lost it and so did the audience. Todd Frizzell stood by me onstage with tears running down the edge of his eye glasses. We sang. And we sighed. And we went on. The reception was modest -- Bill Zukof had decided to take the money we would have spent on fancy food and drink and donate it to the Red Cross instead. A bunch of us went out to an Italian restaurant on West 72nd Street for dinner. Kristina and Gayla argued the opposite sides of patriotism and imperialism. When we got home we discovered that my Mother had freaked out and called many times wondering where we were: she was afraid because we were in the city.

The Rapture of 9/11

2011-09-10T16:48:00.001-05:00

The Leftovers

I got sucked into Tom Perrotta's new book really quickly. His easy, conversational tone and snappy but unhostile humor make his prose welcoming -- with zingers that stick in the mind. His setting is small town America, in a not too distant future: our wars have expanded to Somalia and the Sudan. But public consciousness of the wars is limited to those directly affected -- there is a subplot involving a soldier. Most of the characters display no awareness at all. What they do know, all too well, is the pain and confusion caused by a mass exodus of a cross-section of the populace. There was no rhyme or reason to the selection of who vanished. The rain fell on the wicked and the just, as it were. But all those who are left behind ache for their losses. The main thrust of the novel is an exploration of the various responses by the "leftovers." Why him or her? Why not me? Was it the Rapture and are the end days coming? Or was it a mystery? One character is a minister so disappointed to be abandoned by God that he resorts to defaming the departed, to prove that the event itself could not have been the real thing. But what thing was it...? I think Perrotta has used the concept of the Rapture, the belief in a millennial departure of the saved, as a metaphor for the random mass of deaths that rent many communities in the form of 9/11. Nobody in the novel rejoices for the departed, believing them in a better place. Everyone still on the planet copes with fear and grief and anxiety and abandonment. Some project their negative feelings onto others, some grieve alone -- and that grief isolates them from human companionship. Each plot thread moves through some Kubler-Ross-ian arc of denial, rage, acting out and growing up (or not). Perhaps the largest message of the story is that forcing others to join you in your beliefs does no good. The Guilty Remnant are a cult of death and are set in direct contrast to Mayor Kevin and his slow, kindly patience. Holy Wayne is almost as destructive. Characters who recruit or control either learn to renounce those behaviors or remain imprisoned in their states of stasis. The denouement came more quickly than I expected, but made total sense when I had absorbed it. An excellent book, a fun read: full of sorrow but not devoid of hope.

Richard and Julian's Excellent Adventure

2011-08-24T21:20:00.002-05:00

Tuesday morning got off to a delicious and reprehensible start with breakfast at the Windmill Restaurant. All starch all the time! Actually, my morning started well before Julian's -- I awoke at 5 and lay quietly in my bed until I felt I could wake Julian at 7:15. After the scrapple (me) and the pancakes (him) we checked out of the deserted hotel and spent 45 minutes at the Morgantown Library, where I wrote the previous blog posting. Then it was time for the vacation flow break: an appointment with my sister, her caregiver, and her service coordinator. We got through all the stuff we needed to cover and I received my assignments (various documentation I have to pdf and send on). Then Julian and I set off cross country to enjoy the rolling Pennsylvania-ness. We stopped at a bookstore in New Holland, which looked a lot more promising online than it turned out to be. Then we ate lunch (I did eat a salad this time) at a family restaurant and continued on our way -- to Gettysburg!

At some point while we were driving south on route 15 there was an earthquake, which was felt up and down the east coast. But not in our car. When we got to the visitors' center it was the sole topic of conversation! We put off doing the battlefield to Wednesday and went to find out hotel. The Eisenhower is a relic, rather like a Catskills resort, with a pool in a central indoor courtyard surrounded by rooms that open onto it. The place was almost empty. I sat in the hot tub and chatted with a couple who may have been the only other guests. Julian and I drove back into what we thought was downtown and walked around, eventually settling on dinner at Tommy's Pizza. It was quite good. We then went back to the hotel and settled down to watch Star Trek Generations on TV.

The alarm went off at 1:10 -- I guess the previous guest (who knows when) had set it and left it that way! I wound up staying up and reading until 4, then falling heavily asleep. When I woke it was quite dark. Julian tried to turn on one light after another, to no effect. I called the front desk and discovered that there was a power outage. And looking at my phone I also discovered that it was 9:40! We packed up and left, just as the lights came back on. We chose the Avenue Restaurant for breakfast. Julian was very pleased with his poached eggs. Then we took our battlefield self-guided tour map and set off. I have to confess that I know some people can appreciate the intricacies of the strategy and tactics, some people for whom the details are as vivid as my back-of-the-hand knowledge of opera. But to me it's just vast farm land and men killing each other. A blur. Julian enjoyed the drive and I enjoyed taking him. My Father did this tour with me four decades ago. I remember nothing of the battlefield but can vividly recall watching "If I were a rich man" on the motel TV. But was it Herschel Bernardi or Robert Merrill?

When we finished our tour we left the town, by way of the far more interesting real downtown (not the guns, t shirts and taverns district we had walked through on Tuesday evening). We had another cross country experience, since I missed 15 north and had to navigate my way back to it. We stopped in Harrisburg to visit a truly awesome used book store. And we ate one more regrettable meal (yes, bacon makes everything taste better) at the Skyview Country Restaurant in Lenhartsville. Route 78 east flowed wonderfully -- the westbound side was stopped cold. We took a detour to walk around Flemington, NJ (it was closed!) and then a second to get ice cream (and sorbet) at the Haagen Dazs in Millburn. Then it was time to drive home. We played the Garrison Keillor joke show CD and laughed ourselves silly. It was a great trip.

One Short Day in the Qua-aker City!

2011-08-23T08:01:00.003-05:00

(If you don't get the musical theater reference in the header please refer to the Wicked cast album!)

And off to Philadelphia (and that is another song).

Monday morning. Up real early. Pack real light. And away we go, just the boy and I, down the Jersey Turnpike for our adventure. Traffic was favorable. Breakfast at a rest stop was ok, but getting back onto the highway was not easy. No room between speeding trucks -- and suddenly the SUV behind me sped up and swerved to the left, cutting me off and almost driving me into a Jersey barrier. I stopped, breathed, waited for a gap in the traffic (fearful that one would never come) and then gunned it and got back on 95. Not happy. Oh Mr SUV, when you succeed in causing that accident, I do hope nobody else gets hurt!

We got to Philly a little after 10am, cruised down 5th Street and found a cheap garage just about South on 3rd. Actually, most of the garages looked cheap. And there was street parking galore, made less than optimal by the 2 hour limitation. Indeed Philadelphia in August looked much as I recalled it from my childhood: closed for vacation! We walked up to the Visitor Center and got tickets for the Independence Hall tour. We got in line to see the Liberty Bell, made a brief stop at the portait gallery in the 2nd National Bank, and then did the tour. Our guide was a very extroverted, theatrical guy, much fun to watch. We went back to the Visitor Center when I realized we couldn't get into Dolley Madison's house without another set of free tickets -- and we were lucky to get the last spots open for the day, since the house is so tiny. We split a chicken salad sandwich while waiting for the tour, and had time for a walk. The Todd House (home of Dolley's first husband) was tiny -- and the Bishop White House, down the street, was huge, with awesome high ceilings. Our guide was very friendly, and tolerated my correction of her statement that Madison was more than 20 years older than his wife -- it was 17 years!

Then it was time for Julian's initiation into the mysteries of Philadelphia. We selected from the options on Market Street: Sonny's. And in we went for Cheesesteak. He ordered it the right way, with Provolone, even as I overheard the counter girl offer someone else "Philly Style" -- with CheezWhiz!

(Big digression, on the topic of CheezWhiz: Summer 1982. Chautauqua Opera. I was in the studio program, singing chorus in Blitzstein's Regina, with Cynthia Auerbach directing. Act 2 scene 2 is Regina's party. Before the dress rehearsal, stage management assembled trays of toast points with CheezWhiz for us, the guests. And we were "directed" to eat. Ms Auerbach was not the sort of person you argued with, so eat we did, even as the trays became staler and crustier over the weekend run. Never gonna tiuch that stuff again!)

Julian loved his cheesesteak, and I am sure he will known the difference between the ral thing and the silly imitations they serve elsewhere!

After our (late) lunch we walked to the Seaport Museum and got tickets to tour the submarine Becuna and the cruiser Olympia. The sub was...claustrophia central. Julian liked it and I nearly stopped breathing. The cruiser was much as I remembered it from a visit long decades ago. I love ships and was glad to share that feeling with my son. On our way off the ship we were photographed and briefly interviewed for the Philly Inquirer: it seems the ship, which is in need of maintenance and hard up for cash, may get moved to California. It would be a pity but I am glad I got to see it again.

We walked to South Street, window shopped a bit, had water (Julian ), iced tea (me) and a cookie (we shared) and then got into the car. I drove towards Skykill Crawlway (well, that's what we always called it) and then abandoned it when it lived up to its nickname. I navigated by the sun, north and west, looking for the Turnpike and showing Julian how to make use of the sun. Yes, I was a tracker in a Fenimore Cooper novel in my previous life! We found 276 and drove west to Morgantown. The Holiday Inn gets points for great beds, but loses for a pool with water so cloudy we didn't dare get in. So we stopped by the Windmill restaurant for pie and then went to sleep!

Exciting Travel Plans!

2011-08-14T19:02:00.006-05:00

Maddy is off to Scotland! So the rest of us went to Yonkers....

Saturday was unbearable. Maddy was getting packed up, practicing finding the internet on my iTouch, enduring reams of last-minute advice, and enjoying a family meal at Fleetwood Joe's. Then it was time to drive to JFK Airport (greater love hath no man) where we dropped her off at the curb where her friends were gathering. We chose not to linger, figuring that the swiftest cut hurts least. I drove back another way (like the three kings) because I had seen the traffic going north while we were on our way south! We -- Cindy, Julian and I -- made a date for dinner with our friends Ron and Rita, stopped at Trader Joe's for supplies, and went to hang out. When the heavy rains kicked in it was time to go home.

Sunday. Rainy Sunday. I decided I had to get out of the house so I went to the Unitarian Society, alone. I was one of the first there, although a fair number of people showed up by service time (and after). At candles of joy and concern I lit a candle of excitement and anxiety, saying "I dropped my daughter off at JFK yesterday..." The next candle started with "I dropped my daughter off at JKF on Friday." Then we had "I dropped my daughter off at JFK for her flight to Ghana" (OK, you win!) and finally "I just have to be different, I dropped my son off at Newark!" The rest of the service was a meditation on global warming. It became hideously depressing, with occasional notes of sardonic humor. But the social hour afterwards was very pleasant. I came home and took a nap (or two). Eventually I was so stir crazy that when the rain lessened I proposed going out to dinner. The three of us went to the new Pepe's in Yonkers, a branch of the famous New Haven/Neopolitan Pizzeria. Parking was dicey but I squeezed into a space. Even at 5:45 there was a line, which got much longer as we waited. And it was amazingly noisy inside. Cindy got the fresh tomato pie, which she liked a lot. Julian got the chicken pizza, which he found wanting on the grounds that the chicken was frozen. I had sausage and broccoli, no cheese.

A Short Week on Cape Cod

2011-08-09T07:16:00.005-05:00

We weren't supposed to get to the Cape this year. We have gone here every summer since 1998 but Maddy has a High School Musical Theater trip to Edinburgh which is costing us more than 2 weeks at our usual haunt, Kalmar Village, and occupying the weeks we would have been there anyway. From a purely financial standpoint we should have stayed at home but everyone was in a state of PTown withdrawal so I found us a cheapish motel and we crammed 5 nights there into our schedule and between our mortgage payments.

We drove up on Wednesday, a blessing since the traffic is so much less midweek. We stopped at The Kate, the Katherine Hepburn Theater in Old Saybrook, so Cindy could buy a coffee mug (Ms Hepburn is a family idol; we do imitations of her delivering other people's lines all the time). We got to North Truro much more expeditiously than on any Saturday in the past. The Cape View Motel is rather basic. There is a pool, so old that it is 12 feet deep at one end and suitable for diving. The view is spectacular. The room is smallish and smells of cleaning fluids, not necessarily a bad thing! The beds are not great. And although the rooms are all non-smoking the outside area is not: the clientele is very much a smoking group.

We did one of our many rituals on the first night, dinner at Napi's. Excellent as always. We walked around PTown a bit and then came home to sleep. Thursday we went to Wellfleet, shopped, walked, ate at the Lighthouse Restaurant, and came back to change. Our first beach excursion was to Head of the Meadow, at high tide. The kids body surfed in some pretty vicious-looking waves and had a totally great time. In the evening we went to see The Winter's Tale in the tent at Payomet. What a weird play! Maddy summed up the plot as: everything was fine til some guy decided to be a dick. There were several colliding methods of producing spoken tone, which I always find jarring in Shakespeare. And the performing styles ranged from over the top to rather simple. It was worth seeing but not a play I much want to attend again anytime soon!

Friday we had breakfast at Adrian's, where Cindy always gets the cranberry pancakes, and then went to Marconi Beach. We went into PTown to window shop and ate at Karoo Cafe with an internet friend, Mark. Then we went to Herring Cove to enjoy the sunset.

Saturday we lazed around the room, then we had lunch at the Village Cafe in North Truro (where I used to go for muffins and the NY Times; lunch was a change for us and also excellent) and went back to the room, where I had an epic nap while the kids swam in the pool. We had another theater event (so ironic that we who so love the theater and who live in the epicenter of theater should so rarely attend live plays and almost always way out of town!): An Ideal Husband at WHAT (Wellfleet Harbor Actors' Theater). It was terrific. Each of the 4 actors played multiple parts -- of both genders. In Act 3 all 4 took turns being the Scottish butler in quick succession; it was hilarious.

Sunday came finally the rain, alas (but we had two excellent days and one cloudy, muggy one). We had breakfast at Chach (Julian made his first acquaintance with Eggs Benedict) and went to the Universalist Meeting House for drop-in choir. They are in search for a new minister and I just finished my duties on the search committee at our UU Society, so there was a lot to talk about at coffee hour! We bought a few gifts for folks back home and ate lunch at Twist'd Sisters (the kids enjoyed their slices; my antipasto was quite good). Then we hid from the downpour, safe in our room. We ventured out for the evening: dinner and plentiful hangout time with my college friend Joe.

Monday morning we got up early, packed and left. We stopped for breakfast at a coffee shop in Brewster (the place we used to love in Orleans was long gone) and made excellent time on the way home. Final ritual of the trip was lunch at the Shoreline Diner. I chose food austerity: black bean soup and a salad. Maddy had vegan meatballs made from Bulgur... We were home before 2:30 -- and I had a voice student an hour later!

Smith 2 Part 8 and Last

2011-07-31T20:51:00.002-05:00

My final early awakening in my hot and muggy dorm room! A bunch of us met in the lobby and sorted ourselves into two breakfast parties: Kathy's Diner and Sylvester's. I was of course in the latter. Andrew, Denis and I drove there and met Steve Lanser and Genie Sherer (who were already seated, and moved to a larger table with us when it opened up). We had a leisurely meal and a lot of reminiscing got done. Eventually it was time for the next round of goodbyes and we left Genie and Steve in front of the restaurant. Back at the dorm I observed one of my oldest rituals, the playing of Frank Sinatra's "Only the Lonely" album while I packed up. I deleted myself as admin of the two Western Wind Facebook pages, gave my office key to Liz, loaded the car...and drove off. Next adventure, please!

Smith 2 Part 7

2011-07-31T06:08:00.002-05:00

There was a treat at the final breakfast: lox! (No, that is NOT the photo above) I savored my time talking with my workshop friends at the table. Then I drove over to Sage and sat outside talking to Genie before leading warm-ups. The last Verdi rehearsal got us pretty well prepared. I decided not to participate in any filming for the Western Wind website. After all, I won't be part of the group anymore. I made my very last farewell speech at the end of announcements, and yes, this summer has been like the "Addio, Addio!" duet from Rigoletto.

My group worked through our repertory for the concert, making great strides with each piece. Lunch was less treat-ful: chili. Not a great idea before singing. I got them to find me some cold cuts. One of the Jazz concert ensembles sang for the dining hall staff: "Hungry for Healing" with Christian wailing on the gospel solo. I rode back to Sage with Andrew and our group ran through our concert set. Then it was time to go upstairs. The concert was varied and delightful, as always. My group did sensationally. They sang:

--Gloria by Carillo (uptempo jazzy praise music, with a contrasting soft central section)

--Yumiko's version of Eleanor Rigby, which I sang through most of my time with the Winds. Fine solos by T and Bert, and marvelous ensemble work by all -- with Laura floating on top.

--my psycho-sexy arrangement of the Bizet Adieu de l'hotesse Arabe. Linnea and Christian burned those high notes and the long runs at the end. It was thrilling.

--Vaughan Williams's setting of the "We are the stuff that dreams are made of" speech from The Tempest. Totally appropriate to my mood, and indeed the central 3 songs of the set were all designed to address departure, loneliness and the big picture. The outer 2 songs were energy-generators. I am ALL about the programming!

--and finally, Ride the Chariot, a souvenir from Yale. We rocked and I roared the high solo in the middle.

Then it was time for the Verdi Pater Noster itself. I set up the podium and stepped on top, looked out at the array of faces, breathed, and we began. The sound was shimmery and sweet. All of the emotions of the week hovered around me, near enough to make me tremble yet just faint enough for me to continue functioning. The final three Amens (thanks to a suggestion Mark had made in the morning) traced an arc through sorrow, hope, and release. The last chord hung suspended in the air and vanished. There was perfect silence and then applause. For Verdi, for all of us singing together, and for me as I relinquish my place in this world of community through singing. I fought the tears, stepped aside, and began the round of farewell hugs and words. Each contact was warm -- but when I got to Yumiko the tears came. That was the hardest moment, the truest realization. Some farewells may be truly final, some may lead to periodic Facebook contact, but also some may be simply until the next non-Western Wind gig: I said to Elliot, "Scarecrow, I'm going to miss you most of all!" But surely there will be some low (or high) rent synagogue gig quite soon, and who knows what else.

Betty Canick, who had driven out for the final concert, took me aside and told me she had something for me. It was a painting -- she painted the pond at Smith for me! (Evie Spaulding had also made a presentation, at Silly Seminar, and given me a silly conductor alarm clock.)

Milling about on the stage gave way to driving back to the dorm, filing unused music, and then dinner at Osaka. I treated myself to the Hibachi Filet Mignon and Lobster -- and swallowed a good deal of squirted Sake. The line at Herrell's was monstrous, so we sat and talked on the wall across the street, and then went back to the dorm living room to hang out. One by one the few of us who remained yawned and went off to bed...

Smith 2 Part 6

2011-07-30T05:59:00.002-05:00

The final Friday, always endless! Up early, write, shower, off to breakfast. Bill gave his overtones lecture in lieu of his share of warm-ups, with the assistance of Mark. I finished teaching the Verdi and we ran it (a little). I gave my group Vaughan Williams to sight read -- and Andrew asked if we couldn't wake up our brains with something more tonal. Tonal? I got tonal: Ride the Chariot! We worked our way back up the musical complexity scale and broke for lunch -- and various frantic rehearsals for the afternoon's extra events.

First, the continuo concert, at 1:30. There were a lot of terrific numbers. Liz and Laura singing the final duet from Poppea was beyond stunning, especially as supported by Bob and Dongsok, who gave the piece, which can drag on, such shape. I sang Purcell's "If music" and really let my voice out. The applause was wonderful -- and the acknowledgement from the continuo gods was most validating.

We crammed as much work as we had brain power for into our afternoon small group session and then broke for a few more frantic rehearsals followed by the Jazz/Pop concert at 5. I premiered an arrangement (What Are You Doing New Year's Eve?), which went well, considering how treacherous it is, and sang on another, Yumiko's "Tonight I Celebrate My Love for You." The opening bars terrified me and I spent hours practicing them: getting myself going in the style is the most foreign thing to how I sing now. But the solo licks were such fun and we got into a wonderful groove.

On the way to dinner Evie told me my voice is utterly transformed from 10 years ago, so powerful. Well, yeah, that's why it's time to go....

After a quick cue-to-cue rehearsal downstairs we went up to seminar. My group sang the Glinka "Cherubic Hymn" from the balcony at the start. Then the other groups went through their paces and we got up for our set at the end. Byrd much improved. Weelkes pretty stunning, with my "numb grief" reading making an excellent effect. I sang "Orpheus with his Lute" with Laura, Bernadette and Christian, trying to hold back with variable success. Gayla told them to sing up to match me, which solved one problem but caused concern about lack of dynamic variety. Oh well. Bye-bye Green English Romantic Part Songs Book! We ended with the second part of Gombert's "Lugebat David," a veritable wall of sound.

It began to rain as we went back to the dorm. There was hang-out time in the living room, and I wound up having a long and heartfelt conversation with Christian. To bed, late, and up, early, to write and upload photos. I woke from a very vivid dream about rounding up the Winds for a farewell meeting!

Smith 2 Part 5

2011-07-28T22:24:00.002-05:00

I got up really early and wrote for a while, catching up on my blog. Things have been so intense here that finding time to reflect on them is difficult. By now each mealtime winds up being a heartfelt conversation with someone I have been seeing here every summer, and some of those talks just happen spontaneously between workshop events. I participated in Todd's warm-ups, which included some brilliant stuff and the expected scatalogical reference! I worked through much of the Verdi and did a run-through from the beginning to 3/4 of the way through.

Our group did a short debriefing of the Wednesday night seminar and then we applied ourselves to the Barber Twelfth Night for a solid hour. We broke out to work on our Tudor anthems: I spent a while constructing my Kubler-Ross stages of grief reading of Weelkes' "When David Heard." I was so happy. Someone asked me how I could work so intently with all that is going on in and around me -- the answer is that concentrated musical work is a safe space where I am simply present for what I am doing. What a magical feeling. We finished the morning by reading through an arrangement of a Christmas song that Christian did. It was lovely and I hope we can put it on tomorrow or Saturday. Just before lunch I crammed in a rehearsal of my "What Are You Doing New Year's Eve?" It is starting to pull together and sound really nice.

Lunch was an all dairy nightmare, except for the cold cuts in the salad bar. Harrumph. But I had a long talk with Steve, who is new to the workshop experience, and very perceptive. Then I went out to see the sidewalk sale and wander around NoHo. One of our participants waved at me from a sidewalk cafe table and I sat down with her and her friend for some excellent conversation. Then I went back to the dorm to put my laundry in the washer before turning around and going to Sage for a jazz rehearsal, the gorgeous version of "Tonight I Celebrate My Love for You" that I am singing with Liz, Gayla, Andrew, and Mark. Finding the right voice to sing it with is a project but once I get going it is a total blast.

I came back to the dorm to put the clothes in the drier and take a shower, then went to dinner. It was barbecue night -- indoors -- and the paper plates kept sticking to the tables. Michele had quite a time trying to liberate her bowl from the clingy varnished surface. My group met after dinner in Room 215, since Smith Summer Programs seems to have double booked the recital hall for the evening. There was a summer camp talent show down there! Seminar was the Thursday shortened version. My group did well, and I was pleased that the ultra soft shocked sorrow interpretation of "When David Heard" played so well and got such an excellent reaction. The Barber piece made a big impression too, and turns out to be one of Bob's favorites.

We all drove or walked (I drove) back to the dorm. Silly Seminar featured Billy leading the C Party, taking our country back one half step at a time; Russian tongue twisters by Varya (who just graduated from the Murrow School where we have a residency program); a splendid song by Gayla about her predictable taste in men (married, gay, or messed up); and an appearanc by Tesso (Bert) who sat on Bill's knee, asked questions about politics and finance, and visibly nodded off as Bill answered. I was gently roasted in a skit about various products made from or by my voice. I also won one round of the t-shirt contest, with my Raven Used Books shirt being the "Blackest Shirt." It is time now for the traditonal singing of the Hawewujah Chowus in the voice of Elmer Fudd, which I am electing to skip.... sleepy!

Smith 2 Part 4

2011-07-28T05:57:00.002-05:00

Tuesday started with breakfast and a trip to Paradise Copies, my home away from home this week. Group 6 is a music-eating monster and my job is to keep it well fed! I have 11 singers and need enough copies of each piece (some for all 11, some for breakout groups which must add up to 11). Western Wind's music library has a lot of folders that are either empty or have too few copies of any given piece, so fair-use xeroxing is the way to go. And since I was once a paralegal, long ago, copy machines are my special friends anyway.

I got back in time for a short large group rehearsal and then we called our groups. My last calling the groups question was "when I call your name tell me your favorite spice, condiment or other flavoring." My 11 and I went down to the Recital Hall and got to work. First days's menu:

Barber: Twelfth Night

Carillo: Gloria

Weelkes: When David Heard

D'India: Strana armonia

Lennon & McCartney, arr Matsuoka: Eleanor Rigby

Bizet, arr me: Les Adieux de l'hotesse Arabe

The Barber is hard to count and has a poem for which the word overwritten is way inadequate. Rigby is the first Yumiko arrangement that I learned and would have been on our Monday night program if Michele knew it. The Bizet I arranged for WW in 2003 (we used it on the Funny Valentine program for 2 seasons) and is totally fun to sing. I have wonderful memories of Kristina and Gayla reveling in the coda with its traded roulades, parallel thirds and trill. The D'India is psychotic. Since there is no Tuesday night seminar there was no pressure to get anything performance-ready and my only managerial task was to check in on anyone who was butting heads with the material. Just as we got to break time at 4 the heavens opened and solid sheets of rain came pouring down. I waited out the storm by the music office, talking with Todd. After dinner came Bob's reading session, devoted to English music using the King James Bible for texts. Michele and I debriefed our day over tea at Haymarket and then came back to the dorm -- where we heard the sounds of a small group rehearsing in the lobby!

Wednesday started to fill up with extra events, rehearsals for the continuo and jazz concerts. I led warm-ups (after another trip to Paradise) and more of the Verdi. I had more music for my group:

Traditional, arr Smith: Ride the Chariot

Glinka: The Cherubic Hymn

attributed to Josquin or Gombert: Lugebat David

MacFarren: Orpheus with his lute

Byrd: Miserere Mei

The Byrd was a backup selection, designed to replace the D'India depending on how it went. The Byrd got put into action after ten minutes spent seeing that the D'India was much improved but still not a winner measured by any cost/benefit scale! At lunchtime I rehearsed Yumiko's arrangement of Tonight I Celebrate my Love for You with Liz, Gayla, Andrew and Mark. We spent the afternoon getting 3 pieces ready for seminar. I made yet another trip to Paradise at 4 and came back to run through my arrangement of What Are You Doing New Year's Eve, intended for the Jazz concert. I stopped by the Early Music Internet Cafe of Love (Bob's office) and was handed a lovely glass of wine -- and we read through Purcell's If Music Be the Food of Love. I have sung it for years and know it cold. Bob and Dongsok read it with style. It was a truly delightful experience. Seminar went well, with each group presenting an array of well-prepared material. Bill's group did my arrangement of Erev Shel Shoshanim. Catherine and Barb sang an astonishing Bulgarian duet. My group sang the Carillo, half of the Bizet, and Rigby. And then we went back to the dorm for Vocal Round Table. Amidst the questions about vocal issues came Roger's: Would it be rude to ask why Richard is leaving? I smiled and said yes and we moved on. I took him aside and apologized for going for the cheap laugh but explained that the topic was far too complex and personal for a workshop forum! As the session drew to a close I caught sight of Bill with a tray of glasses and realized what I was in for: a toast to my departure and some very nice words by Bill. I was speechless. It was lovely and painful all at once. I thanked everyone and went upstairs to bed.

Smith 2 Part 3

2011-07-26T05:54:00.001-05:00

I didn't get much more sleep Saturday night. The heat began to abate but it took a long time for the building to release the stale air. After warm-ups and Gabrieli rehearsal we had closing announcements for the weekend workshop, and I made my little farewell speech and got a response so prolonged that I had to fight tears. Doing this the right way has its own costs!

Bill and I worked through the morning with our group. We spent some time on the Bruckner but cut it after a discussion in which several of the participants voiced their doubts about trying it get it performable by the afternoon. We had plenty to do without it. Bill elected not to have us sing the Gabrieli at lunch. We put "finishing" touches on our set at the remaining work session, touches that took us almost to the moment the concert started. The final event of the weekend flew by. Excellent singing, excellent programming all around. And when it was over, as everyone milled about saying goodbye, I made sure to find those who were not staying for the week and make my own more permanent farewells.

Sunday evening was down time. I had dinner with Denis at Paul and Elizabeth's. When they say hot they mean it -- the Cajun seafood sampler nearly wrecked the roof of my mouth. We went to Baldwin to sit on the swing and found Michele and David T already there. But they let us have a turn. Most of NoHo was closed so were wound up at Haymarket. I had something ... healthy... full of juiced vegetables.

Monday morning I actually woke from a deep and satisfying sleep. Breakfast included a mysterious concoction alleged made from oats and maple syrup. It had the consistency of hot wheat cereal.... And they have not figured out which are the most plausible turkey sausages. I had time to myself in the morning, including time for an impromptu Skype session with a friend from Ecuador! Brave new world indeed. I went to Thorne's and up to the third floor for a yoga class, with a teacher recommended to me by my friend the Rabbi David. It was excellent, although it stretched me in more ways that purely physical. The concentration it took to let go of distracting thought! I ate at Paul and Elizabeth's (again), fish chowder and vegetable tempura. It was raining, so i bought a $1 poncho at the dollar store in the basement and walked back to my car.

We rehearsed in the living room and heard a few new participants. This session feels like the end far more than the weekend did: I was acutely aware of "lasts." M last time singing Boston as we test someone's basic sight reading. Few newbies is most definitely bad for business but makes for a relaxing afternoon. There was time for dinner and changing outfits back at the dorm. I drove Gayla over to Sage Hall and then went through another last, my last rehearsal with the Western Wind. And my last concert. The program was again laden with memories:

O Western Wind. The theme song from the group's radio show, long before my time. A neat compsotion by Bob Dennis based on the ageless song. Bill mentioned the Bob Dennis CD to the audience and I chimed in with my best endorsement: every time I play it and hear Gayla's solo at the end of Psalm 30 I call her and curse her out for leaving first the group and then New York!

Katy Cruel, another Bob Dennis piece, which we have been using a lot.

Duerme negrito. I first heard this sung by a group at a Smith workshop a decade ago, and started singing it not too long after that.

i thank You God (capitalization as marked!). The defining song of my WW experience. A terrific poem by e. e. cummings turned into a song of hypnotic perfection by Elliot Z. Levine. I sang it on my first concert with the Winds and had to insist that it be included on my last. This was the most dangerous moment of the concert for me, the one where time really needed to stop. A smile from Gayla (yes, I know, I am leaning on her like crazy to get through all this) kepp the tears away and got me to the last (always last) yes!

Irme quiero. Duet for our sopranos, while the boys hang out on sustained Es and Fs, supported by Bob on his Gamba. So beautiful.

La Rosa. My big solo moment, ever since that first concert. I was afraid of it, afraid that I could no longer manage it successfully. Some of the phrase endings fuzzed out on me in rehearsal. But I pulled it together, thought of Samson asking for one last burst of strength, and it pretty much came. There was a three-bow-long ovation, freighted with the acknowledgement of change.

Avridme galanica. With its spoken, acted-out intro. One last time for Gayla and I to flirt onstage! And singing out full put my voice in a good place: the awkward high accompaniment lines worked better than they have in years.

I am the Rose of Sharon. Another survivor from my first concert in Kenosha. The opening solo used to be Kristina's. There was a concert once, someplace in Michigan, at which Kristina was joining us having been a anitger gig in Illinois. She had plane troubles, and wound up taking a $300 taxi ride from Indianapolis. We kkept tabs on her by cellphone. We reordered the program so she could breathe -- her cab arrived exactly at curtain time -- and she ran onstage to join us and launched right into this solo. What applause she got!

At this point in the program our instrumental faculty played. And they gave us Marin Marais's imagining of a Gall Bladder operation, narrated by Todd. It was hysterical. And immediately afterwards Todd sang Yumiko's arrangement of And So It Goes, which he has been singing so magnificently almost all our years in this group.

The last group on the program was Christmas Songs. First the devilish version of Angels We Have Heard by Gayla. Then Guerrero's Mi fe vengo. And Sweet Little Jesus Boy, with Gayla on the solo. When I played that cut on the Holiday Light CD for my Mother she listened, glowered, and remarked, "she sure makes a BIG DEAL out of it!" I laugh every time I think of that. We finished up with I Saw Three Ships, a rollicking end to the concert.

The 5 day workshop session started with announcements and then I got everyone organized for the first rehearsal of the Verdi Pater Noster. We had an excellent readthrough and went back to the dorm for the reception. We sorted the cards and I picked music and went up to bed.

Smith 2 Part 2

2011-07-25T16:09:00.002-05:00

I was about to write that I woke up on Saturday morning -- but woke is just not a suitable verb to describe the state of sweaty, bleary sand-in-the-back-of-my eye-edness that was my first sensation at 7am that morning. My room is under the eaves and holds heat like a clay pot. But I got up and got myself going. Breakfast featured a treat: lox! I started warm-ups with my breathing routine and then passed the torch to Gayla. Bill spent some time on the Gabrieli with everyone and then we called the groups.

Bill and I started our group off with a big Bruckner motet (Virgo Jesse) and a continuo anthem by Purcell (I was glad). We split them into two madrigal ensembles, with him taking the Marenzio 6 while I coached the Gesualdo 5. Lunch was rather uninspiring: the economic downturn finds its expression everywhere, including the cafeteria menu. In past years they have been very good about serving cheese-free alternatives when the entree is smothered with dairy. They still cover vegetarian options well, but that usually means more cheese. In the afternoon we swapped madrigals, and introduced another set of breakouts, Flor de la Miel for the ladies (BZ took them off to work on that) and barbershop numbers from the old Yale songbook for the men. I hope they had something approaching the good time singing that I had coaching! I went back to the dorm for a brief nap before dinner. Seminar went well, and faster than usual. There were only four groups. But Gayla's group sang a lot! They gave me a present, a reading of my Danse Macabre arrangement, which I wrote for the Winds about 7 years ago, as part of my campaign to put on a Halloween concert. Bob tore into the fiddle part. And the carnival-esque vocal fripperies sounded really quite good! The evening finished off with the traditional trip to Herrell's. The no-moo non dairy flavors were maple walnut and burnt caramel -- I had a sample of both!

Smith 2 Weekend (part 1) (with program notes!)

2011-07-25T08:05:00.004-05:00

Friday was unbearable in many ways! The heat was beyond oppressive. And in addition to the emotional cost of packing myself up for my final trip to Smith I had to leave my kids home alone for the day, pending their Mother's return from her Orff course at Villanova U -- she had a full day of work and the the drive home from Pennsylvania. I had arranged for the kids to be picked up and taken out to lunch by a family friend. But still there was omething about driving off and leaving them there that tugged at me.

First stop: Astoria! To pick up Miss Gayla, Miss Aria (Gayla's Maltese, for anyone not yet acquainted with Gayla!), and all of Miss Gayla's luggage, which was actually less than I thought it would be. But still heavy! Finding my way back out of Queens challenged my usually savvy sense of direction, but we managed to get onto the Tri-Borough and on our way. The temperature was so high that my car started to overheat, and I found myself switching the air conditioning off and back on every few minutes, balancing my engine's needs with those of the living creatures in the car!

We had a truly lovely ride, with the kind of conversation that comes from an old and deep friendship.

We got to the dorm just in time for our rehearsal call and set up in the living room. We sang through parts of the evening's program and broke for food. I drove Gayla and Michele into downtown Northampton, made a quick stop at Turn It Up (I didn't buy a thing!) and then sat down to a Thai Burrito at Bueno e Sano. The ladies joined me and we drove back for new participant placement auditions. Then we had another break, this time for unpacking and a shower. We reconvened at the Hills Chapel, not our usual site but Sage Hall was booked for another event. The heat continued to dominate everyone's sense of the day, sweltering, oppressive and inescapable: not easy to keep a good humor! We sang, our sound and presence buoyed by Gayla's energy.

The progrms for my last two concerts with Western Wind are filled with pieces that stir memories. The accident of Gayla's being with us as a sub for Linda focused the possible song list to those pieces that Gayla could sing with Michele on extremely little rehearsal. And many of those turned out to be souvenirs from my earliest gigs with the Winds:

Qual vive salamandra, by Marenzio. We learned it almost a decade ago and used it on the My Funny Valentine program, which we toured from 2002-05. I used to give the intro, explaining the faux Renaissance science (Salamanders crawl out of newly lit fires, therefore they must be born from the flames). Todd always lifts us into the tempo after the opening whole notes.

Saccio 'na cosa and Avecque Vous (Lasso) are both numbers I sit out. And a good thing: we learned them for the all-Lasso concert that happened just 4 days after my emergency appendectomy last year!

Prendi l'aurata lira (Lasso) was on my first program with WW, back in November 2000 in Kenosha, Wisconsin. And its sonorousness has touched me ever since.

Honor to the Hills, Complainer, and Promised Land, also date back (for me) to Kenosha.

The Concert di cinque cantori comes from Banchieri's Barca di Venezia a Padua, which we have been performing on a bill with Jukebox in the Tavern of Love for the past 4 years. It does give me an opportunity to sing out with my full voice, since each of us has a solo turn as a show-off singer!

4 Hanukah songs (Tsindt, Mi Ze Hidlik, Lo v'chayil, Ocho Kandelikas), all of which I learned right after that first concert, since Hanukah was just weeks later. The first of my many "Hanukah Story" concerts with WW was at Elliot's temple in Great Neck. When we first read through Lo v'chayil Kristina exclaimed that she thought this was a folk tune -- she learned it at a camp in Illinois! But no, Elliot wrote it a a restaurant in Brooklyn.

Don't get around much anymore. We learned this for the My Funny Valentine program. There is a spot in the tag where Gayla and I used to make a flirtatious percussion event out of the ch in much, a piece of performance practice that vanished when Gayla did, 6 years ago. Well, this time Gayla was back, and so was the prolonged CH!

There's a boat that's leavin' soon for New York. I wrote this arrangement at lighting speed right before Smith 1 in 2003. I finished it Friday morning just before packing the car. It was a going away present for Eric Brenner, with a tailored alto line rising to the final high E, above the 2 soprano parts. We (Franny, Laura, Eric, me, Phillip and Zach) learned it and sang it on the Saturday of the weekend session. Kristina cried out, when do WE get to sing it. So I rewrote it to suit our voicing and we started using it later that Summer. It has been a delight and source of pride to me ever since.

America/Rte 66. This is Gayla's magical, demented confabulation of American music, which I have loved singing since she unveiled it something like 7 years ago!

This was my final go-round with each of these songs, and every one was like a madeleine being dipped in the tea of my vibrating throat. It is possible, way more than possible, to have relationships with sounds, not to mention the people who are making them with me.

***

After the concert we heard the remaining newbies downstairs in the blessedly air conditioned parlor and went back to the dorm for the reception. Beer really does help everything! We laid out the cards and discovered that the participants sorted into 4 groups. So we assigned co-facilitators to one group (Bill and me) and Michele was set to float between Elliot's and Todd's groups. Last task of the evening was picking music. Wiped out, I crawled into bed -- but one fan did not much to alleviate the clay oven heat of the room and sleep barely came.

Road Trip!

2011-07-09T17:30:00.003-05:00

I just got home from a real road trip: taking Maddy to visit Oberlin. 500 miles each way (and we detoured on the way home). We loaded up our iPods and took off on Thursday morning. The weather was fine and we got across New Jersey in no time. Then we faced two obstacles: Route 80 and the food culture of Pennsylvania. Maddy is an ethical vegetarian. PA is a state where pork sausage is a vegetable. Our first stop was the Dunkin' Donuts (below) where an egg sandwich solved our problem, for a while.

Route 80 was more of a challenge. The construction started almost immediately, and our rapid progress slowed to 2 mph. I decided to trust my previous life as a character in a Fenimore Cooper novel, abandon the highway at the next exit, and navigate via local roads. Luck and a cloudless day brought us back onto the main road 10 miles west, past the obstacle. Then we simply had to deal with the boredom that is 80 West. That's where the iPods came in: I finally caved and bought a new car stereo with a USB port when I scheduled this trip. We had Garrison Keillor, many musicals, and eventually traded things we love which the other didn't know yet (and now I have heard the Dresden Dolls -- I cannot believe I let Maddy get this far without subjecting her to Act 1 of La boheme!). Our next food stop made the vegetarian issue clear: there were only fast food places (yes, American cheese in a bun was an option) but we found a Wawa Market and Maddy bought the mozzarella pocket. We observed the family custom of listening to Follies in Concert as we crossed Ohio and arrived in Oberlin not much later than my original guesstimate of 7pm. We easily found the Unitarian B&B I had booked and stowed our stuff there, and then went into town to look for dinner.

Oberlin is a truly magic kingdom, if tiny. (Sunset, above) There were many options -- everybody had vegetarian food, and all the stores looked fascinating as well. We ate at Alladin's, which is actually a chain, and had excellent meals. We slept well and ate a pleasant breakfast, cooked by our hostess, who also allowed us to leave the car behind our house for the day. Then it was time for the Info session/tour/interview sequence. We got a panel discussion which featured a really cool Geology professor (who disdains Powerpoint and still uses slides in a carousel!) followed by a tour led by a really cool dude named Will, who plays drums. Did I mention that the whole place and everyone there is really cool? Maddy and I talked for a while with a student who had been on the panel discussion (she told us that she lives in Third World themed housing but they do have running water!) and then I made myself scarce when the interviewer showed up. I made a brief pilgrimage to the Conservatory, where Miss Hodam taught ages ago (and commuted to Boston every week, where I studied with her). Then I met Maddy and we went to lunch at the Asian fusion place (I was less impressed but Maddy liked her meal), took another walk, checked out the used book store (a triumph: I bought nothing and Maddy bought a book instead!) and the candy store. Then we got back in the car and drove east. We decided to swing south across PA and check out Swarthmore so we got onto Rte 76 instead, a much nicer drive -- but all of the same food issues. We tried to go to Johnnnie's diner, but it had closed a week ago, according to the sign which really should have been on the highway! We listened to The Musical of Musicals and got most of the jokes, theater geeks that we are, and bought a bag of truly excellent dark russet chips to tide us over as we hunted for an actual restaurant. Which we found in Carlisle. We were relieved to be sitting in a pleasant place, but when we opened or menus we both burst out laughing (see below).

Nevertheless, dinner was perfectly fine (yes, Maddy got the lasagna) (and I could just imagine Mother ordering the liver). The vegetables of the day were baked or french fried potatoes, onion rings and corn. 'Nuff said.

The man at the next table struck up conversation and we had a long talk about colleges and about getting to the age where you don't care what people think anymore. After dinner we drove for another hour and then stopped to find a motel. There was one place with a sign advertising $30 per night rooms, but it was deserted and surely I only imagined Anthony Perkins sitting at the check-in desk. We opted for a Hampton Inn, more money than I really wanted to spend, but with mattresses so fine that it was truly worthwhile.

There was breakfast included at the inn. Maddy made a rather idiosyncratic-looking waffle. The eggs looked awful. We got going and reached Swarthmore in not much over an hour. The place was closed down except for a wedding. We walked around and got a feel for the architecture: Maddy can decide if she wants an interview later. Then we got back on the road and headed home. Traffic on the Jersey Turnpike was thick but not impossible -- until we got near the GWB. Yankees game = huge crowds. I dodged into downtown Fort Lee and approached the bridge from the south. There was one final traffic jam, who knows why, just a mile from home on the Hutch. I thought of just parking on the shoulder and walking! But we got through and got home. And boy, are my legs tired!

Smith 1: The End

2011-07-03T19:26:00.003-05:00

The cats were SO relieved to see us when we got home! Simba (above) took possession of the laundry basket as if to say you are not leaving again. But I am ahead of myself!

Our last evening in NoHo was complicated by Julian's stomach ache. I took him back to the dorm from Osaka, leaving Cindy and Maddy to finish their dinners and walk. But Julian felt better after a little while, so we went downtown hoping to catch the others at Herrell's. They weren't there, so we took one last look at Faces (above) and got back in the car. We found the other half of the family halfway back to the dorm and took them the other way for ice cream. Herrell's was impossibly crowded (I cannot believe the fire department doesn't close it down as a hazard on Saturday nights) and I left my family in line while I took a brief solo stroll, with a stop at Turn It Up! The stress was really getting to me. I got back well before our turn to order and claimed a table. The kids loved the flavors they chose. My blueberry sorbet was kind of meh. We went back to the dorm (again) and hung out for a while in the living room. Andrew, Derek and I talked recent movies: I liked Midnight in Paris better than Derek did but we both hated Tree of Life. Linda slept on the sofa, wiped out by her first week at Smith! Cindy and Shirley knitted. It was hard making myself go to bed, tired as I was. And this endless parting has been hard on my family as well. They are all part of the workshop community, with friends they have sung with every summer for almost a decade. I first brought my children to Smith in 2003. I have the most magical memories of Julian being taught to play frisbee by Kristina, Eric and Alan; of Julian taking naps by the Timpani; of Maddy discovering the power of her voice; of Maddy sitting on the Baldwin porch swing discussing Harry Potter with Brandon; of Kristina making use of one of Julian's toys at Silly Seminar and getting a laugh by merely uttering the word "Bionical." As I go into voluntary exile I take my family with me. So I have told them that we will visit Northampton, and I know we will find various ways to sing with folks again. Sometime, somehow.

This morning we went to Sylvester's for breakfast, and happily found Evan there. Then back to the dorm one last time to pack and depart. Julian and Maddy got recruited to carry boxes of sheet music into BZ's room. We had one final round of hugs and got into the car. The trip home was easy and the cats were so happy to see us that they forgot to act stand-off-ish!

Smith 1 Part 8

2011-07-02T19:07:00.002-05:00

I actually slept last night. The exhaustion was so utter that I could have slept on asphalt. I got up this morning feeling a good deal better than I had yesterday. I was in the zone doing warm-ups, blissfully focused on everyone's registers and unaware of time. I made my little farewell speech during announcements -- and received an ovation so prolonged that I had to fight tears. Parting is such sweet sorrow my ass! I was grateful for the recognition but I can certainly see how quitting abruptly has its advantages.

I was determined to get through our pieces in the morning small group session and just made it. Some things needed more time but what we had would have to do. I bought a sandwich and joined everyone in the dining hall for lunch. We sang Elliot's piece for the dining hall staff and then went back to Sage Hall for a brush-up and then the concert. Bill's group sang Ani l'dodi, which mine was also singing. But they were treble voices with instruments and we were male voices unaccompanied, so I thought it would be OK! And then suddenly, as always, it was over and we were all milling about saying goodbyes. This time some of the goodbyes really hurt: they were to and from people I have grown to know and love by seeing them here every summer.

We went back to the dorm, refiled the unused music, and met for the traditional expedition to Osaka (see photos above): More Sake More Happy!

Smith 1 Part 7

2011-07-02T06:49:00.002-05:00

Thursday afternoon was the usual half holiday (just like in Mary Poppins!): no small groups, no scheduled activities. But instead there was frantic preparation for the Silly Seminar....

I took my kids downtown for round one of shopping/wallowing in Northampton. Maddy wanted a real NoHo haircut, so we got her an appointment for later in the afternoon. We had to be back for a 2:30 rehearsal with Nancy. I put in a load of laundry and then we got our parts for the skit. We went downtown a second time, this time leaving Maddy with the hair stylist while Julian and I went shopping. Maddy had asked for me to buy part of her costume, which is how I found myself -- and the sales clerk at Newbury Comics -- managing not to giggle while I paid for a set of fishnet stockings. Maddy's hair turned out even shorter than she had anticipated but it looks really cool. Then we went back to the dorm, and from there to the barbecue dinner at Lamont. It then turned out that Maddy also needed supplies from CVS so I ran over there to pick them up while Linda got our group started. We are one more than we have been for the week thus far: Judy had been here for the weekend but then in Boston with all the Cantors (imagine!), and rejoined the workshop at dinnertime. We added her into our two numbers and went upstairs to the Seminar. Everyone kept their sets nice and short, and all the repertory choices were excellent. Our group ended the seminar, with The Blue Bird and I'm Gonna Sing til the Spirit Moves Me. Then we all rushed back to the dorm for the main event.

Silly Seminar was its usual hysterical self. Moses (Bill) confronted Jesus (Grant) and gave new laws: Thou Shalt Not Leave Liquids on the Pianos, etc. Dr Lotte Heinohtz shared her wisdom. Michele's warmups got roasted. And my kids appeared on the Dr Phil (Elliot) show as victims of vocal child abuse. Maddy gave an awesome performance as a sort of younger Mrs Krebabble crossed with Lili von Shtup, in fishnets and black lace, taking drags off a (non functional) hand rolled cigarette! Both Cindy and Julian won prizes in the T-shirt contest. It was hard to go to sleep after all the excitement!

Friday was LOOOOOOOOOOOONG, as it always is. Two extra concerts take the place of any break time and the day seems endless -- but worth it. I started off with a redo of Thursday morning: breakfast with my friend at Sylvester's. Then back onto campus for the start of the workshop day. Small group work til lunch. Lunch at the Tibetan restaurant with Andrew. The Continuo concert, which featured truly awesome singing by Linda and Michele. Small group work through the afternoon. The Jazz/Pop concert, where something unheard of happened: an encore! Yumiko's arrangement of Grandfather's Clock was so stunning that it had to be repeated. I picked up a sandwich and joined everyone in the dining hall. By the time we got to seminar I was so toasted I could barely keep my eyes open. And when we got back to the dorm I pretty much crawled into bed.

Smith 1 Part 6

2011-06-30T11:39:00.003-05:00

The rest of Wednesday was a sensible day, full of hard but rewarding work and pretty much free of drama. I took the kids downtown again and we scored big on the present buying front (Mommy's birthday is next week -- she'll read this but she doesn't know what we found!). I developed a pretty strong headache, triggered by the fierce sunlight. We went to dinner and then Julian and I went for a walk, stopping in the gorgeous gardens and then arriving at the Japanese Tea House, down by the lake. It has been vandalized with graffiti but still has a calm and restorative air. Seminar went well, with each group doing awesome stuff. Cindy got some nice validation for her voice, and also found that she really can sing alto if she allows her chest voice to come out and play. Halfway through the Hawley Ave Maria (lovingly sung by Michele's group) it really hit me. This is it. I was sitting at the top of the left aisle, with Julian beside me, remembering all the years I have brought my family here, all the way back to the times when Julian used to take a nap during seminar, curled up at the back of the house by the Timpani. And I am leaving -- this gig, this group, these workshops, this chapter of my life. There is really no groan deep enough.

We all went back to the dorm for "vocal round table," an informal discussion event. I began to feel detached but contributed as best I could. There was a long discussion of child stars with grown-up voices, which led to Nancy leaning over to me and hatching the idea for a silly seminar skit: stay tuned, rehearsal at 2:30 today! It was hard falling asleep and today I am even more tired.

I got up early, having made tentative plans for breakfast with a friend who lives nearby. I went to Sylvester's and wound up eating alone. Some sort of crossed signals: I hope I can see him later this week (what's left of it). I went to Paradise Copies and xeroxed more music for our group and got back with time to spare before small group sessions began. Linda and I planned out our morning and then we got to work. There was some stress generated by comments from last night but that got worked out. And again it is lunchtime and I am typing!

Smith 1 Part 5

2011-06-29T11:42:00.002-05:00

Tuesday was Hot! We started the morning with warmups by Todd and Linda, Elliot conducting his piece, and announcements. And then we called the groups. Favorite moment: Todd asked "what is your go-to news source?" Maddy replied, "the Onion!" Another favorite:

EZL: What is your source of weather information? Carolyn?

Carolyn: My husband!

EZL: Bill?

Bill: Now we're in trouble!

Linda and I are co-leading a group, so I am learning how run things my way but not all the time! (This is a work in progress for me) We started with Swete was the song the Virgin soong. We read a piece by Jim Bassi that sounds interesting but did not arouse much excitement. I spent lunchtime gathering more music and copying it over at Paradise copy. When I got back the group had to assimilate a new member, who moved from Todd's group. There was not consensus about proper placement and this led to two meetings and eventually to the participant returning to Todd's group, which is, I think, the right place. Getting people placed properly is a tricky thing and we do what we can to get it right so that each group can function.

I took my kids downtown to look at the Leonard Nimoy photos on exhibit and do some shopping. Julian bought a wallet at Newbury Comics, their new favorite store. The evening was devoted to Bob's King James Bible presentation, a reading session, with strings and organ, of English verse anthems from the 17th century. I enjoyed singing bass.

This morning I led warmups, doing my breathing and attack, sustain, release routine. The morning session with our small group went well. Linda took the ladies and read trios. I worked the men on a Lassus trio. Grant came in to add lute and much coaching to Swete was the song and Yumiko drilled us on the spiritual. Now it is lunchtime and here i am typing! Time for a sandwich...

Smith 1 Part 4

2011-06-28T05:58:00.003-05:00

Monday was the (partial) day off, between the weekend and week sessions. Breakfast was intimate (and there was lox!). Then we took off for a little Amherst experience. Unfortunately it was closed! There were a few places to shop, but the all-important used CD store wasn't open, and neither was the African restaurant. The cemetery was open, however, so we were able to pay our respects to Miss Emily Dickinson. We had lunch at the Lone Wolf and it was excellent.

When we got back to the dorm there was time for a nap and a load of laundry and then it was time to start hearing new participants. We got through almost all of them quite quickly. I warmed up and we rehearsed onstage. Our continuo faculty (Bob and Grant) decided to "play" on the concert by singing: Zefiro torna! They were awesome, their voices dancing lightly on the phrases with perfect command of diction and style. I began to say goodbye to our repertory, being aware as I sang that I was singing some of these songs for the last time with the group. Laura's arrangement of Yiddish Tango went particularly well, growing ferocious towards the end.

We did the start-of-workshop announcements and one of those comedy-is-best-when-unintentional moments occurred: after one of the 'don't make noise late or leave water on the piano' admonishments I joked, "well, that's it, I quit!" There was a brief silence, then a spluttering of laughter as reality set in. After all, I DID quit! Oops. Two more auditions to hear and then off to the party. Several people pointed out that I have not yet replied to their kind and thoughtful notes, sent when the news of my departure from the group went out. I have quite a stack to answer: that is a task for July!

We divided up the cards and assigned groups. Off to the music library to pick stuff for the morning, and then off to bed!

Smith 1 Part 3

2011-06-27T07:44:00.002-05:00

Sunday's weather was a BIG improvement on Saturday's monsoon season. I made instant oatmeal in my room and packed a PB on Ezekiel bread sandwich for later. Warmups were run by Elliot (eye-to-ear coordination via Kodaly hand signs) and Bill (improv, with the participants in three circles). As part of group announcements I made a formal farewell to those who were only staying for the weekend. I will have to do this for each session as the summer goes on. "Yes, I am leaving, but please stay in touch!"

We got down to business with our small groups and worked through to lunch. We sang the Stephen Paulus Pilgrim's Hymn for the dining hall staff. There was no music stand so I held Linda's score for her while she conducted. I was born to be a page turner! The brief afternoon session flew by and we gathered for the final concert. There was a lot of really impressive singing! One highlight: Michele's group joined the kids for a rich and lovely Georgian lullaby. We all sang the Paulus together and then we were done.

Dinner featured brownies, raspberries and chocolate fudge. Maddy swore that her brownie fell into the fudge so she had to rescue it and eat it that way. And I believe her. We wandered downtown for a while and I introduced my kids to the wonders of Newberry Comics, where we will be spending a fair amount of money later this week, I predict.

Smith 1 Part 2

2011-06-26T07:16:00.002-05:00

If you don't like the weather in New England, wait 10 minutes. That was yesterday! Dark and threatening, then sunny, then a monsoon.

I got a deep tissue massage from the iron hands of Shirley, who explained to me which muscles were tight and causing my lower back pain. Then I bought a sandwich at State Street Deli, ate half and set aside half for later, and went into Lamont Dining Hall (I am off the meal plan this week) to hang out with folks. It began to rain seriously, so I offered rides to a bunch of people. We filled my car, drove to Sage, and then sat trapped for 10 minutes by a downpour so fierce that umbrellas seemed useless. Eventually it let up and we went inside.

This was the first Smith seminar since Laura's departure and I was quite conscious of missing her.

First up, KC and Mollie's group: the kids. As always they were astonishing: an act that nobody should have to follow! But EZL's group did their usual heartwarming thing. And they joined my group for a rousing "Open the Window, Noah!" My group continued with music by Guerrero, Ingalls (awesome solo by Debbie R!), and Rossi. I got a lot of excellent help from Bob and Grant. Bill's group included my daughter -- I got to watch (and hear) Maddy more than hold her own in a Campra trio with grownup singers. Michele's group was all female and did truly splendidly. It was particularly nice to hear Gayla's arrangement of "The Water Is Wide" sung so beautifully. Todd's group soared over the top with "Over the Rainbow" and "Dancing Queen."

I went out to Haymarket with Annie A for a quiet chat. There are many relationships I have developed through these workshops that I hope to continue by other means after this summer, but for now I have to find time to talk with people as the opportunities arise! It took a while to fall asleep and I had a perfectly horrifying nightmare...and now another day begins!

The Beginning of the End

2011-06-25T11:44:00.003-05:00

Here I am at Smith College, facilitating a small vocal ensemble at the Western Wind workshop. I have been doing this for 11 years now, and this is my final summer. I have just this week plus a week at the end of July before moving on. This is hard: one of the deepest and most intense transitions of my life. I love this work and moving on is difficult even though I can feel that it is right.

Yesterday (Friday June 24th) started with insomnia and a futile attempt to get back to sleep. I drove C to her job at 7:30 and then finally managed to get an hour of rest. The kids slept in (school is SO done). From 9 to 11:45 I raced around the house packing and cleaning and getting the two of them ready to leave. We picked up C at noon and stopped for sandwiches and gasoline. Then we had the swiftest and easiest possible drive to Northampton. I had bought a new car stereo on Thursday so we were able to plug in our iPods. M shared her Jonathan Coulton album and I played a bunch of Lee Venora tracks. We arrived at the dorm and unpacked. Then the rituals started. Setting up the music library. Hearing the new participants. I got the Thai Burrito at Bueno e Sano and then changed for the concert. We rehearsed on the stage of wonderful Sage Hall with Bob and Grant and then sang for our workshop participants. Our new soprano L has the large group piece conducting duty: I sat in for moral support. Then we all headed back to the dorm for the reception and more rituals: sorting the participants' cards and organizing the groups, picking music for the morning, and finally bed!

Today is cold and dreary. I had planned to make instant oatmeal and coffee but the dorm kitchen is being renovated. So I dropped my family off at Lamont for breakfast and went off by myself. Jake's is closed! I ate at Cathy's, the railroad car diner, and then bought coffee at Haymarket. I had a long talk with AA in the parking area outside Sage and then went in to do my portion of warmups and sing the Stephen Paulus piece that L is conducting. Then we called the groups and started working. I have a nice copacetic ensemble, but I need more stuff for them so it's back to the music library for me!

Two movies that couldn't have been more different from each other...

2011-06-19T20:00:00.002-05:00

Last night I saw Tree of Life. And today Midnight in Paris. My first reaction to the former was WTF? And to the latter, almost total delight. Part of this comes from my current attitude towards stress and sorrow, best summed up by the song from The Wiz: "Don't bring me no bad news!" I don't need mindless fluff, but a light touch and a warm aura really help.

Tree of Life. I saw it on a smallish screen on an analog print. So there were little black dots in the upper right hand corners when the reels were ending. And each time I saw the warning dots I thought SURELY this is the last reel! And it kept on not being so... Long, aimless, and often inaudible. Sometimes beautiful but sorely in need of a good trim. The opening sequence, with the telegram announcing the death of the much-loved son (fighting in Vietnam, perhaps? That never seemed clear) and the parents' keening, worked relatively well. Then we were off to modern Houston and the inner workings of Sean Penn's mind. All moving and affecting, but so much, maybe too much for my patience. The much-vaunted creation of the world plus asteroids, tsunami and dinosaurs cried out for a long toke! Then the meat of the movie, a LONG series of scenes from childhood, with much repressed rage and lot of Darth-Vader-with-laryngitis whispering into the camera, overwhelmed me with its oppressive misery. And the hand-held camera triggered my motion sickness. Unfortunately I have gotten to the point where I need the camera to stay still or I have to head for the lobby. But I stuck this one out! I realized we were in the finale as it got going but it didn't really end; it just stopped. This may be the point but I guess I just like my art to be art, my reality to be reality--and leaving me in somebody else's dream grotto aroused feelings more of abandonment than of satisfaction. Sean Penn looked aged and haunted, and his role consisted almost entirely of pacing. Brad Pitt was excellent as a well of disappointment and anger. One shot actually showed him at an unflattering angle (crouching in the garden) and when he played the organ I couldn't help having one irreverent thought: Omigod, Brad Pitt is playing gay! Jessica Chastain was heartbreaking as the Mother, looking like the most delicate porcelain and radiating love. Lots of good stuff in the movie but I don't know if I could sit through it again.

Midnight in Paris. Wow, so utterly the opposite! The contrast reminds me of Anna Russell explaining the difference between German and French art song (it must be on Youtube somewhere). Typical Woody Allen opening: a song and a visual montage. And how can you go wrong with Paris? Owen Wilson is disarmingly charming as Woody, oops, I mean Gil. The one major flaw with the film is that the supposed engagement of Gil and Inez is unbelievable from the get-go. He is a dreamer and she is a materialistic bitch. Soon he is off on his quest for the romance of the past, where he encounters all of expatriate Paris circa 1925. The Fitzgeralds are nice but Hemingway is a total hoot, with all his dialogue written exactly in the voice of his novels. Kathy Bates does yet another terrific character turn as Gertrude Stein. And Gil learns, oh so gently, that romancing and romanticizing the past will not solve his present problems--and he winds up in a present that honors the past. Why he keeps mentioning the unseen Linda (Mrs Cole) Porter, however, I cannot guess! It almost seemed like one of those "no homo" tags from a rap song! There is one piece of old-style Woody Allen shtick near the end which has a terrific effect. I roared with laughter!

It has been a while since I saw a movie. Soon...Harry Potter 7.2!

Jury Duty

2011-06-09T18:26:00.002-05:00

So tonight, for the fourth evening in a row, I have called in to the number on the summons and been told to call back tomorrow. With any luck they'll just let me go...

I have never been on a jury. But I have had one truly jolly voir dire....

It was 1986. NYC was awash in crime and fear and Bernie Goetz was a folk hero. I was called for my civic duty and put in a jury box and questioned. A lawyer approached me and asked, "Have you ever been the victim of a crime?"

"Well, sort of... I was on the 7 Train coming from Queens back to Manhattan with a loose stack of xeroxed music on my lap (the almost 400 not-yet-three-hole-punched pages of Donizetti's Gianni di Parigi) when a gang of kids surrounded me hissing, "you got money? How much money you got?" All I could think was if I drop these pages I'll NEVER get them in order again! I froze -- but caught sight of a transit cop in the next car. I said, "transit cop!" and the boys all jumped backwards like a Gilbert & Sullivan male chorus, crying, "transit cop, man!" And they ran out as the doors opened at Grand Central...."

The lawyer pressed on with "were you armed?"

"No, I don't carry a gun!"

"Well, if you HAD a gun, what would you have done?"

"I'd have killed them!"

"Excused!"

And that is as close as I have been, so far, to jury service! (Oh, and I got home with the Donizetti score intact!)

Mother's Cane

2011-05-08T06:13:00.003-05:00

It has been almost four years since Mother died. I am still settling her estate and working on my autistic sister's residential placement issues. Whoever said that the child lives the unlived life of the parent didn't even begin to cover it! And what is amazing to me is the mythical, mystical status that Mother had for those for whom she was an inspiration....

Last Monday I was at physical therapy (for my frozen shoulder). The assistant PT was putting me through my paces on the passive resistance machine. I knew that he and my PT had treated Mother after her knee replacement. He started to describe how awesome Mother was: that she could still walk with no more aid than a cane even though she must have been 80 years old (not quite) and had suffered from multiple sclerosis all her adult life! The assistant PT is a tall and strong man in his 30s. He said that Mother's strength and courage meant a lot to him since he has MS too. I froze -- who could guess from his appearance that he had a chronic and incurable illness? They have better drugs for it now, he said, so that's why he is in such good shape.

His words stuck with me. So before my next PT session I picked up Mother's cane, which has leaned against my office doorway since the night Mother died, and took it with me. I leaned on it as I walked into my appointment. And when the assistant PT saw me I lifted it and held it towards him. He recognized it instantly (he must see a LOT of canes, so I guess context helped!) and his face melted into a soft look of reverence. I gave it to him, saying I hoped he never would need it. And he took it to his locker and put it away. And then we started our work...

Operatic Calendar

2011-04-24T15:02:00.003-05:00

Today is Easter, and while everyone else I know was wishing people a happy Easter I was contemplating Santuzza's Easter invective: A te la mala Pasqua! There's a terrific melange of over-the-top shrieking sopranos on Youtube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QwHbkl1L3QI). And it got me thinking...about compiling a calendar marked by the operas appropriate for the day or season. Here's a start (please comment and add to the list):

Mardi Gras: Benvenuto Cellini, La traviata

Good Friday: Parsifal

Passover: La Juive

Easter: Cavalleria rusticana, Faust (in all its forms)

Easter Monday: I Vespri Siciliani

Spring in general: Die Walkure

May Day: The Bohemian Girl

Mid-June: Tosca (right after the battle of Marengo, June 14th)

Midsummer: Falstaff, Midsummer Night's Dream, Die Meistersinger

August 15th (Feast of the Assumption): Pagliacci

Halloween: Don Giovanni (it's scary, why not?)

Christmas Eve: La boheme, Werther

Hidden in Plain Sight: The Metropolis Case, by Matthew Gallaway

2011-02-05T11:29:00.000-05:00

How clever (and unlikely) is this – a novel which seems to be all about Tristan und Isolde is actually a reworking of The Makropulos Case. The title is the dead give-away. And most of the reviewers missed it entirely! Note: this essay will be wall-to-wall spoilers, and it intended for after reading the book.

Gallaway uses Wagner’s obsession-fest as the scenery for a tale of death and the longing for it. Both operas are focussed on those issues. Wagner’s love pair wish to die and block out the world. Gallaway’s protagonist (L.M. throughout the novel, with all his name changes) and Janacek’s heroine (E.M. in the same manner) endure superhuman life spans until they learn to let them go.

There are four main characters in the novel, although one appears in three guises. Interestingly, the name changing and ageless L. M. obtains a different identity for each generation he deals with. He is Lucien to his father and the people he knows as a young man, Lawrence to the woman who bears his children, and Leo to those children. His inner self may remain stable but his outer persona reflects what others need to see. The gender reversal at the heart of the novel makes for some awkwardness. Opera thrives on the anima: female spirits and their siren songs. L.M. takes over the function of heroine, which is perhaps one of the factors in this being a “gay” novel. And he is gay, except when he isn’t. There is lots of sex littered throughoput the pages. The hetero-sex is explicit, the gay sex more discreet. Since there are two main episodes of incest I must confess I was longing for the hot and raunchy encounter between father and son. I found myself quite disappointed that none of the characters dealt with the acts of incest they had performed when their true relationships were revealed (Maria: OMIGOD I fucked my father; Martin: Ewww I screwed my sister, and I’m gay!; Leo: Sorry kids, I really screwed you over). These incest events reflect operatic sources: the brother/sister pairing in Die Walküre and the intergenerational one night stand of Emilia Marty and Prus in The Makropulos Case. Ignoring all these threads leaves the final chapter as beautiful and far too short, with too many issues unexplored and unresolved. It stands in stark contrast to the parallel descriptions of Martin’s and Anna’s encounter with the speeding taxi, which truly rate as lyrical arias of sustained feeling.

I became quite angry at the author as he killed off Martin’s and Maria’s adoptive parents. I didn’t see why those events needed to happen. They were horrifying and deeply upsetting, and hyper-coincidental in the manner of Dickens. Both kids had enough trauma in their lives to justify all their crazy choices already. And I have a quibble over the fictionalization of Maria Callas in Tosca. It may seem silly, but I prefer the intersection of fiction with fact to honor fact. Callas did make two Tosca “films,” but both were Act 2 only. Here we start with Act 2 but proceed to Act 3 with Callas on television. And the slight slips of describing the crux of Act 2 as taking place in a small town in Italy (that would be Rome) and the climactic event as being a stab in the back (nah, she goes for the heart) are bothersome and could have so easily been fixed.

Anna Prus, by name reversed from the Baron of Janacek’s opera but otherwise rather unlike him, is the most sympathetic character in the novel. This underscores the gender issues, since Martin feels like the focal point but Anna owns the feminine prerogatives. And she grows over the four decades that we see her in. The persona of omni-mothering voice teacher suits her and bonds her with her daughter, even as she refuses to reveal what she suspects. So operatic, so Die Marschallin of her. Martin is well fleshed-out, literally, bear that he is, but both he and his sister read more as the sum of their catastrophes than as individuals. Maria’s Catholic school experience, however, is nightmarish and vivid.

There is a lot of good material here and I found the book quite gripping, but it left me wanting to fix it as much as recommend it.

About that Cummerbund...

2010-05-02T14:00:00.004-05:00

My friend Ted invited me to his class reunion. He is a year old than I: my reunion is next year. But he wanted me to come and sing with him at the chapel service, and that became the main activity of yesterday.

I took a nap after posting to this blog yesterday morning -- I knew I had a long day ahead of me. Then I wandered around the Main Line for a while, paid a visit to my parents (seen here in the St David's cemetery)

and to a stream that my Daddy loved, beside Paper Mill Lane.

Downtown Wayne, PA was hot and sunny. The library wasn't open (new hours, open at 1, must be budget cuts). Ted met me for lunch at Christopher's. I ate sparingly. He had dessert! We talked the way old friends do, leaping from subject to subject, re-attuning ourselves to each other's mind. Then we drove out to the new Episcopal Academy campus. It was my first visit there. The grounds are sweeping and impressive. The Chapel dominates the landscape. I am afraid that my first reaction to it was horror: a huge cross atop a ziggurat made of particle board. But the inside was beautiful and inviting, almost Unitarian or Quaker in its spare openness (except for the immense cross and ominous pipe organ!). We rehearsed with a small chorus and had a few moments to mingle with faculty from our youth (wow, they must have been younger than I am now to be the ages they currently are!) and classmates not seen in decades. Then the service got going. It was a tribute to the teachers, heavily scripted and heavily add-libbed. My feelings were a mix of honor and sorrow. I felt a lot of disconnect, and never quite fit in. Why did I need that? After we sang I snuck out and drove to my gig. There was time to warm up, change, and wait.....

The b minor Mass is beyond immense, far beyond unmanageable. The labor that went into the performance was laudable and there were moments of triumph and delight. There were also long stretches of nervous anxiety -- because I sing two pieces and sit for an hour and a half between them, worrying about whether my voice will even speak when the time comes! Each of the soloists has the same issue. On the other hand, soloing in this work is a heck of a lot easier than singing the whole choral part! As I sang the Benedictus, counting every beat and fighting the tendency of my body to freeze in fear, I realized that the optimum outcome would be to sing this so many times that I relaxed and trusted and got into the zone with it. Not just memorized, but internalized, so I could let go and play with it as though it were Danny Boy. Amen, and may that happen!

We finished, I said my good-byes and thank-yous, and I was on the road. My eyes are not as happy about night driving as they used to be. And I was tired. So I was mighty relieved that I saw the car STOPPED AT A JAUNTY ANGLE IN THE MIDDLE OF THE PA TURNPIKE in time to screech to a halt and then circle around it. I called 911 to report a car in distress in the roadway but they hung up on me. So I rode through New Jersey listening to Crespin, Amara, Bacquier and Gedda in The Tales of Hoffmann, and made excellent time. Home, exhausted, before 12:30!

Oh, and about that Cummerbund. I was going to buy one at a thrift store, but I realized I had lost enough weight so that I could button the jacket. Problem solved.

High Mass and Low Breakfast

2010-05-01T07:20:00.010-05:00

I forgot my cummerbund! But I’m getting ahead of myself (and this isn’t as bad as the time I drove to Richmond for a recital and forgot my black shoes).

On the road again -- Bach's b minor Mass in Ambler, PA. But it's not like I can just pack up and leave for a gig; there's so much stuff that has to be done first. So I started yesterday morning with bill paying and packing, then took a break to drop by the dress rehearsal for a concert which I will miss today (Half Moon Trio: Jim Elkin, Diane Guernsey and Mike Lunapiena) at the New Rochelle Public Library. Then back home to teach one lesson and finally into the car, with my scores, CDs for the trip, and my clothes...well, most of them!

It was a truly gorgeous day. I cruised down the Jersey Turnpike listening to Steve Winwood, took time for a long conversation with a dear friend who is undergoing major life changes (and this was legal -- I bought a wireless speaker for my cell phone, which mounts on the visor). There were a few pockets of traffic but I had left early enough to avoid the major rush hour issues. I found myself in eastern Pennsylvania with oodles of time to spare. I remembered where there was a Barnes & Noble, for some browsing and some email checking. Then I took a chance on Appleby's for dinner. Surely I could find something healthy there.... It was harder than I thought, but not impossible. The broiled Tilapia had no breading, the rice could be left off and the broccoli doubled. Everything else on the menu was deep fried with cheese and starch!

I got to the church early enough to warm up and run my two numbers. Then the dress rehearsal got going. (Photo: Dave Spitko conducting) There were some stops and starts. I came in way loud on the first entrance in the Domine Deus and got a plea for piano! It is the first note I sing and it is a top G! But OK.... I learned the Benedictus a zillion years ago in college (studying with Blake Stern, who sang this with Shaw in the '50s). His recommended speed of quarter note = 70 is penciled into my score. We are going at quarter = 40 this time: please fetch my aqualung! We are also using flute rather than violin obligato, a modern trend, which makes the slower speed a practical necessity (at least for the flautist!).

We finished up around 10:15 and I drove out to West Chester, where Mother lived for two decades, and which I try to visit when I can. You can't really go home again, but you can tootle around nearby. I am staying at the Microtel -- yes, there is a window seat! (see photo at top) I fell sleep pretty fast -- it had been a long day.

This morning I made a pilgrimage -- to Hank's Place, the family restaurant in the heart of Wyeth country. Down 202 and west on Rte 1 into the Brandywine Valley. A tiny place, though it been expnaded somewhat since I started coming here almost 30 years ago. And now they have fancy omelettes. But I stuck with the simple and local: eggs and scrapple. If you don't know what goes into scrapple you may wish to remain blissfully ignorant. Suffice it to say that it is very savory!

Love Lost and Won

2010-03-01T11:50:00.003-05:00

Two movies I saw this weekend, so different and yet with certain common threads. WARNING, spoilers galore!

I came to the movie version of A Single Man without preconceived notions -- I had not read the book, and indeed had waited so long to see it that I could barely recall the reviews. It was directed by a designer, Tom Ford, and bore his imprint not only in its detailed loveliness but also in its symmetry. Pants have two legs, shirts have two arms, and almost every event in this film became part of a pair of something. It opened and closed with fade to black and the nude body in the water. George got approached by two contrasting men. George had two meetings at the same bar: his first with his lover and his last with his stalker/student. His lover's acceptance of death in the moment of happiness was balanced by George's experience of the same, and so on. It is as if the whole movie had flying buttresses on each side. Some of the mirrored events had great power: George's dream of kissing his dead lover's corpse was answered when the dead Jim kissed the dying George. And the use of clear versus soft focus had an impact as well -- George's last perceived image evanesced as he took it in.

I gather from my research that there George does not have a gun, a heart attack or a last name in the book. Here he borrows Falconer, presumeably from Cheever, another "invisible" gay man, and devotes a fair amount of time to fiddling with the gun, not quite ready to off himself, too much in the manner of Papageno for me to take quite seriously. It was uncomfortable to watch, and verged on the embarassing. Colin Firth looked very attractive, so it was easy to understand why everybody wanted to have sex with him and quite difficult to see why almost everybody kept telling him how awful he looked. He did not look the way a man of his age would have looked in that era -- he was too close to "50 is the new 30." And his heart attack radiated down his right arm, an odd medical choice. He certainly managed to act repressed for two hours, with a few moments of cracked facade.

Julianne Moore played his fag hag friend Charley, who wounds him with the accusation that he lacked a "real" relationship and gets a pretty easy pass from him -- he seems unable to carry his rage into action, except perhaps against himself. Moore gives a delightful performance, magically recreating a young Lynn Redgrave.

George's scene of suicide preparation, with the OCD laying out of his documents and notes, is accompanied by Ebben, ne andro lontano from La Wally (the Miriam Gauci recording on Naxos). The aria became notorious when it was used in the movie Diva, but it was quite appropriate here -- "Alright, I shall go far away" really is what he is thinking. A pity the scene lasts longer than the aria, which had to have an extra repeat looped in. Sorry, I cannot hear music in a movie without noticing the nuts and bolts!

Overall the film left me both sad and slightly angry. I love formal structure, but this went so far that I felt manipulated. And the scene of George tenderly locking away the gun and then encountering the owl -- which I hoped was his lover Jim blessing him to live -- was so peaceful that I felt cheated by the sudden death. Stories can be open ended.

Which, oddly, is what David Copperfield is. It has a "happily ever after" finish, but then you don't really know what will come next. I borrowed the DVD of the 1935 George Cukor version from the Yonkers Public Library and proceeded to play my part in educating my children -- they need to see great classic movies!

How amazing to experience Dickens after reading Alice Miller, not to mention Freud and Jung! How instinctively he understood the struggles of the child to relive and "fix" traumatic situations. Poor David, falling in love with a pale copy of his Mother, and seeking an idealized Father in the less-than-ideal Steerforth. Of course everything comes out right and the evil ones get their just desserts, but somehow Dickens' fixation on the goodness that cannot be spoilt leaves a smile on my face at the end. The supporting cast gets all the glory. How can I even begin to sing the praises of Edna May Oliver, the tart but loving Aunt Betsey? Basil Rathbone is beyond slimey as Murdstone -- and Roland Young gives him a run for his money as Uriah Heep (why did Dickens choose Uriah, the name of an honorable man destroyed by King David's lust, for this character -- who knows?). As for W.C. Fields, even lacking the requisite accent he triumphs in a role where being himself is acting enough. And who would not want to revert to childhood again in the arms of Peggotty (Jessie Ralph)? Freddie Bartholomew manages to be cloyingly sweet without actually being laughable -- or maybe I have a tolerance for this sort of acting! My daughter was annoyed by the gender stereotyping, and she spotted a gay subtext in the David/Steerforth relationship which is surely justifiable but probably not within Dickens' imagination. There is something deeply satisfying about the way the story explores misery and brings it around to possibility. Hurray for catharsis! (And for that last sharp exchange between Aunt Betsey and Mr Dick!)

The Smile

2010-02-26T06:30:00.002-05:00

Yesterday I joined my Western Wind colleagues for a day of residency activities at the Talent Unlimited High School in NYC. Christian Smythe has built an excellent program there over the past nine years and the kids are really receptive to what we offer. At each class we sang two or three numbers, ran warm-ups, and listened to them sing -- and coached them. I got to exercise my creative teaching chops, which haven't been used very much this year, and I had a really happy and exciting time. I showed one girl how to create the mood that makes the pianist start playing, and then helped her focus on finding the inner need expressed in the song. And when I applied concepts of period dress and posture with a girl who was singing Silent Noon the most thrilling thing happened: a shy, subtle, involuntary smile crept across her face as the text prompted her, and the whole class saw what happens when you open yourself to being a vessel for the song. Everything I have been working on in my mens' group revolves around the idea of identifying what I have to give and giving it -- the payback is beyond price.

The day's work was bookended with two commutes that were exciting in less positive ways: rain, snow, slush, and very slow, careful driving. I was relieved to get home in one piece.

Food as Torture

2010-02-19T12:24:00.002-05:00

I have had weight problems all my life, and have developed bood sugar issues as a result. I have been exploring various ways of coping with my challenges: diet, exercise, disciplines. Diets are hard to stick to and exercise is dull (even a good opera video combined with the treadmill is no match for the same opera video paired with a good easy chair!). I went to Overeaters Anonymous for a while, but found the fundamentalism not to my taste. The eating plan they taught me seems the best I have seen, however, and certainly the only one that has reined in my glucose levels without the aid of prescription meds (all of which made me sick). The notorious grey sheet diet consists (mostly) of:

Breakfast: oatmeal, fruit, and a serving of protein
Lunch: protein and a whole lot of vegetables, a piece of fruit
Dinner: same as lunch, with a little salad dressing (watch out for sugars in the ingredients!) with some more fruit thrown in.

Nothing made from ground grains. No potatoes (sigh). No booze. My problems with this start with my sugar levels -- they fluctuate more wildly if I eat only three times a day and stay steadier if I eat "between" meals. So taking the fruits and making them snacks works better for me than eating them as part of larger meals. The breakfast protein works better when turned into "elevenses." Might not the occasional glass of red wine be of benefit to me? I check my sugars and can see which foods have immediate undesirable effects. It sure is a source of constant meditation.

Then there is the issue of how I feed my children. One is vegetarian, with the result that she eats a great deal of dairy and a lot of pasta and other starches. The other is an omnivore who accepts the cheeseburger as a staple of life. He talks about which foods are healthy are which are not but does not make choices based on that knowledge. We were all home today for lunch and I made what seems to me a healthy meal: asparagus, red onion and herbed tofu sauteed in olive oil and garlic served on wilted salad greens. By now I can accept such a platter as both nutritious and appetizing. It was more of a stretch for them! One ate much and with some acceptance, the other resisted mightily. This is lunch -- no food till dinner! I don't want to feel that I am punishing them, but am I nurturing them better when they smile while being fed cake? There is of course a balance -- and we have the opportunity to explore it....

Car Listening

2010-02-18T09:22:00.003-05:00

I do most of my music listening in the car. Therefore I don't hear much Mahler anymore -- too many pianissimi for the ambient noise! But Musical Theater -- that seems made for car listening.

M came with me into NYC yesterday. We brought along The King and I, the revival from the '90s. We are liberal with the fast forward button and applied it to several numbers as they threatened us! One line from the boy playing Anna's son and that was it for Whistle a Happy Tune. The album is interesting -- much of the show is so strong as to be virtually unkillable. The updated orchestrations make the score sound tinny, but the tune and the harmonies of the March of the Siamese Children still hit their mark. Donna Murphy overenunciates as though she were dubbing Mary Poppins for a cartoon. Occasionally she makes a strong dramatic point but mostly she seems to lack any connection to period style. And it takes a lot of added reverb to hoist her voice to the upper reaches of Hello Young Lovers. The young lovers are rather attractive, though Lun-Tha presses on his voice in a way that does not bode well for his long-term vocal health. We didn't hear much of Lou Diamond Phillips -- that fast forward tab made short work of the King! We own most of the possible King and I albums (Original Cast, Movie Soundtrack, Rise Stevens revival, Barbara Cook revival, Julie Andrews): I ought to compile our favorite versions of the various numbers, which would certainly include Lee Venora's Tuptim material from the Rise Stevens album (which also features Patricia Neway as a rather ripe Lady Thiang).

On the way home we listened to some cuts from the new Ella Fitzgerald 12 Nights in Hollywood set. It is magical. Ella manages to maintain her good-girl-flirting-mildly-with-naughtiness persona through songs that range from the childish (A-tisket, a tasket, delightful with many different voices, almost in the manner of a ventriloquist) to the sexy (Witchcraft). Witchcraft belongs to Sarah Vaughan, as far as I'm concerned, but this is pretty good (and includes the verse). Ella also ventures One for My Baby and One More for the Road, the personal property of Frank Sinatra. She delivers a good, solid, swinging version, which almost makes up in sheer musical delight what it lacks in dramatic connection. Odd to hear a song so thoroughly film noir in its stereotypical masculinity sung by a girl singer....

Bye-Bye Brattleboro

2010-02-17T07:40:00.006-05:00

I couldn't write yesterday -- too tired. So here is the account of the last day of the workshop.

Monday morning was grey with scenic flurries. And inside the church the boiler was back on, though it took a while for the heat to make itself felt. We warmed up and sang through the large group piece. BZ started recording it, but there was hammering noise from a workman which intervened every time we got to the final phrase. We split up for our final small group sessions. Since the Waldorf school was in session for the day we needed to find replacement rehearsal rooms. My hosts had let me know their house was useable, so I sent LC there with her group so that LC could ogle all the quilts. Lunch involved the clever (and frugal) use of leftovers. We ran our set and then gathered for the final concert. There were all the usual moments of triumph, beauty, and "oops how did that happen? -- we knew this before lunch!" And then, like Brigadoon, the workshop was over and dissolving. People checked out, and various combinations of us packed up the music library and loaded it into T's car, swept the floors, folded and stored the tables, and put all the folding chairs in their racks.

We drove off and got to Northampton around 6pm. We put all the music in CC's basement where it lives, and then went to Paul & Elizabeth's restaurant downtown to meet KB (former Western Wind soprano, now Professor in Wisconsin) who was in town as guest conductor at the 5 Colleges Choral Festival. It was a festive event, and a treat to see her. Then it was back to the wheel and down 91, across the Merritt (more like a video game than a highway, with no lights, snow, and all those twists and turns), and back to my driveway, where we met to apportion people and luggage into two cars (EZL's and LC's) continuing south and west. And I went inside to start sleeping!

Singing in the heat, singing in the cold

2010-02-15T07:28:00.003-05:00

Saturday the church was warm. They are in the process of installing indoor oil tanks and need to run through the oil in the old, outdoor tank. So the heat was on full blast and it was the warmest I have ever been here (and this is my 10th Brattleboro workshop). I led vocal warmups, MK led a rehearsal of the large group piece (Rise up by Healy Willan), and the rest of us picked music for our groups. We then called our groups with the usual ice-breaker questions, i.e., when I call your name tell me your ideal vacation spot. I came up with when I call your name tell me who should be Sarah Palin's running mate in '12. There were some inventive answers -- I'm sure she and Jon Stewart would get along famously. Then we got to work. Lunch was instalment #1 of Navob's festival of health food, with its high roughage content, balanced with excellent (if inadvisable) sweets. My break time got chewed up with picking and xeroxing more music. We worked through the afternoon and ran our stuff after dinner, and then ventured three pieces at seminar:

Stars of the Summer Night, from the Victorian Partsong book

Kyrie and Christe from the Lasso Missa "J'ai perdu"

and the first 20 bars of an insane arrangement of Free at Last which I found on CPDL

By the time seminar was over I was competely exhausted -- i drove to my hosts' house and went to bed.

Sunday I woke up at some ridiculous hour and lay in bed for a long time. There were local blueberries, just defrosted, with breakfast. We rehearsed the Willan and sang it at the UU service (Western Wind also sang Hark! All Ye Lovely Saints Above). Coffee hour bled into small group time, and then lunch and a brief run into town. By now I have shopped Brattleboro dry and simply wander around not expecting to find or buy anything. The afternoon session included some group-hopping, as I drafted EZL and LC to assist in a Caldara piece and EZL invited LC and me to join his group in a round and a spiritual. Seminar was... cold. The outside tank had drained to the pint where sludge entered the boiler, which shut down. It took a while for the chill to pervade the building, and when it did a phone call to the service person yielded instant results in terms of work but not in terms of results -- no heat possible for the evening. So we bundled up and sang. And sang. Till almost 10pm. Another night when I drove home and crashed, another morning when I woke before dawn...

Winter Wonderland, Day 1

2010-02-13T14:10:00.001-05:00

Friday Feb 12: 1st day of Western Wind's Winter Wonderland Workshop in Brattleboro, VT

I woke up insanely early, as has become my habit. I was packed and ready well before departure time, which has not been my habit.... EZL and TF drove up, left EZL's car (Fluffy, the geriatric Toyota) in my driveway, and off we went. The drive was swift and easy, and there was less and less snow as we got further north. I ditched Rte 91 two exits south of Northampton, where construction caused a 3 into 1 merge and a near total stoppage of traffic, and used my previous-life native tracker qualities to figure out a route northwards into NoHo. We met T at State Street Deli, retrieved all the sheet music from its hibernating cave in CC's basement, loaded it into T's car (with overflow into LC's car and mine) and then TF and I made a brief shopping stop in downtown NoHo. I sold some CDs at Turn It Up, browsed a bit but bought nothing, and then we resumed our northward journey.

All Souls Unitarian Church in Brattleboro is its beautiful self. We set up our music library and check-in materials for the participants. It was a relaxed and easy load-in. We drove down to the Vermont Deli to pick up sandwiches and then heard auditions from our first-time participants. BZ, who had sung with the St Thomas Choir at the ACDA convention in Philadelphia in the morning, finally arrived, a bit after 7. We sang our concert at 8, mingled for a while, and then TF and I went to our hosts to find rest! A long day... and the workshop is just getting started!

Stolen Time

2010-02-11T08:35:00.003-05:00

We watched Time Bandits (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_Bandits) last night. I vaguely recall seeing it in a movie theater when it was new, decades ago. And I thought my kids might be amused by it. The low-budget special effects aged better than I thought they might and the Monty Python-based writing and acting is ageless -- assuming one ever liked that style anyway. My daughter, who is a total MP fan, found it only mildly funny. My son, however, laughed throughout. OK -- it is pitched towards pre-teen boys. And I kept thinking, "this would be hysterical if I were stoned." The boy actor playing Kevin sounded remarkably like the voice of James from James and the Giant Peach, but was not in fact the same actor. They must hand out those identical accents from some English acting school. The Evil Overlord, with his long nails and head-dress, reminded me of Malificent in Disney's Sleeping Beauty -- so there may be some stereotypical evil gay subtext going on here. The most remarkable thing about the movie was the subtle introduction of the concept of repressed rage on the part of Kevin, who must long to punish his parents for their neglect and winds up being the agent of their destruction even as he wanly begs them not to touch the chunk of pure evil that he has subconsciously brought back from the depths of time. Nice to see a great big dollop of Freud and Jung left unresolved at the end of the story -- or, as my son said, "what, there isn't a happy ending?" Well, maybe it is happy for the boy in the long run. The fireman who saved him (twice, since he was also Agamemnon in an earlier scene) winks at him, and he is free to grow on his own. Be careful what you wish for....

Zinka and my Blog

2010-02-10T10:37:00.003-05:00

OK, it is a snow day, and maybe the right time to start writing again. I blogged for a while in 2007-08 and had a disaster which turned me off the whole blog thing for a while. And it relates, in my mind, to a story about Zinka, the diva of all dive.

Zinka Milanov was a Croatian soprano who reigned over the Met in the '50s. She was, ahem, Juno-esque, and not much of an actress, but she could really sing: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ga_GsJOnY6g

Here is her Wiki Page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zinka_Milanov (notice her wise decision about replacing her maiden name!) and a fascinating article about her teaching: http://listserv.bccls.org/cgi-bin/wa?A2=OPERA-L;rrM5aw;19960521103534-0400D

She had one of the most majestic egos of her era, and a Dracula accent to go with it. There are legions of stories of her charmingly overbearing behavior, and here is the one which connects to my blogging.

After a performance a fan came to Zinka and gushed, "O Madame Milanov, your voice is like Silver!" Her reply (and you must supply the dialect to get the full effect), "Vawt, not golt?"

Blogging, to me, is different from writing a diary. It is public, and I am a performer. If I sing someplace and want to write about it I am quite circumspect in my comments as they might touch upon my colleagues. So when I wrote what I thought was a clever, witty and original compliment about one colleague I was beyond shocked when that colleague did not take what I wrote in a positive way and proceded to make my life so difficult that I found it necessary to make major changes and eliminate the ensuing stress. "Vawt, not golt?" indeed.

I have been posting a video a day on FaceBook recently, and maybe I will upgrade that to a video a day on my blog, with some comments and links.... and maybe a return to blogging about my performing and touring.

Off with their heads

2009-10-24T07:10:00.002-05:00

Last evening I had the pleasure of introducing my daughter to Poulenc's Dialogues des Carmelites. We enjoyed it Bayreuth-style: we ate dinner after Act I. This was my 3rd time watching Marthe Keller's Opera du Rhin production, and I enjoyed just as much (although I had a few quibbles this time around). It was a delight to experience this most riveting of operas and pass my enthusiasm on -- and see it catch fire.

The production is dark and spare, which works to the opera's advantage, even when obvious visual props are missing. The female principals are all strong. Blanche (Anne-Sophie Schmidt) has the almost ungrateful task of holding the whole thing together, with neurasthenic terror and a face that resolves from singing to an awkward smile. Her voice lacks luxurious beauty but she sails through the challenges of text and tessitura. Patricia Petitbon is a stunning Constance, revealed as a redhead when the wimples come off in Act III. Her sweet voice and serene presence illuminate the darkness around her. The Old Prioress, Nadine Denize, performs her role with great power and clarity, although she is hobbled -- or rather, unhobbled -- by directorial choices that make her illness less debilitating than I think it ought to be. Her first scene gives the impression that she suffers from arthritis, no more. And surely if Mere Marie bids Blanche approach the Reverend Mother's bed the Reverend Mother ought still to be in that bed! On the other hand, there is a fine pay-off for Madame de Croissy's dying crawl, the image of her corpse supported by Blanche in identical poses as one's death passes to the other. Marie is played by Hedwig Fassbender, with just the right balance of pride and tenderness -- and one hint of lesbian feeling, a look she gives to Blanche in the ragout scene. Valerie Millot sings the New Prioress's music with ease and beauty, and makes her sharp yet kind.

The final scene lacks a guillotine, or even the shadow of one. Yet it works shockingly well. The nuns (having made crosses on their chests with coal from their prison cell, an excellent touch) line up and step forward, one by one. We see them each meet death: as the guillotine sound thuds they freeze and fall. It is possibly more intense and disturbing than the traditional walk into the wings because we can see their faces and experience their deaths as individual events. Here it is http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P85S_70oSOk.

It was interesting to discuss the opera with my daughter, who commented that it was more a play with music. She just finished a unit on the French Revolution in her global history class and found that this brought the reality, make that the feeling of reality home. She lacks the background in Christian ritual with which I grew up, and needed a lot of explanations as we went through the story. Poulenc certainly managed to mix the sacred and profane in the best Massenet manner, far exceeding old Jules in fact! There is a chord in the Old Prioress's death scene which vividly conjures Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue, to unfortunate effect. But the sensual harmonies balance with the chaste rhythms and create a musical language that is so completely and recognizably Poulenc's. Everything he wrote sounds like preparation for or outtakes from this opera.

I have acted in two productions of Dialogues, as the Chaplain at Des Moines in 1984 and as the brother in the Opera Manhattan production at St Peter's Citicorp in 1993. The brother has one terrific duet scene with his sister, and the Chaplain has some rewarding participation in what is really a female-driven story. It was amusing to recall in-jokes from Des Moines: rehearsals that ended with a call of "who's heartless enough to go to Pizza Hut now?"; and Mere Marie's "loudest address in the world" -- Madamoiselle Rose Ducor, Deux Rue Saint DeNIIIIIIIIIIIS.

How odd to have a list of favorite operas that embraces Carmelites and Gioconda! Now it is time to start with the Ring....

Zerfliesst's wie eitel Schaum

2009-08-04T06:38:00.004-05:00

I fell asleep at 9pm last night, utterly wiped out. I had sung Dichterliebe at 5... well to be honest I enacted Dichterliebe at 5:15, and that was the second time in two hours.

I had been asked to sing as part of Summit Music Festival. They don't usually have vocal music, and I was the only vocal event on their schedule. One of their board members is an adjunct piano teacher at the college where I used to teach. We had been discussing doing a project together and she offered me this. It was to be a lecture/recital, with the lecture supplied by a professor from the college (which is also the setting for the festival -- this made for an awkward addition to the stress level of the event). So we rehearsed and readied ourselves. The professor bowed out, so I added the lecture to my duties. As I worked on the song cycle, which I had last sung 25 years ago in Satellite Beach, FL, I realized how theatrical it feels and I became less and less able to see myself standing still in the crook of the piano while singing it. So I developed a modest staging, which involved a notebook, a pen, some movement, and no shoes.

Last week was the Western Wind singing workshop at Smith College. I was not able to divide my mind and so the Schumann songs went to the back burner. They took the prime spot in my consciousness on Sunday: I typed my own translations for the program in the morning, listened to Olaf Baer bark the cycle on my car's CD player, practised my lecture, and sang a run-through at 10pm, the only time we could get into the theater.

Yesterday I awoke with a sore throat, and the feeling of a developing chest cold. I patiently worked my voice and used warm fluids and a hot shower until I had enough range and balance to survive. It wasn't going to feel like I was at my most comfortable, but I was pretty sure I'd get through. I taught a lesson at 12:30, always my favorite way to warm myself up. I got to the campus at 4 and we ran through the whole cycle once in a studio. The we walked over the student center, where the theater is, and set up for the show. There was a good-sized audience, including an number of people whom I had invited and some of my former students from the college. The lecture went OK (I speak with only the skimpiest notes and keep my focus on the audience) but drained a good portion of my voice. I went offstage, drank some water, removed my shoes, and entered the world of Heine's angry and sorrowful poet. My staging was simple enough to work efficiently -- and I was careful to keep things to a minimum during the postludes. The beauty of technique is that my voice did what it was supposed to even though I didn't feel up to par. Opening myself emotionally to the songs is dangerous, particularly when a surge of rage tempts me to shout. The half hour flew by as I sang and suddenly it was over. Three curtain calls and two bouquets: a mighty fine reception. My brains were fried and it was all that I could do to keep enough focus to talk with people afterwards.

I took my surplus of emotional energy out to dinner with a group of friends and family. We went to Mary Anne's (Mexican) in Port Chester, where I ate myself into a stupor (Pollo con limone, Kahlua flan). No wonder I fell asleep at 9!

One Short Day in the Emerald City

2009-07-24T14:13:00.002-05:00

One day between the Nantucket tour and the Northampton workshop! And so much to crowd into it....

Laundry first. Then two students. And then a trip into NYC for three events: a rehearsal, a lesson, and my shrink. The rehearsal was way uptown, on West 176th Street. My accompanist for Dichterliebe had asked me to attend a session with someone who would be coaching her. The apartment had a stunning view across the Hudson, and three awesome cats. I sat crossed-legged on the floor and declaimed Heine/Schumann to a deep grey tom, while our charming Armenian (I think) hostess made notes and faces. We gave a pretty good runthrough, and then got a lot of really excellent suggestions.

I drove downtown and parked for a second time. I had time for a salad at Hot'n'Crusty before my voice lesson. Then I subwayed further into NYC, to the Flatiron district, and browsed at Acadmy Used CDs until it was time to be shrunk. It rained on and off during the afternoon and gathered some force as I worked my way north. Traffic was unusually heavy for post-rush-hour on a Summer night.

Nantucket Diary

2009-07-22T17:08:00.002-05:00

Western Wind's Nantucket Tour 2009

Saturday, July 18
EZL and TF arrived at my house at 8am for our departure -- they left EZL's car in my driveway and we took my Subaru. Lovely day, and shockingly little traffic. We stopped for gas on the Merritt and got mixed up with a parade of expensive cars on their way to an auto show. There was a stunning yellow Jag and a shiny Rolls. TF wanted to leave with them, but they were blocking all the gas pumps, except for one that was broken, and we took off to find a different place to refuel. We got onto 95 and stopped in Milford. But we didn't start, because the car wouldn't turn over. A few coughs and then nothing. We pushed it to the side and called AAA. They came and jumped us, and told me my battery needed replacing. So we decided to drive to Hyannis and leave the car someplace for repairs while we went to Nantucket. We stopped at a Getty station and asked if they could handle the car -- their diagnosis was far more expensive than a battery; they said my alternator needed replacing. I was not in a position to comparison shop, with a ferry ticket and gigs to make. So I swallowed and left the car (actually, we drove to the ferry and unloaded our luggage, and the guys from Getty came and picked up the car), taking a business card for a receipt.

We ate at a clam shack by the ferry (http://www.baxterscapecod.com/), where they needed to install a mortgage broker to arrange financing for the lobster rolls. My income has not risen but their prices sure have. I ate the smelt platter, which was more of an adventure than I think I really wanted. The ferry ride was easy and we were soon being driven to our host homes. TF and I stayed in the same place we had stayed 5 years ago, a really neat place chock full of art and tchotchkes with a most hospitable host. We met at 7:15 at the Episcopal Church to rehearse for our Shakespeare in Music program. LC, TF and I walked down to the harbor to find food. And then I went to bed.

Sunday, July 19
Up ludicrously early and out for a walk. I ate breakfast at Black Eyed Susan's (http://www.black-eyedsusans.com/) -- the sausage was terrific. WiFi is hard to find on the island, and I spent a while wandering around looking for a hot spot. We met at the Unitarian Society and sang at the service, and then I managed to squeeze in a nap. We resumed work at 3, rehearsing and then giving the Shakespeare concert. Nice audience and a lot of fun singing Dowland, Weelkes et al. We were treated to dinner at the home of the cellist who had arranged this concert. Her 9 year old son played the piano for us, quite impressively.

Monday, July 20
I managed to sleep in, all the way to 8am. Our host took us to the town dump, where there is a shack full of free stuff: I picked up some books. We had lunch at the home of the high school chorus director, who served us a delightful meal on the table in her garden. I took a walk around town and then we met to rehearse for the Tuesday concert, after which we gave a promo performance, a few songs and a Q&A session, at the Unitarian Church.

Tuesday, July 21
Up way early again, and out to the Even Keel (http://www.evenkeelcafe.com/)for breakfast, and then to the Bean, a coffee shop, for tea and WiFi. I spent my morning working on an arrangement. Lunch was a buffet at Helen's house, with the board of the Musical Arts Society. Howard turned out to be a graduate of my old school, the Episcopal Academy (Merion, PA). Helen and I had a long talk about running community choruses. I took a brief rest and then dressed for our concert, and walked to the Congregational Church. We rehearsed and then took a break. Our valiant substitute soprano, RS, gave me an excellent hand massage. The concert went well. Pretty decent sized audience, very responsive. Excellent acoustic. Ned Rorem (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ned_Rorem) came up to me afterwards and complimented me on my voice and the group on our tuning. He was still stunning at 85, in a robin's egg blue shirt that picked up his eye color. LC, RS and I went in search of food and found lobster rolls and beer (for me -- LC had a mojito!). I cannot sleep after drinking booze, so my night was restless.

Wednesday, July 22
Up at (gasp) 5:30 and off to the Bean, which opens very early. Tuesday morning there had been another guy doing WiFi there -- this morning he was there again but spoke: you sang last night! It turned out he was Rorem's house guest. We had a nice chat. Then I went to Black Eyed Susan's again and would up joining the chorus director and her husband for breakfast. Then I walked back to our host's house and brought my bags downstairs to wait for the ride to the ferry - where I am now typing this. But I cannot post it till I get home....

Harry Potter and the Tuning Fork of Steel

2009-07-16T09:48:00.002-05:00

I had a really odd double bill yesterday: a workshop at the North American Jewish Choral Festival (http://www.zamirfdn.org/index.php?p=7) plus the new Harry Potter movie. But there was a certain Old Testament feeling linking the two events.

First I went on Fandango and ordered my tickets. Since I had promised my kids the movie as a reward for accompanying me to my gig I couldn't risk not getting in. I picked a movie theater in Fishkill, NY so that we would be halfway home when it was over.

Then we drove up to the Hudson Valley Resort and Spa in Kerhonkson, NY. The weather was perfect and the views stunning. We arrived in time for lunch (cod, pasta, latkes, salad, cookies and fudge brownies) and set up for a whirlwind hour and half Western Wind workshop presentation. BZ, EZL and I each took a group of singers and taught them a piece (or in my case two). My group did nicely. We worked for a hour and then got back together to sing for each other. And then it was suddenly over. The kids had time to browse the lobby, which was full of Jewish tchotchkas for sale. They got an object lesson in the difference between Jewish culture on the one hand and Unitarian upbringing with an awareness of Jewish background on the other.

We bundled into the car and drove to Fishkill. I wanted to get there in time to pick up the tickets and see if the line for seating was so long that we would have to eat sandwiches while we stood. But there was almost nobody there. The kid at the ticket booth snickered at me when I asked how long the line might get. So we went to Charlie Brown's Steakhouse, next door, and ate. They had a veggie burger, so M was happy, and a regular beef one, which pleased J. I ate a plate of stuff from the salad bar, mostly artichokes and mushrooms on lettuce.

HP6 was... like all the others. Dark. Threatening. And based on the same "they tried to kill us, they lost, let's eat" formula as much of the Bible, not to mention the previous 5 books. This time of course the ending was tragic (for AD), with an appended attempt at peaceful resolution. Draco Malfoy has grown into a mighty handsome young man -- if only he could display facial expressions other than a sneer or a snivel. Harry has become a fine-featured poetical type, and Ron a big bruiser. Jim Broadbent did a terrific guest star turn as Slughorn. The kids loved it. I am over the whole extended franchise by now. Two more movies, sigh!

We drove home, listening to the Beatles. Classic.

Time to let my mind wander

2009-07-12T07:50:00.002-05:00

Yesterday -- two gigs in two states, separated by The City.

First the wedding, in Garden City, NY. I HATE driving on Long Island. I know most of the tricks and dodges, but the traffic snarls anyway. I wasn't late, amazingly. We rehearsed at 2 (a choir of 6, with organ) and the service started a little past 3. Nice music (Ubi caritas, Ave verum, Ave maris stella). The officiant was a bishop, a round, jolly man in a big shovel hat. The church was huge and even with the sound system turned up it was hard to make out his words amidst the reverb. I pondered the issue of gay marriage for a while as I listened to the language of the Catholic wedding ceremony, driven as it is by the issue of "issue." The parents got ovations as they exited: they had done their job and gotten their kids hitched so that they could have kids and get an ovation upon completion of their task and so on. Where do other types of union fit into that model? Or to put it another way, I can see why two lovers of any stripe would want the legal protections of marriage but why would they want this sort of communal sendoff, at least in this format and with this language? (I know, services can be tailored to fot the need.) As you can see, there was a lot of down time between anthems!

Then I drove to Millburn, NJ for a Western Wind rehearsal at LC's house. PC had made curry, and a pie concocted from cherries soaked in Frangelico stirred into chocolate mousse. In a chocolate graham cracker crust. That did in fact justify the two hour trek on the LIE, under the East River, across Midtown, under the Hudson, and through the used-sneaker-making district of New Jersey. We got some useful rehearsing done, although breath support was an issue on top of that meal!

Ich hab' im Traum geweinet

2009-07-10T13:51:00.002-05:00

This is just intolerable. But I have to manage it.

I agreed to sing Schumann's Dichterliebe on August 3rd at the Summit Music Festival. The Summit Music Festival is in residence at Manhattanville College. Manhattanville College is where I taught for the past 7 years and find myself no longer employed, due to a series of events that would be hilarious if the result were not so upsetting. And so I find myself trekking onto a campus where I no longer feel myself to be welcome, and on top of it all ran into two former students of mine today, who seemed delighted to see me....but they are now somebody else's students. Indeed, they were part of the search process for my replacement. One of the candidates for the job, an old CityOp friend of mine, called me for the scoop on the job, not realizing that he would be auditioning to take my place, not to be my colleague. That was awkward. I explained the situation to him, being as fairminded as I could manage while still calling down the furies.

Two more rehearsals and then the performance. Then I think I have to shut this door.

The Week at Smith

2009-07-03T05:35:00.002-05:00

Too busy to write!

Some random events of the week....

Tuesday morning. I was conducting a rehearsal of the large group piece, O Clap Your Hands by Orlando Gibbons, when there was a commotion in the Choir 1 Bass section. One of our participants had started to faint and been helped to the floor by the people around him. Someone called 911 and the stricken man was taken off to Cooley Dickinson Hospital, where they found nothing much wrong, maybe dehydration or interaction of meds.

We had moved from the stage to the recital hall downstairs while our unwell baritone was waiting for the ambulance, so we put away Gibbons for the day and moved on to the ritual of calling the groups -- each facilitator calling the names of the participants with whom s/he would be working using an icebreaker question, such as what is your favorite flavor of ice cream. But this time EZL asked, "when do your think the rain will stop?" and got a range of answers that identified who was an optimist or a pessimist. One person said "tomorrow" while another thought "when it starts snowing." I asked "which Michael Jackson song would you pick as cantus firmus for a mass setting?" which seemed a good music nerd question for a workshop like this!

My group is large -- 13 people. 9 women, 6 of them altos. I have spent the week pulling odd voicing combinations out of my hat. It has rained every day and the sky seems permanently threatening.

Teen Workshop at Smith

2009-06-29T05:43:00.002-05:00

I haven't written for a long while. Writer's block, depression, disenchantment with blogging? All of the above most likely. My blog got me into trouble because I wrote something I thought was complimentary about another teacher at the college where I used to teach. And I am writing the words "used to teach" as a result of the maestrom of bad feeling that ensued. I love college teaching, and I am in mourning for my position. I got a little classroom teaching fix this past weekend at the Western Wind workshop at Smith College. I have been facilitating at these workshops for nine years. But this time I got to work with our teenage participants, which is a whole different feeling from a regular workshop group.

Our focus is on forming amateur singers into small ensembles and showing them how to work on their own, without conducting. The teens (seven girls and a boy with a changing voice -- what a good sport he was!) need a different level of involvement, and I was pretty much as happy as a clam working with them. OK, a clam who spent all weekend explaining things! Together we learned:

Alleluia ( a canon by Boyce)
Erev shel shoshanim (Israeli song, arranged by me)
Sigh no more, ladies (R.J.S. Stevens)
Lidia spina del mio core (Monteverdi)

At the seminar Saturday night I had my colleagues Laura and Michele hover behind to prop up the kids when they strayed from the key -- which wasn't too often. By Sunday's concert they were pretty much getting it on their own. The work was hard and repetitive but the results were rewarding.

Karma Balance

2009-06-29T05:38:00.003-05:00

I got two emails in a row. One was a rejection for a conducting job I had applied for. The other was this (identifying info deleted):

"Hi, Richard! I'm in [name of hospital] with my Grandma [xxx], who studied organ in Julliard before leaving to work in intelligence in WWII. Afterwards, she was a piano teacher and church organist - classical music always playing in the background of her life. A couple of days ago, she started to hum and then sing the lyrics for Kashmiri Song and I'll sing These (sic) Songs of Araby, that she recalled from her 8th grade graduation. (Amazing, isn't she?) Anyway, I did an itunes search and found these songs on your album and we have been truly enjoying them. Just wanted to let you know and thank you for your contribution to her comfort during this time in her life. All the best on your life and your career!"

Measured in pure money the tradeoff is dire -- I did not get a steady part time gig with an income in the low five figures while bringing in exactly $1.98 in mp3 sales. But measured another way it felt glowingly good.

Buying "Rent"

2009-03-15T07:19:00.002-05:00

I took in the Hastings High School production of Rent yesterday evening. Make that Rent -- the School Edition. The main pruning that had been done was of F words. Otherwise the show was close to its Broadway size and scope. High school students in downscale East Village chic, heavily miked.

The energy of the music and the lyrics is undeniable. But the running gag of Roger trying to write Musetta's Waltz slyly skirts the issue of harmonic interest: Puccini used a lot more chords than Jonathan Larson! And the amplification had the paradoxical effect of distorting the words and making them just as hard to comprehend as if the singers had been using natural acoustics. Except -- the musical lines lie far too low to be projected without mikes. And the strain of 2 and 1/2 hours of shouting took its toll on many of the lead actors' throats. It is an irony far beyond the thought of the writer that the verismo dramatic style of the original La Boheme has been scuttled for a post-modern stylization while the highly trained singing of a century ago has been traded for verismo, as in real-life, vocal production. The most untrained-sounding voices, made audible by electronic means, are now highly prized. Some of the kids in the show sounded like they had some tone in their tone. Some had raw material of promise. And some didn't get microphones and just moved their mouths (Mimi's drug dealer was essentially a mime part!). As a voice teacher I must confess I recognize the future when I see it. But I feel sad for the passing of singing with overtones, in tune. End of rant -- on this topic!

Next rant -- the ending. Mimi goes through her death scene... and resurrects! A vision of the dead Angel sends her back. And all rejoice and the opera ends happily. It feels as false as the rewritten Shakepeare plays from Queen Anne's time (Othello with a handkerchief found, Lear with a happy reunion). The show does not stick with its convictions and yields to the market-driven need for a feel-good conclusion. It's not as if Mimi doesn't have AIDS anymore (Roger, too). It's not as if one or both of them might not die in the unwritten Act 3. But the cast gets to sing an uplifting ballad and send us on our way. It was exactly as annoying as the ending of Spring Awakening. And the fact that Angel died -- heavy-handed symbolism of drag queen as otherworldly emmissary/OK to kill the femme part of the gay pair -- the second Act is full of predictable, sell-out events.

Sorry, this is not being a review but rather a rant or two. I did enjoy the musical far more than the movie. And the boy who played Roger looks like he has real potential: killer good looks, strong voice (as far as I can tell through the sound system). Angel was played by a boy we know from our UU Society. he was excellent, carrying off his drag with strength and pride -- and two impressive jumps up onto a table.

Placeholder

2009-03-04T13:21:00.003-05:00

No time to write and so much to mull over. Topics from the past week, which I must sit down and cover at length:

--The Pressburger/Beecham Tales of Hoffmann movie
--My student's dress rehearsal, where the soprano duet partner wasn't avilable and so I sang Papagena
--The songs of Carl Michael Bellman, in concert at Columbia U.
--Driving through the rain for a party in NoHo
--The day of three concerts, two of which were senior recitals by students of mine
--The snow day
--that'll do for now...

Basingstoke, Fred!

2009-02-21T21:42:00.003-05:00

Sorry, but I am simply having hysterics over the collision of Fred Phelps (the God Hates Fags guy from West Topeka) with the oh-so-proper world of Gilbert & Sullivan. Phelps tried to invade the town of Basingstoke, where the students are putting on a production of The Laramie Project. There is a scene in G&S's Ruddigore that hinges on Basingstoke:

********************************

Margaret. Yes, I know, dear � it shan't occur again. (He is seated � she sits on the ground by him.) Shall I tell you one of poor Mad Margaret's odd thoughts? Well, then, when I am lying awake at night, and the pale moonlight streams through the latticed casement, strange fancies crowd upon my poor mad brain, and I sometimes think that if we could hit upon some word for you to use whenever I am about to relapse � some word that teems with hidden meaning � like "Basingstoke" � it might recall me to my saner self. For, after all, I am only Mad Margaret! Daft Meg! Poor Meg! He! he! he!

Despard. Poor child, she wanders! But soft � some one comes � Margaret � pray recollect yourself � Basingstoke, I beg! Margaret, if you don't Basingstoke at once, I shall be seriously angry.

Margaret. (recovering herself) Basingstoke it is!

Despard. Then make it so.

**********************

Perhaps we should all shout Basingstoke at Fred Phelps -- ya think he would make it so?

Bye, Bye, Brigadoon

2009-02-17T05:57:00.002-05:00

The last day of the workshop. Warmups and large group rehearsal at 9:30, followed by announcements. We had a spirited discussion of how to spread the word about the workshops and attract new participants. I volunteered to make live presentations to local choral groups. Then we broke up for our final small group session. I floated from ensemble to ensemble, helping as I could. I picked out music from our library for one of my students, who wanted material to sing with her friends. Lunch was quiche, but this time there was a cheese-free serving set aside for me -- thanks! The printer in the office was out of ink, so we had to make up and xerox a handwritten program for the participants' final concert. It was amazing how much music got learnt during the weekend, and the generous length of the concert was the result. I snuck up into the loft above the chapel and listened to the sound bouncing off the exposed panel ceiling. Suddenly, it was over and we were cleaning and packing. I worked the checkout desk, totaling music purchases and taking reservations for our next workshop. We inventoried the music books in our library. I washed the dirty coffee/tea mugs which had been left in the kitchen. Tables got put away and floors vaccuumed/swept/mopped. Farewells got said (I had time for a brief conversation with BarbB) and then we were outside loading our cars and driving away. El, Todd and I stopped for sandwiches at the Vermont Deli and then made a quick trip home, entertained by CDs of Woody Allen and Elaine Stritch. I greeted my family with a treat: luxurious brownies from the Vermont Deli. And then I fell oh so soundly asleep....

Sunday in Brattleboro

2009-02-16T06:35:00.003-05:00

Sunday at Brattleboro starts with a focus on the service at the Unitarian Society where we present our workshop. The six of us met briefly to brush up our group numbers and then rehearsed the "large group piece" with the full workshop membership. This time it was "Hard Times Come Again No More" by Stephen Foster in a very atmospheric arrangement. Todd conducted.

DCtheBF came to visit -- to hang out during our mealtimes and breaks for the day. He arrived in time to sit with me at the service. He really knows how to meditate -- that kind of stillness eludes me -- and got to make use of his skill when the worship leader told us to contemplate in silence. Western Wind sang at several points in the service. We did "Zol shoyn kumen di geulah" and invited Tom B, who acts as liaison with the UU Society, to join us with his harmonica. It was quite lovely. The arrangement opens with a series of solos -- and I forgot to come in on cue. No idea what was going through my mind. I scrambled in, two beats late, and crammed my text into the remaining bar.

I gave DC a task -- keep me away from the sweets at the coffee hour. So we sat and talked in a room at the other end of the building. He read in the parlor while I worked the one hour of small group time after the coffee hour. Then I went to find him and discovered him helping KB set up chairs for lunch! I sent a posse of workshop folk in to help her and led him off to my car. We had two hours to ourselves in downtown Brattleboro. Our first choice for lunch was too crowded so we would up in a Italian place. It was nearly empty and had a relaxed feel. We walked around town in the moderate chill and then drove back to the workshop. He took off for home and I went back in to work.

I had a variety of groups to assist during the long afternoon session, but ran out of steam before the 6pm end time. I snuck into our parlor for a brief nap before dinner. Dinner was an all dairy event, but there were leftovers (Tuna salad, egg salad) from the lunch I had skipped. The seminar lasted far longer than we had intended. There is always tension between the desire to give the participants the most we can and the fear that maybe it is all a little too much. We finished well past 9:30 and split up. I could hardly wait for bed!

Tonus Peregrinus

2009-02-15T07:45:00.002-05:00

The first full day of the workshop was, as ever, LONG and tiring. But also as ever there were new wrinkles and new opportunitites.

Our enrollment is lowish. The economy is taking its toll on the discretionary spending of people who like to sing madrigals so we have fewer participants than in years past. I have heard laments of this type from all sorts of retreat- and workshop-based activities over the past two years. As a result we have enough people for 4 groups -- and 6 of us to handle them. We decided to have a large group co-facilitated by El and Laura, other groups taken by Todd, Bill and Kristina -- ans I would act as floating extra facilitator, to work with break-out ensembles. KB dubbed me the Tonus Peregrinus (wandering tone) of the weekend. I am thinking of myself as the drive-by coach, spending half hours or hours with various constellations of participants but not responsible for their repertory choices. I am having fun, getting to work with a much wider range of the total enrollment than is usual when I am assigned to a single group.

Our caterer outdid himself with lunch -- he's big into roughage, but red bean chili and cabbage salad at the same meal?????? Excellent, but very stimulating.... I ran into Brattleboro for a brief shopping adventure after lunch and found a 2CD collection of Woody Allen routines at Turn It Up. Now I can share "I shot a moose" with my kids.

KB asked me for some Barbershop music for the guys in her group -- she knows I always bring some. But somehow this time I had left the Yale Songbook at home! So I phoned home and got C to scan 2 numbers and email me the pdfs. Truly the computer age is full of marvels!

The rest of the day ran smoothly, and suddenly it was almost 10pm: we had sung and worked on our singing since 9 in the morning. I was totally wiped out and could barely keep my eyes open for the short drive to the place where I am staying (an awesome house well up a hillside with a commanding view of snowy slopes and grey trees).

The Road North

2009-02-14T05:45:00.002-05:00

Yesterday was Friday the 13th and I went back to Brattleboro for my 9th Winter Wonderland Workshop with the Western Wind.

The start of the day was frantic, as a pre-workshop morning always is. Packing. Organizing a folder for the opening night concert. Two kids to get out of the house. And on top of it all we have contractors in the house doing work, including a new ceiling and walls for the upstairs bathroom. Yes I could take a shower, but in a stall that was walled with sheets of plastic since most of the tiles were gone. And those sheets lifted and swirled in the heat of the shower, embracing me in a rather unwelcome manner.

I did have time for one treat before I left the house. Cindy has been watching the BBC adaptation of War and Peace (20 episodes long) one episode at a time on her morning treadmill routine. And we have been discussing each episode afterwards. I have read the book many times and seen the BBC version twice. So this has been like a third course I am teaching this term, a seminar for one student covering one of my favorite topics. And I delight in helping her figure out what is going on, as in "what does Andrei REALLY want?"

Elliot and Todd arrived just after 9:30, as I was loading my stuff into the car. And off we went, on a beautiful day, east and north via the Hutch, the Merrit and 91N. No traffic, a totally easy drive. Elliot did a phone interview with a Brattleboro radio station by cellphone from the back seat at 11. And we got to Northampton before noon. I made my pilgrimage to Turn It Up for a few used CDs (Glinka chamber music, now THAT looks interesting: instrumental fantasies on themes from Anna Bolena and La Sonnambula). El and I ate lunch at Sylvester's. The Wasabi Tuna salad was as spicy as promised. And the tea was as good as ever. We met the others at Carla's house and retrieved our music library from her basement, and then resumed our trek to Vermont.

I think this may have been the earliest I have arrived for this workshop: 2pm. There was ample time to move tables and set up the boxes of sheet music. We rehearsed and heard some new participant auditions, and then I drove down the long hill to the Vermont deli for take-out dinner. The black bean and vegetable soup was even spicier than advertised. There was time, frankly too much time, to chill before singing the concert at 8:30.

The audience was great. We returned their energy. The length of the day showed up a few times in tiny moments of lapsed concentration. And we edited two numbers out near the end, one by request of the soloist (My Funny Valentine) and one by collective amnesia (we owe our workshop folk a Sh'boom sometime this weekend!). The program had been rather generous as it was.

The reception afterwards was my downfall, of course. I had been good and carb free all day, but the combination of exhaustion, post-performance euphoria, and a room full of people -- plus a plate of chocolate macaroons.... Today I atone!

Certainty

2009-01-29T07:46:00.002-05:00

I saw the movie version of Doubt yesterday. It was intensely moving, but more full of definite ideas than uncertainties.

The play -- and the movie -- had been billed as a cat and mouse game between the ferocious nun and the wily priest. I didn't see that story at all. Indeed the two of them seemed to agree on one huge issue, an issue neither of them could name. Sister Aloysius tormented herself and those around her with fear that the priest might do something, or have done something, ""evil." But what she really despised was not his actions but his intrinsic being -- and worse still his attempt to harness that being for good. Father Flynn was aware of his intrinsic being, and sought to channel it in the service of selfless love. But that fell short of total repression, and they both knew it. The crux of the drama came in the confrontation scene in the nun's office. The look on the priest's face as he realized that nothing he could ever do would make him less loathsome in her eyes revealed that he knew her eyes were the eyes of his God. And he loathed himself as completely as God and the nun did.

The unnamed horror is homosexuality. Father Flynn was gay. Sister Aloysius saw that, and saw that instead of effacing all traces of his homosexuality Father Flynn allowed it to flower as nurturing. I have no doubt that Father Flynn's relationship with Donald, the black boy whose "purity" Sister Aloysius seeks to defend (Sister Aloysius has a consistency problem here; she treats all the kids as depraved but romanticizes them as sexually innocent) did not include actual sex. From the viewpoint of church teaching the relationship was just as bad: Father Flynn was seeking to make Donald feel good about himself, in effect to give him permission to be gay. Not to act out his desires, just to acknowledge his nature. That would not be acceptible to Sister A, any more than it would to Pope Benedict. And here I find myself both pitying and angry with Father Flynn, though I do not blame him for living within the confines of his time and culture. He sought to stay in a church that invalidated his being, a church with a history of abuse and even murder foisted upon such as he. He knew of no other way than to make himself as acceptible to God as he could manage -- and show others how to do the same. Better than beating the boy, as Donald's father did, but far short of spiritual liberation. Alas for a world of fear and judgment!

Donald's mother is beautifully realized, a woman who loves her child and is willing to accept almost anything if it brings love and a measure of peace. I am not sure that she could have existed with that worldview in 1964, but it is nice to think that anyone could focus so clearly on love without judgment.

Sister Aloysius is an awesome creation, an almost perfect horror. Her tics and looks, her spying and lying -- she justifies her actions as stepping away from God in the greater service of good, just like Dick Cheney -- all project an aura of creepy grandeur, Catherine de' Medici as grade school principal. Indeed, I wonder if the doubt here might not be less about Father Flynn's likely gayness than about Sister Aloysius's so-deeply-repressed-that-it-cannot-even-surface-as-an-issue lesbianism. She is certainly a virago, a woman outraged by her powerlessness in a church run exclusively by men, who revenges herself by using covert action to achieve her goals. Even she has a humanizing (or at least justifying) moment: she tells novice Sister James to put up the picture of the Pope, and when Sister James objects that the photo is of the wrong Pope she says that it can be used as a mirror so that Sister James can see what the pupils are doing as she writes on the board. Simple and effective classroom management. Poor Sister James goes from innocent to outraged, caught between her belief in goodness, her obvious crush on Father Flynn, and her awe of Sister Aloysius. The confrontation of the two nuns at the end is unfortunately the weakest scene in the movie. Sister James lacks the force to bring Sister Aloysius to any sort of spiritual crisis, and Sister Aloysius has been too thoroughly encased in stone to crack as horrifically as she does. I could see her raging against Father Flynn's promotion but not yielding to her doubts.

Meryl Steep, our Lady of the Accents, has been taken to task in some reviews for the bizarre diapaison she employs in this role, but I am here to tell you that, as a friend and listener of several Bronx-born and -raised Italian Americans, she sounds utterly real.

Worth seeing.

Milk and the tidal wave of thoughts that followed

2009-01-12T07:29:00.003-05:00

I finally saw Milk last night. I haven't cried that way at a movie before, maybe ever. Harvey Milk was so uplifting, and what happened to him so hatefully wasteful. And yet he achieved so much, maybe as much as was his proportion of things to accomplish.

Sean Penn was astonishingly good. He suggested the accents of Woodmere without putting the dialect between himself and the audience. His tics and smiles, the intensity of his desire to connect, and his own fears which got in the way of his own relationships, all were vivid. The intermingling of authentic footage with recreation was seamless. One moment of musical editing was particularly unsettling -- the crosscut from the minor key ending of Tosca to the ringing of Dan White's phone, on the major third of the chord that had just concluded. One piece of video editing was just unsubtle enough to annoy me: Harvey said he wouldn't make it to 50 at the opening of the film, and there had already been a reference to that prophecy at his 48th birthday party, so bringing back the quote as he died seemed overkill. I would rather have seen a clip of him sharing that 40th birthday cake with his lover, which would have evoked the idea without hammering it in. But that is one quibble with a great film. Oh, one other: why a big fat girl as Tosca, when the actual Tosca that night was the ancient, overwhelming, but not enormous Magda Olivero? Surely a movie with "don't stereotype gays" content should avoid stereotyping fat opera ladies? (there is a moving recollection of the event by a member of the SFO Chorus at http://listserv.bccls.org/cgi-bin/wa?A2=OPERA-L;EwFSqg;20081205201451-0800A)

Harvey's final speech, the exhortation that any bullet entering his brain should blast down all the closet doors, reduced me to sobs. Juxtaposed with the reality of the bullets, and the proper emphasis on his face -- with Dan White reduced to faceless unimportance -- the effect is to release the words and give them the power they possess. Poor Dan White, repressed and twisted by his fascination and his fear, a Claggart to Harvey's Billy Budd. Twinkies or no, he was a monument to what happens when people live for the approval of others.

I was struck after the movie, by the similarities between the struggle for gay rights and the situation in the middle east. It seems to me that a Jewish state is based on the same premise as having a safe haven for gays in the Castro: it avoids dealing with the worldwide discrimination against some people based on other people's fears, whether in Tblisi or Topeka (cities chosen randomly, purely for purposes of alliteration!). I have always thought Theodore Herzl was wrong -- the promised land is Miami! But all joking aside, striving to make a world where all are safe to be themselves regardless of race, creed, color, gender, orientation or other "difference" would stab at the heart of human misery. Claiming acreage as "ours" only reverses the problem.

There is a larger fear at the back of repression and discrimination, a Darwinian fear. People want to see their genes survive. This is discussed at http://www.economist.com/science/displaystory.cfm?story_id=12795581 as a basis for seemingly self-destructive acts such as suicide bombing. In order for one's genes to go on into succeeding generations, one must compete with the bearers of other genes. Anything that hints at a genetic dead end sparks subliminal terror. And I guess for str8 people who want to make sure their children are str8 the idea that a homosexual agenda might interfere trumps all reasonable considerations. The out gay teacher who supports a teen as s/he comes out is not recruiting, but giving permission that the parents may dread. The teacher is not recruiting, or making the kid gay, but is only opening a path to the inevitable, natural state of that young person. Societal/parental repression cannot make the kid str8, but sure can make him/her miserable. Miserable but with grandkids might be preferable to some people. Educating people about overpopulation is unlikely to help -- most will only too glad to let somebody else's genes take a hit for the planet. How to progress beyond this point...?

With this the gist and sum of it
What earthly good can come of it?
-- Dorothy Parker

Good eats -- then not

2009-01-03T10:36:00.002-05:00

Yesterday was a good day for dieting: oatmeal with cinnamon for breakfast; omelet with soy sausage and onion for lunch; white bean soup and salad for dinner. Snacks of nuts. I felt good. Today I had a challenge that was truly unfair. After the oatmeal I had to bake a cake for my son's belated birthday party. I made the traditional organge layer cake, the one that Mother used to make for Daddy and me all throughout my childhood. I could not resist sampling the icing as I frosted the cake. Delicious, but instant headache. Ouch.

Still on the wagon

2009-01-01T15:01:00.000-05:00

Lunch:

Hummous on greens, and a dollop of guacamole
Coffee

Ich bin was ich es

2009-01-01T10:58:00.003-05:00

New Year's resolution: to put food in my body that doesn't harm it.

Breakfast: 1/2 cup oats dusted with cinnamon

So far so good.

I finally read up on my diabetes meds yesterday, and was appalled. Actos causes weight gain. That I had figured out. Januvia has a cancer risk profile. That I had no idea about! Byetta, which my doc has mentioned as an alternative, causes pancreatitis. I think I have to lose a lot of weight and stop needing pills, if possible. It does seem that type 2 diabetes can be reversed by diet. So this is my project for 2009. This is going to be hard, given my chaotic lifestyle. But the other choice might be ... two weeks in Philadelphia!

Bye, Fenno

2008-12-06T11:24:00.002-05:00

This photo was taken on the stage of Woolsey Hall at the 2004 Whiffenpoof reunion. We were rehearsing Fenno's arrangement of September Song. Fenno had just or was just about to shoot a look at me and make sure I blended properly!

He was truly an institution. Just not an institution I fit in with. I arrived at Yale at the point when the informal singing group world was parting company with the Glee Club world, and I threw my lot in with small groups. I sang with the Glee Club once, for the St John Passion junior year (I got the small solo role of the servant) and toured briefly with them the next winter when the Whiffenpoofs joined forces with the Glee Club for a mid-Atlantic states tour. This was, I believe, the last time the Whiffs toured with the Glee Club.

We didn't hit it off well. Too alike perhaps. And it took me years to figure out that I was a conductor and understand just what a fine model he was. We did have a good talk the last time I saw him, and he told me how much he loved the work that The Western Wind does.

I find myself quite emotional about his death.

The Bar Is Set High....

2008-11-30T13:17:00.001-05:00

I was sent this recently:

The Hidden Spirituality of Men

Real men work to save the planet, and like any prophet, take the attacks that standing up for a moral cause invariably brings.

Real men love the sky. They are curious and eager to learn about the new cosmology, and they share their excitement with others, especially the young.

Real men meditate. They are not afraid to look inside and see the vastness that is there.

Real men awaken their mammalian brain to remain connected to their compassion, rather than let the win/lose mentality of the reptilian brain take over.

Real men treat youth with respect. Real men sport a Fatherly Heart.

Real men love their bodies. They work to keep them healthy, honoring their temple with good food and cleansing exercise.

Real men enjoy sex and the delights of ravisher and ravishee.

Real men are not homophobic (or heterophobic). They acknowledge and respect the diversity of creation, which includes sexual diversity.

Real men seek to expand their consciousness. They get to know the Blue Man inside, increase their powers of imagination and creativity and exhibit compassion.

Real men listen to music and are unafraid to follow the inner journeys of joy and grief, celebration and community, surprise and elegance that it inspires.

Real men are warriors, not soldiers. They learn to battle (jihad) with oneself first to overcome the temptations of power for power’s sake, greed, power-over and power-under. They seek power-with (compassion)

Real men wage peace, not war. Real men know that peace is harder to wage than war, and that waging peace begins in one’s heart.

Real men enter war reluctantly, as a last resort.

Real men send young men to war reluctantly, as a last resort.

Real men practice solitude.

Real men are not afraid of the “dark night of the soul.” They do not run from it but know that darkness has important things to teach them.

Real men criticize institutions (including religious ones) that wage lies and wars that poison the true meaning of justice and religion.

Real men defend what they cherish , including space, children, grandchildren, Earth, and all her marvelous creatures.

Real men communicate with younger men and older men and thy listen as deeply as they teach.
Real men use all the brains God has given them—the intellectual and rational brain and the intuitive and mystical brain.

Real men remain curious and alive and are always learning, and they hunt for ways to heal and preserve what is good and beautiful.

Real men have inclusive families. They expand the Fatherly Heart to take in and welcome all people.

Real men are fathers to the young. They embrace their children and other children and they remember the “extended family” of tribal memory.

Real men, when they become elders, refire. They don’t retire. They join forces with the youngest generation.

Real men respect women. They respect the women in their lives and women’s movement’s fight for justice and gender equality for all women.

Real men befriend other men.

Real men do not shame themselves or other men about their masculinity.

Real men channel their aggression in ways that do not harm themselves or others.

Real men stand up to addictions that dictate to their soul, and they do the inner work necessary to detox inside.

Real me experience their emotions. They don’t run from their feelings.

Real men honor the passages of life with meaningful rituals.

Real men are generous, not hoarding.

(Author unknown, but probably a real man)

Xmas Meme

2008-11-30T07:35:00.001-05:00

Christmas Questions passed on by Dr Ted:

1. Wrapping paper or gift bags? paper
2. Real tree or Artificial? real
3. When do you put up the tree? Dec 23
4. When do you take the tree down? MLK day after our xmas party
5. Do you like eggnog? does eggnog soy milk count?
6. Favorite gift received as a child? the blue whale from my daddy
7. Hardest person to buy for? mother is dead
8. Easiest person to buy for? my sister
9. Do you have a nativity scene? no
10. Mail or email Christmas cards? annual holiday website
11. Worst Christmas gift you ever received? cannot recall
12. Favorite Christmas Movie? George C Scott Christmas Carol/Charlie Brown Xmas
13. When do you start shopping for Christmas? day before thanksgiving
14. Have you ever recycled a Christmas present? no
15. Favorite thing to eat at Christmas? Harry & David's Pears
16. Lights on the tree yes- small and white
17. Favorite Christmas song? Chesnuts roasting as played on the Charlie Brown album
18. Travel at Christmas or stay home? home
19. Can you name all of Santa's reindeer? that's what wikipedia is for
20. Angel on the tree top or a star? Reindeer
21. Open the presents Christmas Eve or morning? Christmas morning
22. Most annoying thing about this time of the year? that all the snow comes later
23. Favorite ornament, theme or color? a brass bell that was my grandmother's
24. Favorite for Christmas dinner? I can no longer eat my great grandmother's plum pudding sauce, a dairy nightmare. sigh.
25. What do you want for Christmas this year? a nap
26. Who is most likely to respond to this? not sure
27. Who is least likely to respond to this? also not sure

Gobble, gobble, snore!

2008-11-28T08:34:00.003-05:00

It was a really excellent Thanksgiving. We joined forces with friends. They made pies and I did the turkey. C made mushroom pate and cranberry sauce. L made cranberry salsa. I drove to their place and put the turkey in their oven, and then we all took a walk in the nearby nature preserve. J hated the horse poop, and I turned my bad ankle trying to avoid patches of mud. But it was beautiful, and there were huge swans on the lake. We drove home to make mushroom gravy and baked squash (since the other stove was at capacity) and then back to the other house where J and I made deviled eggs, half of which were spiked with wasabi. They were a triumph and got eaten up almost instantly. P and I went outside in the early dark and talked by his clay oven for a while, by a roaring fire of non-recyclable cardboard. Then dinner was ready and we sat down to be together. It was really nice, balm after years of dysfunctional family holidays.

Early Bird....NOT

2008-11-27T10:28:00.002-05:00

I left much of my shopping until the very last minute and rushed out this morning to brave the A&P. It was a cinch: nobody there, everything I needed in stock. So much for the early bird and the worm!

Dispatch from the Gig Wars

2008-11-17T10:22:00.002-05:00

A busy weekend. But now I am sitting at my laptop, with the Cantique de Jean Racine playing on Vermont Public Radio!

Friday was a full day of teaching followed by a frantic rush into the city for a Western Wind concert at the New York Historical Society. I had my suit in a bag in my studio -- when I finished giving lessons I changed, like Clark Kent dashing into a phone booth, and emerged from the room as ... Supertenor! The drive in was not too crowded and the parking gods were favorable. I arrived right on time and we rehearsed and tried to get a feel for the acoustic. Clear but unflattering. A good hall for art song, harder for blending. And the concert included moments of hair-raising uncertainty: EZL was right next to me, but his sound went out into the room and I could not hear him at all! The audience seemed to enjoy themselves. The concert was free, and packed. It is a joy singing for a New York audience: they give their energy! After the concert,and reception I met a friend for supper at Cafe con Leche on Amsterdam Ave. We had a very intense discussion, rather more than I was ready to deal with but a refreshing change from the business of normal life. It was unusual for me to drag myself out in the evening, and I was glad I did.

Saturday started with a morning of teaching (and an incredible downpour!). Then I drove into the city again to rehearse with Western Wind -- Xmas and Hanukah music, it starts! KB was sick and canceled. BZ was late due a medical issue as well. We are using a sub tenor for 2 gigs in December and spent the time rehearsing him in, falling over ourselves trying to remember all the little unnotated details. Truly our motto is ex simplicitas mishegas. (I know, that's not the ablative!) The third event of the day was the Creddorion concert, for which KB dragged herself out of her sickbed to conduct a solemnly gorgeous program. How I love the sound of her bass section, so lean and cello-like! The English music theme featured Sarum chant, Rota, Polyphony and suddenly 20th century music... the 200 year "lacuna" in great English composers includes some of my favorite stuff! That's for me to program.

Sunday morning I rehearsed my UU choir and then drove to a gig at New York Institute of Technology in Old Westbury, Long Island. I had been hired to do a G&S program with the Long Island String Quartet. CAR and I have been doing our G&S duet show for decades now. It features songs, duets and dialog from most of the operettas, sliced and diced with lightning segues from scene to scene. As we have aged one scene in particular has meaning for us:

Yum-Yum: You forget that in Japan girls do not arrive at years of discretion until they are fifty.
Nanki-Poo: True, from seventeen to forty-nine are considered years of indiscretion.

Which evolved over time to
Yum-Yum: You forget that in Japan girls do not arrive at years of discretion until they are fifty.
Josephine: You shall not wait long.

And by now has become
Yum-Yum: You forget that in Japan girls do not arrive at years of discretion until they are fifty.
Chorus: Too late, ha ha, too late!

CAR has been teaching first grade and her voice has taken a beating. And so this time, for the very first time, I did our show with another soprano. Fortunately LC was available. She knows the material cold and has the perfect voice and manner. So we were fine. The quartet, however, had an uphill battle. I sent them a piano vocal score and was under the impression that they were going to have someone turn it into string parts. But no. They played from the piano reduction, with resulting issues about page turns, and in the case of the violist, clefs. I did double duty, conducting and singing, a hard gig in any circumstance and particularly difficult in a program I knew so well from an acting standpoint: it hurt to drop mood and give upbeats! And I forgot more than once.... The hall was a lecture hall not a concert hall. Not as dead as it might have been, but no joy to sing in. But the audience was wonderful, very attentive and responsive.

I drove LC back into the city and went home, absolutely wiped out!

The Cantique de Jean Racine is long over -- and the waterproofing guys are drilling up my basement floor!

Thanks a Lott, Senator!

2008-11-08T08:21:00.002-05:00

I forgot the true highlight of Friday morning: the sunrise. Western Wind has been my ticket to stunning auroras across the country and this was another gift. Fuschia clouds over the eastern horizon. Thank you!

We were driven to the airport in a van with a driver from Nigeria. He had a lot of things to say, and a lively discussion of national attitudes ensued. It seems that when he first came to America he found himself in between apartments and a friend invited him to stay over -- but the landlady threw him out at midnight. She wasn't having a black man in her house!. That was 1988, and he feels that things have changed. He remarked that his country was different because there weren't any gay people like here. I pointed out that he didn't actually know that, he only knew there weren't obvious "out" gay people, and I explained to him that repressive societies can make gay men miserable but not straight. He had not thought about things this way before.

The flight to Atlanta was packed and uneventful. TF, BZ and I ate in the food court in Atlanta airport. Popeye's spicy chicken was quite tasty, if undoubtedly full of evil ingredients. The flight to LaGuardia was also packed -- and there was Senator Trent Lott, smiling as he boarded and sat down in his coach seat (lo, how the mighty...). I restrained myself from giving him a piece of my mind. Instead I wound up having a delightful conversation was a stewardess who was commuting from her home in Atlanta to her job, flying out of JFK. It turns out she loves to sing but feels she cannot and her kids make her shut up. I explained to her that (almost) nobody is tone-deaf and that she had to find her right range, where she could match pitch successfully. Maybe she will go find a place to sing. Or not.

We landed pretty much on time and TF and I drove into the city. I dropped him off and went to find a parking space. I ate dinner with my friend Will (http://designerblog.blogspot.com/) who was in town to see La Damnation de Faust at the Met. Then I drove home and collapsed!

All about Pie

2008-11-07T09:44:00.003-05:00

Thursday lunchtime. Same place where I had breakfast: Cordoba Family Restaurant. Pretty much the only game in town, aside from McD's and the Sub place. Met LC again, as at breakfast, but at a different table. The burger was very good. But the highlight of the meal was the pie. Blackberry pie. It seems that there is an old lady in town who does nothing but bake pies and sell them. The restaurant buys them, as do many of the locals. As somebody said, "I just can't understand how she's still single!"

Thursday afternoon we spent teaching at Baker University. Two high school choirs and a college vocal ensemble sang for us and we critiqued, clinic-ed, and otherwise inundated them with more input than they could possibly ever take in. The college choral director led his group in a series of Robert Shaw style warmups which they sang with astonishing precision. And TF pointed out one obvious but overlooked detail in an arrangement of "Be Thou My Vision": the piano part quoted "When I Fall in Love" -- why? And just moments later another chorus sang... "When I Fall in Love." Coincidence...?

We walked down to the Methodist Church and rehearsed. As usual, after an hour on my feet holding a music folder I began to suffer from the pangs of sciatica, and finished the rehearsal seated.

Dinner was served to us at the Three Sisters Inn. The house is a Victorian fantasy of busy wallpaper, paintings (how can I resist a place with an Alma-Tadema in the foyer?) and heavy wooden furniture. The meal was pleasant and relaxing. Then I took a few moments to xerox copies of one piece which we were short on and walked back to the church. The concert went well. Moderate size audience -- the competing events in town were the college drama society and the high school wrestling competition. But our audience hung rapurously on every chord -- it was delightful to watch them as we sang. The mold from the carpet infiltrated throats and lungs and we just made it to the end before the frogs began appearing.

Our hosts took us to their home for ... pie! Two more pies, lemon meringue and peach. Lard crusts. Utterly terrific. Schnapps and Limoncello too. I did not sample the Iowa Rye. It was a lovely little cast party. Then to bed and up early for breakfast at, yes, Cordobas. And a van to the airport.

Toto, I'm in Kansas!

2008-11-06T10:37:00.002-05:00

Yesterday was mostly a long travel day. But it started with a dress rehearsal: one of my students has a senior recital on Saturday, and we set her final run-through for Wednesday at 11am since I would be in Kansas all of Thursday and Friday. We had an audience, since one of the faculty brought her class in to watch. Things went well. I took advantage of the time we had to run one number twice, and fiddle with the positioning of the piano. My student has blossomed vocally this Fall, and it was a treat to hear her fill the hall with rich and solid sound.

The atmosphere on campus was electric. In particular the support staff, all hispanic, were elated. I did fist bumps with everybody and learned to say "Si se puede!"

I ran over to the faculty cafeteria and scarfed lunch, and then drove to LaGuardia Airport. My Western Wind colleagues were still on their election highs and mostly outfitted in Obama t-shirts. Even with the rain it was a truly beautiful day. Our first flight was to Atlanta. I sat in the emergency row and reaped my reward -- legroom (and an empty seat beside me)! The 757 had trouble with its transponder so there was no TV. I read a bit and dozed. Why I risked the takeout sushi in Atlanta airport I'll never know, but it was just about the worst thing I have ever eaten. The flight to Kansas City was packed like an anchovy tin, and, for the descent portion of the flight, quite bumpy. I am doing somewhat better with my flying phobia, but this was kinda hard. EZL and I got into a rental car and set off for Baldwin City. We bought food at a gas station. What I said about that sushi? The chicken salad sandwich was worse! Fritos, however, can be depended upon. An hour of high-stress driving in heavy rain later we got to The Lodge, our motel. And I fell into bed and to sleep.

This morning I awoke really early, still on Eastern time, and wandered over to the family restaurant next door to the motel. The food was a major improvement on yesterday's adventures... mediocre is GOOD. LC and I sat and talked. TF and BZ joined us. It is amazing how all moods seem lifted by the election. I walked to Baker University, where we are singing tonight, and found the library so I could get online. There is a stream emerging from a spring right outside the library, a lovely sight as it meanders across the campus. It is a glorious day, perfect autumn air. The trees are past their colors here but the sky is just fine. Downtown Baldwin City is pretty slim pickin's: a couple of gas stations, a burger take-out place and a Kwik-Mart (sorry, Apoo). But the college is handsome and I am looking forward to our work with the students this afternoon and our concert tonight.

Yes We Did

2008-11-05T08:27:00.002-05:00

A few thoughts....

Sarah Palin mocked Obama for being a community organizer. But that's how he got out the vote: his experience is what enabled him to win. I wonder if she is capable of learning anything from that.

As for the experience issue -- I saw a letter to the editor in my local paper recently in which the writer alleged that he would prefer to be operated on by an experienced doctor and not a fresh med school grad. That depends, doesn't it? I would rather have the fresh Harvard med school grad with all the most up-to-date technical savvy cut me open than some elderly doc with shaky hands. Metaphors are wonderful things, aren't they?

As for all the "pro-marriage" amendments that passed, well, I wonder if they can stand up to a legal test. The Bible is not the law of the land. And writing discrimination into state constitutions is a sad thing. I have this feeling that a lot of people "drew the line" in their voting booths by casting ballots for the better presidential candidate despite possible racial reservations and then asserting their conservative bona fides. Oh well. A big step has been taken...more will follow.

Yes, I Saw What I Saw...

2008-10-11T12:33:00.003-05:00

It was late and I was tossing in the lovely firm bed at the house where I am staying in Woodstock, VT. A cat lept onto the bed and nuzzled against my side. I put my arm around the cat and it nibbled at my hand. Then off it went. The whole thing was a blur.

In the morning I asked my hosts if they had a cat. Well, we used to, they said. She died. Was she grey? Yes, and they showed me a picture. Totally creepy -- I think I was visited by the ghost of their cat. And yet not creepy -- it didn't feel creepy at all while it was happening....

Back on Stage

2008-10-06T12:23:00.002-05:00

I had the rare treat of really acting on Sunday: being onstage with someone who gave and took. It was marvelous, and, perhaps unfortunately, rewhetted my appetite for being onstage.

The event was a concert of songs with texts by Joan Rudel. The music was written by two faculty members and one other composer. I only had one number, but it was part of a set, a confrontation between Adam and Eve, post-Eden (and waaaaaaaaaaay updated). So we staged it, with me sulking on a stool while Eve grilled me for my drinking and smoking and not listening and then rising to push back with my complaints about her selfishness. It was painful, and thrilling. I don't get to be that open and vulnerable very often, and onstage is the best place to open up like that (I don't want to think about the implications of that, other than knowing that my home is the stage!).

I'm shocked, that's what I am, shocked!

2008-09-17T20:24:00.000-05:00

Church organist fired for being gay!

http://www.wkowtv.com/Global/story.asp?S=9016431&nav=menu1362_2

September Songs

2008-09-11T19:40:00.002-05:00

I wrote this 7 years ago....

September Songs

September 29, 2001. Today was a brilliant early Autumn day, as bright and crisp as I could ever desire. I drove down to Penn Yan, a town on the west side of Seneca Lake, whose downtown was an unchanged image of the 1890s. I walked around, visited the two used book stores, and drove back north along the lake. I stopped at a "fruit outlet", the clever name for an orchard’s store, and bought sweet golden apples. Then I returned to the motel where I am staying during this brief production of The Magic Flute at the Smith Opera House in Geneva, NY. There was nothing to remind me that this September is different, nothing but the new unease of my heart and of course the wall-to-wall TV coverage which leaps at me as soon as I turn the set on.

The last evening of carefree America was September 10th. I had a rehearsal with The Western Wind Vocal Ensemble that afternoon and then rushed (with two colleagues from the Western Wind gig, Kristina and Eric) to Sutton Place Synagogue for a rehearsal with my High Holy Day choir. The bus across 86th Street and the #6 train down Lexington Avenue got me there with time for a bite to eat. Rehearsal was stressful, because the music is so intricately dependant upon the musical mood of the Cantor, and my job is to steer the choir after him, no matter what beats he skips or adds. I love conducting, but sometimes the fact that my position is that of follower, not leader, gets to me a bit. And that evening the Cantor decided to cut a piece of music I like and replace with a different version of the same prayer, with music I care for a great deal less. I conceded the point, but it didn’t help my mood. I went home annoyed, and slept. Bad rehearsals there have a way of being followed by pleasurable ones, so Wednesday evening was bound to make up for things.

On Tuesday morning the 11th, Cynthia (my wife) decided to try out the new local gym. So when I had gotten both kids to school I had the house to myself, a rare treat. I went into the kitchen to make a leisurely breakfast, tapped the radio’s on button, and hoped to hear the end of Morning Edition while I cooked. But WNYC was only static. I was confused, but found music on WQXR and set about grating a potato. For all I know they had a news break while I made an omelet, I wasn’t paying too much attention to the radio. I took my breakfast and the New York Times to the dining room and settled down for a while. After the meal, the paper, and the tea, I went upstairs and logged on to AOL. And there I saw what was going on. Just as when Princess Diana died, I saw it on the web and then went right to the TV. No NBC, no PBS, no CBS -- it wasn’t just WNYC radio that=2 0was reduced to static that morning. I found the BBC on Long Island Public TV and sat on the sofa watching Rome burn for 20 minutes or so. Steve Vasta called. He had heard something was going on, but having no TV needed information. I sat for a while watching, sharing with him over the phone. When Cindy came home she was she was crying and shaking. And as she joined me on the couch, we both saw the buildings come down, one at a time. My response was cold, shocked; hers was warm and hysterical. I did not believe that the whole tower was falling, I was sure that the upper floors had crumbled leaving 60 floors upright below. I just couldn’t accept a total structural catastrophe. By the time the second tower fell, I knew what was going to happen as it started to go.

I had several events scheduled for the day: teaching at Brooklyn Queens Conservatory in Flushing from 2:00 to 4:30, a Magic Flute rehearsal at 5:30 on the Upper West Side, and the first meeting for the Fall of my little chamber choir, Jubal’s Lyre. I called Brooklyn Queens, knowing that the bridges were all closed, and before I could tell Gloria that I couldn’t get there, she said not to worry, nobody is expected to teach today. By contrast, the Magic Flute people told me that the show must go on! It was going to have to go on without me, since there was no way for me to enter Manhattan, either by car or by train. I figured that nobody would show up for Jubal's Lyre, and didn’t worry about it.

The hardest thing about the day was the terror that other things could be happening anywhere. There were reports of planes unaccounted for, car bombs, who knows what else. Cindy and I discussed getting the kids home from school, but after calling both places decided that the children were fine where they were, and indeed that they should enjoy a few more hours of insulation from all the horror. So we sat on the sofa until almost 3:00 and then went to get Maddie at Pennington. [Did we then get Arlene followed by Julian?] We turned the TV off and told Arlene that the children were to see videos only, and went off by ourselves for a bit. We eventually settled into a news-gathering routine of checking things on the web or turning on the TV news after the kids were asleep.

We decided that we needed to eat out, where there were other people. So we picked up my Mother in front of her apartment building and went to the Athena in Fleetwood. We had to balance our need to talk about the disaster with Mother and our need to shield our children from too much knowledge. Maddie was starting to realize that something big had happened. But Julian was blissfully ignorant. Much of our talk centered on the fear of losing our civil liberties as part of a terror response. We could not even contemplate the possibility of another attack. Afte r we got home I called each of my choir singers to make sure they were OK. Jessica Marsten saw the whole disaster from the Queensborough Bridge, and was extremely upset, though alright. Phone calls and e-mails: "just checking to see if you’re alright" became a full time occupation. My group of Yale Whiffenpoofs all checked in on the New York and Washington residents, and it turned out that Jeff Knishkowy and his wife Patti had become the parents of Aaron Max that day.

How different Wednesday was. Cindy was supposed to go to Staten Island to teach a computer course at the SoftWise Office. But there didn’t seem to be a way to get there. She managed to arrange to teach by phone hookup. Rehearsal by phone was not an option, so I decided to face the city. MetroNorth had announced the return of (limited) train service, so I allowed a lot of extra time and set out for Manhattan. The train wasn’t as late as it might have been. I got off at 125th Street and went to the downtown subway, which was also not so bad. Then I caught the 86th Street crosstown bus, which detoured up Madison and across Central Park at 96th, since the 86th Street Transverse was closed, who knew why. I had time for lunch, and was lucky to have cash, since I discovered that nobody could take credit cards and all the ATMs were down. I ate at Ollie’s and still had time before my voice lesson. I walked to Starbucks, thinking to buy20a cup of tea, but all the Starbucks were closed. I wound up at a local coffee shop on Amsterdam Avenue, where I drank my tea while staring at a TV. They were raiding the Copley Plaza Hotel in Boston. I went to my lesson, where Conrad and I discussed the mess briefly and then set out to block it out with singing. We pretty much succeeded. Next was Western Wind rehearsal. Everybody was subdued, and many people were late, due to various transportation problems. First we cut one number from our program -- we were rehearsing for a concert of Jewish High Holy Day music to be narrated by Leonard Nimoy on the following Sunday. Nimoy was already in town, so there was no danger of his not making it. But we felt the Shehecheyanu prayer, a thanksgiving for making it to "this day", would be disrespectful to those who had not made it, and the jolly music setting was in unspeakably poor taste. Then we worked. Three hours later we adjourned, and I set out for Sutton Place again, with Kristina and Eric. This trip was rather different. The bus went across the park at 86th, which was now open, who knew why, and we transferred to the subway at Lexington Avenue. But the train we got on promptly went out of service, and we waited a long time for another. I took the express to 59th and walked the rest of the way. I called ahead and asked that the other choir members be warned that I would be late. No one could concentrate. We started 25 minutes late, worked for an hour and ten minutes,=2 0and then I sent everybody home. I walked to Grand Central, not even worried about whether the train would be on time, got on a train and went home.

Thursday was another day of coping with getting around Manhattan. Everything was easier, but nothing could be done without forethought. I saw my therapist, who wanted to know if I had cried yet (no), my voice teacher, and went to Western Wind rehearsal. Then I went downtown to Union Square and saw the holistic health counselor I have started working with. She reassured me that all her clients had reverted to comfort eating! I walked past Union Square and went to the Virgin Megastore and shopped for opera DVDs -- I bought the Berlin Huguenots production with Richard Leech. And then headed for Grand Central and home.

Friday was the dress rehearsal for the Western Wind concert. One of our Cantorial soloists had canceled, fearing that he would be able to fly in for a Sunday concert and then get back to Chicago in time for the start of Rosh Hashana on Monday evening. So we reassigned two of his numbers and cut the other two. Leonard Nimoy attended the rehearsal. He was quiet and professional, working through his narration and getting his cues. We were all even more careful than usual not to make any Star Trek jokes. Since the program included three items from the Yizkor (Memorial) Service, we decided to expand one to more fully cover the immense tragedy. The El mole prayer is often expanded to include a section about the victims of the Holocaust, so Rabbi Skolnik, who wrote the narration for our program, added a section in Hebrew about those who died in fire for our country. Our job: to sing it without losing it!

I went home and my student Jeanne came by. She didn’t want a lesson, just a cup of tea and some company. She had been a public figure in her own right earlier in the week. She was the spokesperson for the teachers’ union at three local Catholic schools where a strike was called, unfortunately on the morning of Tuesday the 11th. As soon as the disaster began, the teachers called off the strike, figuring that the students needed them. And Jeanne got quoted in the local paper. We made tea, as we always do anyway, and talked. She has a friend who is in such denial that cannot discuss the events of the week at all. Jeanne stayed to dinner and then joined us as we lit candles, along with our neighbors, at 7:00 p.m. Then I left for my regular Friday night gig at Temple Israel New Rochelle.

We had music to rehearse, but mostly we wanted to talk before the service. When the topic of how our leaders responded came up, I confessed how impressed I was with Giuliani and how disgusted but not surprised I was with the vanishing President. The sub alto got furious with me20and went off in a huff. Chris Mooney, the baritone, remarked, what is HER problem? The service went well and the Rabbi was comforting.

Saturday the 15th I was scheduled to sing a ballad concert at the Merry All Center for the Arts in New Milford, CT. I called ahead to see if they still wanted me to show up. They did, but were concerned, as I was, that the program might seem inappropriate. So I suggested that I could put together something topical, and maybe add a sing along at the end. In the morning I assembled a crazy program: an adventure in rage, grief, consolation and hope modeled loosely on Elisabeth Kubler-Ross’s "On Death and Dying." Then I went into the city to rehearse for the Magic Flute, picked up Steve Vasta (my accompanist) on my way back north, and stopped to fetch the babysitter, since Cindy was coming with us. Cindy had been longing for a cathartic musical experience, and was hoping that my recital might help her deal with her feelings.

We drove to Connecticut and stopped for dinner at a Boston Market on Route 7. Then we found our way through the trees and winding lanes to Merry All. It is a quaint little building in a quaint locale, but it is not winterized, and reeks of damp and mildew. A decent sized audience showed up and I started to sing. I launched into Sound an Alarm, from Judas Maccabeus, and then told the audience that they=2 0were right to notice that I wasn’t singing A Wand’ring Minstrel I, which was listed in the program, and explained what I was doing. Some of them had come for escapism, and were skeptical, but soon everybody was with me, as I sang and explained each number. The only problem was the mildew -- and probably mold -- which poisoned me more with each intake of breath. My high range dried out and departed, leaving me to survive on cleverness and some rearranging of the program as went along. I sang Avenging and Bright, a bloodthirsty Irish song of vengeance, and Ah, la paterna mano (rage over the slaughter of loved ones) and In Flanders Fields. I switched moods and did some ballads of love and loss (I hear you calling me) and of acceptance (Grieg’s The Last Spring) before leading into inspirational songs. As I started The Holy City I realized I no longer had a non-cracking high A flat, but I saw that many of my listeners knew the song, so I motioned them to sing along -- and each time we got to a high note they sang it for me! I led a sing along of Battle Hymn of the Republic and America the Beautiful, and stopped, relieved, while I could still speak!

I woke up on Sunday with no voice at all, but had to get one somehow, since the big Western Wind concert was at 3:00 p.m. I drank plenty of hot fluids and took lots of vitamin C, and went to the Unitarian Church in Hastings with my family. The pla ce was packed, and the mood was a mix of sombre and bewildered. At the place in the service where candles are lit for memory or hope, a girl got up and said simply, "Tuesday was my birthday..." We all sighed for her. Her parents got her a cake by Saturday. The minister preached tolerance, saying that we should no more blame all Eastern-looking people than we should blame people with blue eyes. Maddie reared back in her seat and covered her (blue) eyes in horror that anyone could think of blaming her for anything, and I explained to her that that was exactly the point.

We went home, left the kids with a baby sitter, and drove into the city. Cindy got roped into helping set up the reception while I did some frantic last-minute rehearsing with the group and our guest conductor, Mati Lazar. I had not had time to eat, so Cindy sent me a care package backstage: vegetable fried rice and hot & sour soup, just what I love when my sinuses are giving me trouble. The concert went well. We had a large audience. The intensity of the music, the words, and the situation locked us all together. When Nimoy got to the place where he read the text of El mole, with its added section, he developed a lump in his throat. Slowly he lost it and so did the audience. Todd Frizzell stood by me onstage with tears running down the edge of his eye glasses. We sang. And we sighed. And we went on. The reception was modest -- Bill Zukof had decided to take the money we would have spent on fancy food and drink and donate it to the Red Cross instead. A bunch of us went out to an Italian restaurant on West 72nd Street for dinner. Kristina and Gayla argued the opposite sides of patriotism and imperialism. When we got home we discovered that my Mother had freaked out and called many times wondering where we were: she was afraid because we were in the city.

The Gift That Keeps on Giving

2008-09-08T09:00:00.002-05:00

The phone rang yesterday morning. The name on caller ID was that of an old friend of my Mother's. And my heart sank as I picked up and heard him say he had just found out that Mother had died -- well over a year ago! How had I missed him, in all the morass of Mother's address books? She had so many friends. I felt guilty and apologized profusely. He was not upset in the least and accepted that people get left out unintentionally. Are there more out there?

Such a Deal!

2008-09-02T07:18:00.004-05:00

Of course, I charged in and asked, "How much for the cat?"

They told me I couldn't afford it. And as it turns out they have already sold the store -- and the cat is really included.

http://www.boswellsbooks.com/

And here is Boswell!

Correspondences

2008-08-27T13:31:00.002-05:00

With severely inadequate apologies to M. Baudelaire....

This morning M had her wisdom teeth out and C took a college math equivalency exam. Who suffered more? C, because she had no anesthesia.

M had anesthesia while J played with his gameboy. Who was less aware of the passage of time? Neither!

M has swollen cheeks and awoke from her drugged slumber in floods of tears. The nurse said all the girls do that. For once M did not bridle at the sexism of the suggestion... she said, well, that's biology! I made her a mango and vanilla yogurt shake with ginger ale. It is helping.

C passed her test -- now she can get her NYS teacher accreditation.

A big day.

Why Are They Here?

2008-08-18T16:29:00.002-05:00

Provincetown. Sin City. Party boyz, muscles bulging. Bears with nipple rings. Smiling dykes holding hands. Them I understand. But the gawkers?

I have seen an amazing array of tourists here. Swarms of Russians (and that includes tourists: most of the waitstaff are Slavs!). Families with strollers. Gaggles of ladies with Christian slogans embroidered on their sweaters (in August?). And even some orthodox Jews, frum in black. Do they come to dip their toes in the swamp of Sodom and say they got out intact? Do they even disapprove, or are they opening their hearts to the humanity of the gay community? What an odd convergence.

Ouch!

2008-08-15T18:05:00.003-05:00

Massage. It sounds so friendly. And I had been told about a wonderful massage therapist in P-Town. So I went.

Massage. It touches you where the accumulated tensions reside. And I think you may have heard my groans as far away as the mainland. The masseur was strong and merciless. He was there to help me no matter how much it hurt. I think he may have detached the muscles from my ribcage.

And he laughed. It was not unkind laughter, but it stung anyway. He laughed as he told me, over and over, to "let go." And I couldn't. He would leave my leg up and wait for it to fall, tapping it to prompt me to let it go. But an entire childhood of being a good boy had taught my body to "stay" instead of to "be." And that really hurt. He got some satisfying results from my legs and lower back, but was confounded by my shoulders.

"Why are you wearing your shoulders as earrings?" he wondered.
(pause)
"Because I'm a cheap bastard!"
"Not a bad comeback."
"Yeah, but it took me awhile!"

As our hour ended he gave me advice about continuing the quest for letting the tension, the rage, the sorrow and hurt to flow freely from my body. 50 years worth. I have work to do.

A Tempest in a Tent

2008-08-14T21:29:00.002-05:00

I attended Shakespeare's The Tempest at "Shakespeare on the Cape" in a tent in Truro this evening. I was delighted to find that the production was clever and witty. Nine actors doubled their way through a text that had been heavily but skilfully edited. And there was gender-bending galore. Prospero was played somewhat in the manner of Delta Burke, bring a warm, benign camp aspect to a role I last saw performed by the ever-so-uncampy Patrick Stewart. Ariel was marvelous, fey but potent. Caliban had more than a whiff of Gollum about him. The company became the shipwreck in a well-choreographed opening scene, and sang and danced their way through many of the spirit-laden events of the play.

I may have to go see their School for Wives next week!

Unvibrating Elgar

2008-08-14T13:01:00.001-05:00

This reminds me of Danny Pinkham's remark that the more out of tune early music is the more authentic it sounds :)

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/13/arts/music/13vibr.html

I never thought of Elgar as early music...

The Physique du Role....

2008-08-14T09:54:00.001-05:00

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/14/opinion/14collins.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

Now here is a case of vocal casting for looks to the ultimate degree....

South Terrific

2008-08-08T18:49:00.002-05:00

Well, that's what Mother always called it.

I saw the new production at the Beaumont on Wednesday night. I love theater in the 3/4 round! All the options for naturalistic interaction between the actors and interesting stage pictures. Even the proscenium-style production numbers (Nothing like a Dame, Honey-Bun) gained from the angles at which they could be viewed.

The orchestra was the first star -- playing muffled under the stage and then revealed by the withdrawal of the front portion. The sound of the 30 players rose to fill the house. But when they were covered the microphone and speakers sound quality was less satisfactory. The actors were miked quite well -- there was a sense of where the voices were coming from.

The kids were cute and Henry (Henri) bustled like a south sea Eric Blore, making the most of his drily humorous scenes (la JEEP de mam'selle est ici!). Emile de Becque was simply marvelous, vibrant of voice and alive to every nuance of his role. Nellie was quite good, although some of her lines got lost, spoken so quickly (and her petite voice needed more miking during some of the dialogue scenes). Bloody Mary acted very well, but I found her pop style somewhat at odds with the more legit contralto lines of Bali Hai. Lt Cable -- what a dreadful role, so badly written! -- did what he coud to be manly and macho...from Philadelphia! I grew up there, with all the landed gentry of the Main Line. That character was stiffer than anybody I can recall. He looked OK with his shirt off but sounded overwhelmed by his high Gs. Luther Billis was the life of the show, but the would-be smooth operator/wise guy line of comedy seemed dated. His rage with various men alternating with obsequiousness for Nellie sparked a thought, doubtless far from Oscar Hammerstein's mind, that Billis might be gay. So closeted that he could never come out. I felt sorry for him.

The busy-ness of the staging paid off marvelously near the end. At the moment when Nellie wanders the beach wishing for Emile's safe return the stage was bare, for the first time, just as her mind cleared itself of all the meaningless baggage that got in her way. How much more effective that moment would be if her reprise of Some enchanted evening weren't the 14th time we heard the tune. Reprises are to musicals what cabalettas were to primo ottocento operas. A custom, comforting in their formulaic regularity and predictability. I wish there were more music in South Pacific: fresh songs for the changing moods of the later scenes instead of the semaphoric repeats of tunes designed to manipulate our reactions. Oh well, it is still a moving and effective show. Michener's words, projected onto a drop curtain at the beginning and end, made an excellent frame.

Footnote: Mother saw the original production, and loved to tell of seeing Ezio Pinza in a restaurant eating dinner alone and instructing the waitress, in his thick Italian accent, "no garrrrlic in the saLAd, I moost keess Meess Marrrteeen tonight!"

Madeleine the Music Critic

2008-08-07T14:11:00.001-05:00

On hearing Lotte Lenya...

"She sounds like a German sheep!"

Shorn

2008-08-07T13:00:00.000-05:00

Look Ma, no hair!

Expensive Free Parking

2008-07-24T07:21:00.003-05:00

I am not sure what hurts more, the sense of violation, the sense of my child being hurt, or the inability to remember what got stolen....

I parked on the bridge over 125th Street yesterday morning, my usual way of dealing with Manhattan parking on Wednesdays. I took the subway south and went about my day (shrink, used CD store, rehearsal, voice lesson, dinner with a friend) and went back to get the car at 8pm. Broad daylight. I didn't feel like it was a dangerous place in the light. I was wrong. As I approached the car I suddenly had the sickening feeling that there was no longer a window on the right side. It had been smashed, the glove box rifled (nothing there), some CDs taken -- and I cannot even remember which ones were in the car! -- and, worst of all, DS's art backpack was gone from the back seat. I called 911 and waited for the cops. They were matter-of-fact and not at all sympathetic. They filled out the forms and left, in search of doughnuts, no doubt. And I drove home with the wind rushing around me.

When DS learned that his stuff had been taken he was beside himself. He is quite young, far too young to be learning about burglary first hand. It took a while to calm him, first with accounts of crimes past (Mother having her purse rifled at the A&P -- and boy were they even unhelpful -- and the in-laws having their car stolen) and then were ever-increasing fantasies of tortures to be inflicted on the morons who committed the crime.

I did not sleep well. And of course it rained, so the car interior is soaked. It is at the dealership now, being attended to.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRGH.

Millburn, We've Got a Problem

2008-07-22T07:41:00.002-05:00

I made one of my period pilgrimages to Pennsylvania over the past two days. Filial piety and fraternal duty combined in a voyage to visit my parents' graves in St. David's Cemetery and have lunch with my autistic sister in Morgantown, where she is taken care of.

I had wanted to make the journey in May, the height of the azalea season, when southeastern PA is at its most spectacular, but the deep greens of July were treat enough. I took the DD and the DS with me Sunday afternoon and we listened to the revival cast albums of Man of la Mancha and Guys and Dolls as we crossed New Jersey. We stopped in Princeton for a snack at a coffee shop and a bag of goodies from the Princeton Record Exchange: chamber music, broadway music, and Steven Wright, who connected instantly with DD's funny bone.

My parents are buried in a single grave with a single headstone. Someone -- I think I know who -- has planted flowers. I am grateful for the care which Mother's friends take of her. But it is different. I used to come visit my father and talk to him. Now that they are there together it feels silent and empty and I say nothing. The tree near the grave was felled by lightning years ago but the stump was only removed recently. That feels different too. It is as if they had never lived. Silent and empty.

We drove to West Chester and checked into the Microtel (they have window seats and I have a mania) and then went out for dinner at a Mexican restaurant at Painter's corner. It was quite OK. Back to the hotel and into bed with the A/C on full blast, since it was hot and humid.

By morning the A/C had chilled the room to "Hudson Bay late January" and we were all shivering. We went out to breakfast at Hank's Place, the center of Wyeth country. I had scrapple. DS ordered the Belgian Waffle with two fruit toppings: it took all three of us to finish it off. We packed and left the hotel, paid a visit to Baldwin's Book Barn (no cats, one dog -- maybe new owners?) and set off over the countryside for Morgantown. Yes there were horse and buggy sets on the roads. We met my sister and her caregiver at the Windmill Restaurant (the windmill looks like it needs electricity rather than wind) and enjoyed the "hearty" cuisine of the Amish country. Meat, potatos, pie. My sister has been put on meds for her sleep issues, and the unfortunate side effect is dramatic weight gain. Suddenly she looks old, and she walks with a slight tilt to the front just like Mother did. Scary.

We drove north and then east to catch route 78 into New Jersey, bound for a visit to my friend LC and a playdate with her kids. Usually I am rock solid with directions. But somehow I got screwed up and we wound up on the cellphone with LC (DD acting as shotgun and interpreter) who read a map and guided us to her house. It was a long drama full of turns missed due to NJ's lousy street signage. But we got there and I wasn't even shrieking. Dinner was lovely and the kids had a great time. I found my way home in a much more linear fashion!

And Slow Down!

2008-07-19T12:17:00.002-05:00

I started a new med this week. Gabapentin is prescribed for epilepsy but off-label for anxiety and insomnia. Insomnia is one problem I do NOT have: I am the connoisseur of naps and the king of going to bed early. But anxiety, that's another issue. And maintaining concentration, especially while attempting to do stuff on my own (not rehearsals or lessons or anything I do with the energy of other people in the room), is something I really feel ebbing away. So I added this new medical wonder to my daily stew (I finally bought a pill minder; now THAT is a sign of aging!). Today, day 4, I feel as if I have been run over by a padded truck. I slept like a stone after breakfast. Fortunately today I have nothing, nada, zip, and can devote myself to getting used to the drug. I am told the drowsiness gets less oppressive. I hope so. It is working: I am not anxious, but I am also barely conscious!

Speed Up!

2008-07-16T10:55:00.002-05:00

I sang in the Hamptons on Sunday and in the Catskills Monday. The contrast was dire! Pastel shirts gave way to earth tones. And Bach to Sholom Secunda.

Sunday's concerts, two times through the program (4pm and 7:30) played to capacity crowds. The church is not really big but it was mighty full. The audience loved the music. It was very gratifying. There were little mishaps but overall it went as well as could be expected. Mahler's Resurrection Chorale, in a reduced orchestration, was overwhelming. The second go-round bore a few traces of post-dinner carb slump. And what carbs they were -- an excellent meal at the Pie Cove, a fancy pizza and Italian food place across the street. I had a cheese-free pie with sausage, olives and broccoli rabe. Very nice.

After the concert I fled -- I had the drive home and an early departure the next day. Getting out of the Hamptons was a traffic nightmare but the LIE was fine. I got home, slept, repacked and got on my way before 9am. I picked up KB, TF and BZ at the 242nd Street stop of the #1 train and drove up the Taconic, over Rte 84 and up the Thru-way to New Paltz and then slalommed through the mountains to the Hudson Valley resort and Spa for our gig at the Jewish Choral Festival. The hotel looks as though, pace Senator Gramm, there is a recession on. The food was worse than last year and the rooms frowsier. Luke-warm falafel, ugh. Yes, Senator Gramm, I am a nation of whiners! We did a brief workshop. My group was the beginners, and I had a lovely time with them. I taught by rote and we learned the first half of EZL's Dodi li. Then we rehearsed for our concert -- in the dining room, with sounds of conflicting choral singing drifting in from the next room. We moved to the theater for our sound check and held a long-overdue business meeting in the hallway.

The concert went extremely well. The miking was good and made up for the deadness of the room. Then we sold CDs -- it was the "release party" for our newest Judaeica CD. We were mobbed; it was like we were Elvis. I was handing out records as though they were Mrs Lovett's Meat Pies ("more hot pies, bless my eyes, fresh supplies!"). When we were done I snagged a glass of wine and crashed.

Tuesday morning the hotel was like a desert island, silent and abandoned. Slowly a few people drifted into the lobby and the dining room opened for breakfast. I lay around for a while afterwards until it was time for us to depart. Then disaster struck: LC's car was dead. After a flurry of phone calls (and my cell was the only one with good reception) we left her to wait for the tow truck and went to the brunch we had been invited to by a workshop friend of the group, who has a lovely house in the vicinity of New Platz. Lovely doesn't begin to do it justice, it is a paradise amid the fields with a commanding view of the mountains and a magnificent organic garden. We were served whole grain waffles with intense raspberry syrup, blueberries and strawberries. Laden with produce from the garden we set out for the return trek to NYC. And we finally actually listened to our new CD together. And were pleased.

P.S. LC's battery was dead: her E-Z Pass had fallen onto the hazard light switch and lain there all night. They jumped the car and she got home OK. We owe her some waffles....

Slowdown

2008-07-13T12:34:00.002-05:00

I have been staying where there's no internet, and really nothing to do but lie on the chaise. I have snuck off to the local library to write this!

I drove to Bridgehampton yesterday morning. An hour on the LIE, and an hour to get through Water Mill. Traffic worse than Cape Cod! But it is truly beautiful out here, and the weather has been most cooperative. We rehearsed in the Presbyterian Church all afternoon. It is a lovely place to sing, though maybe not really a big enough room for a Mahler Symphony! I would like to come back and sing a recital here. I did my solos in the Bach Cantata, and pitched in on the chorus parts as well, in the Bach and in the Brahms Alto Rhapsody and the final movement of Mahler 2. Then I was led to the house where I stayed last night. It has no wireless and no DSL -- just books and a patio. It was good for me. We went to another home for a cookout in the evening, and sat by the pool hurling a ball in so the excitable terrier could keep playing. Then we went back to our place and I slept on a good hard bed.

This morning I woke early and sat and read for a while. Then I drove to the local Unitarian Society, where I met a number of the chorus singers from the gig I am doing, and heard a speech by the man who runs the UU mission to the UN. He is gay and very out and politically active. Now I am enjoying some quite time in the library -- and am due at rehearsal at 2 for our concerts today: 2 performances, one at 4 and one at 7:30, with a lecture about Mahler in between. Then I hope in the car and go home, only to pack and leave for another gig by 9am tomorrow!

How the Other Half Rehearses

2008-07-10T13:42:00.002-05:00

Yesterday I had a busy day of trekking around NYC. First I parked -- always a challenge -- and then took the #1 downtown. I stopped at Academy Used CDs and bought Porgy and Bess (Simon Rattle/EMI) and How to Succeed (the revival cast, with Matthew Broderick). Then to my shrink. Then uptown on the #4 to a rehearsal for this weekend's gig with Choral Society of the Hamptons. I am singing the Evangelist in Bach's Ascension Oratorio, aka Cantata 11. Rehearsal was held in a 5th Avenue apartment with a view across Central Park. There was what I am almost sure was a real Magritte on the wall... people don't own paintings like that, museums do! So that's how the other half lives. I walked across the park in the hot sun and hung out at the Western Wind office for a while. Then I ate early supper at EJ's: Granny Smith's Chicken Salad (chopped apple, grilled chicken, raisins, romaine, tomatos, hold the cheese). I saw my voice teacher (on the same day as my shrink, yes, it's redundant) and then taught two lessons at Kaufman Center. I probably scared the bejesus out of my first student. It was a first lesson and I hit her with every concept known to vocal art. I must stop thinking I have to give people their money's worth; it overloads their concentration.

Another Workshop Done

2008-07-05T21:27:00.002-05:00

The last two days of the singing workshop were a blur. Many rehearsal hours, much music. My group accomplished a lot. I spent a lot of energy on clear vowels and blended sound, and we made some progress in that department. There were pieces that started out well and regressed in tonal quality as they went along, but still.... We worked all week on a huge and complicated arrangement of Motherless Child. The group hated it on Tuesday but I stuck with it and they loved it by today. It hurt to work on it, now that I qualify. Brahms' Im Herbst was another treat this week. Very hard to tune the chords. We ended our set at the concert today with The Parting Glass, a Clancy Brothers number. Our resident fiddler RE played the tune as an intro to the choral arrangement: it was the most magical moment of the week.

I had a fair amount of company today: a lunchtime visit from DC and a dinnertime visit from VS. DC and I had Mexican food, or rather, we went to a Mexican restaurant and I ate the Thai chicken wrap! (Too sweet). VS arrived after the workshop was done, in time for a group outing to the local Indian restaurant. It was a lamb free-for-all. I had ground lamb and he ordered the lamb special in some sort of dark spicy sauce.

Now almost everybody is gone. A few of us have stayed to pack up and clean in the morning. The dorm is quiet. I have had some time to enjoy the curved window seat at the end of the hallway, an excellent place to sit with my legs extended and watch the weather.

Dark

2008-07-03T21:24:00.002-05:00

FG sang a lovely Dowland song this afternoon, all about wanting to be in the dark. Be careful what you sing about... the lights went out at 5:08! We had another heavy downpour, and this time the storm knocked out the power, for about 2 hours. I was giving a private voice lesson when darkness struck. But there was light from the window, and we kept working. Dinner at the dining hall was an adventure. No candles, alas. They had cooked all the food before the electricity went out, so we had a meal in the twilight. We went back to our classrooms for brief small group sessions before a seminar which we didn't even know if we would be able to hold. As my group achieved a well-tuned chord in their Gesualdo madrigal the lights returned. Such is the power of just intonation.

I spent my afternoon off driving around Massachusetts, an expensive treat. I went to Amherst and bought CDs at the used music store, and then found my way to the Montague Book Mill and sat in an easy chair by a window overlooking the stream, which runs over rocks below. Magical.

This evening after our real seminar we held the Thursday evening treat: silly seminar, our skit night. It was shorter than usual, due to our low enrolment, but still full of belly laughs. BZ and Andrew did a wonderful improvised skit about the 2nd amendment and the right to bear tuning forks. And Evie won the T-shirt grand prize for her 10 Reasons to Be Episcopalian number.

I have had three glasses of wine. Bed...

50 Questions

2008-07-03T08:03:00.003-05:00

I picked up this meme from my friend Will (Designerblog) -- feel free to copy and paste in answers.

1. What do you add to your coffee?
Nothing -- but I hardly ever drink coffee. I drink tea.

2. What are you reading now?
Daniel Deronda (George Eliot) and a new biography of Anton Rubinstein

3. Do you own a gun?
No but my daddy owned a bunch of shotguns and a 357

4. Are you registered to vote? DO you vote?
yes

5. Do you get nervous before doctor appointments?
no

6. What do you think of hot dogs?
i love sausages. hot dogs are ok

7. Favorite Christmas Song?
there is no rose from britten's ceremony of carols. wexford carol. vince guaraldi's arrangement of christmas song, gayla morgan's arrangement of silver bells

8. What do you prefer to drink in the morning?
tea -- blackcurrant -- make it so!

9. Can you do push ups?
uh...

10. What was the name of your first boyfriend/girlfriend?
Janeen. and Denis. One of each :)

11. What's your favorite piece of jewelry?
i dont really wear jewelry, except for my father's pearl cufflinks

12. Favorite hobby?
what's a hobby? :)

13. Do you work with people who idolize you?
well. i conduct and my singers like me. i teach, run singing workshops and -- ditto. i sing and, well, some of 'em do!

14. Do you have ADD?
Oh yes

15. What's one trait that you hate about yourself?
carb addiction. and i do dishes to avoid real work

16. Middle name?
Linsley, for my father's mother's father, jared linsley simonds

17. Name 3 thoughts at this exact moment.
how am i gonna get through the morning workshop session with one of my altos missing?
did i really need to eat the banana bread?
what a GREAT day!

18. Name 3 things you bought yesterday.
hampson's verdi arias cd, honnegger symphonies, gedda sings rachmaninoff songs, all used cds from turn it up here in northhampton

19. Name 3 beverages you regularly drink.
tea, water and wine

20. Current worry right now?
that my sugars will destroy me and that i cannot motivate myself to exercise

22. Favorite place to be?
cape cod in the summer, southeastern pennsylvania in the spring, nyc in the winter, hudson valley in the fall

23. How did you bring in the New Year?
i fell alseep

24. Where would you like to go?
coast of south africa, london, russia

25. Name three people who will complete this.
no clue

26. Whose answers do you want to read the most?
let's wait and see

27. What color shirt are you wearing?
a gray t-shirt with the motto "careful, or you'll end up in my novel"

28. Do you like sleeping on satin sheets?.
no. love flannel

29. Can you whistle?
Yes but not well.

30. Favorite color(s)?
cobalt, shades of purple, peacock

31. Could you be a pirate?
nah

32. What songs do you sing in the shower?
mad scene from pirata. act 1 elena aria from vespri

33. Favorite girls name?
madeleine

34. Favorite boy's name?
julian

35. What's in your pocket right now?
tuning fork, cell phone, keys, and all the loose debris that ought to be in my wallet

36. Last thing that made you laugh?
my colleague todd

37. Best bed sheets as a child?
cannot recall

38. Worst injury you've ever had?
ankle sprain two years ago

39. Do you love where you live?
sorta. i love the city, but i would rather live where i can walk to the center of a small but interesting college town with used books and coffee shops.

40. How many TVs do you have in your house?
3

41. Who is your loudest friend?
they're all loud

42. How many dogs do you have?
2 cats: Simba and Xena. Maine coons.

43. Does anyone have a crush on you?
i think so.

44. What are the most fun things you ever did?
my year in the whiffenpoofs

45. What are your favorite books?
singer bios and autobios, robertson davies novels, tolkien

46. What is your favorite candy?
marzipan

47. Favorite Team?
the one i recently joined :)

48. What songs do you want played at your funeral?
vaughan williams' 5 variants on dives and lazarus and steve winwood's it was happiness.

49. What were you doing at 12 AM?
zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

50. What was the first thing you thought of when you woke up?
ouch.

Smith Stuff

2008-07-02T11:44:00.003-05:00

Lots of music. That's what I'm up to.

Monday night's concert was extremely satisfying. We had a a much larger audience than just our workshop attendees: our Carla brought in 100 kids from other Smith summer programs. They seemed to enjoy us. And we did a lot of new stuff, including about half of La Barca di Venezia a Pa'ua and three numbers from Jukebox in the Tavern of Love. TF is conducting the large group piece -- a choral arrangement of an Indian Raga, called Desh. Only TF.... The party was pleasant and sorting the cards into groups got done without too much fuss. TF and KB flipped a coin for the top group. KB won. We all picked music from the library and that was the nd of Monday.

Tuesday was stormy, with a huge downpour and tremendous thunder for much of the afternoon. I got off to an awkward start by forgetting to take my cell phone off vibrate. The alarm went off... but I heard nothing! Fortunately I woke up only 45 minutes late. My group read through many pieces. It took a while for us to warm up to the complicated arrangement of Motherless Child. I snuck into town after the rain and shopped and hung around. I met two friends, the Rabbi (for coffee at Haymarket -- but we didn't drink coffee, just talked), and DC (for dinner at Paul & Elizabeth's). I needed breathing space! (and down time)

Today started out dismal but grew sunny. My group has tackled more new things, including the gorgeous Brahms In Herbst. And now it is time for more...

Beyond Writer's Block

2008-06-30T14:21:00.003-05:00

OK, it's been a month. And I have simply not felt like writing. Or doing much else, to be honest. Depression or exhaustion, or both? My lexapro does wonders for my anxiety, but I am contemplating adding Gabapentin to my life so that I can concentrate better. I manage well in the AM and become progessively less motivated as the day wears on. By the evening I cannot think straight, unless I have a rehearsal to deal with, and then the stimulus of coping with others keeps me functional.

Part of my blog aversion comes from the burn I got when somebody objected rather fiercely to something I wrote and communicated that objection to a circle of people I deal with. My friend the mezzo warned me about blogging and the laws of unintended consequences, and she was right.

But here I am at Smith College, doing another singing workshop, and this is the sort of situation that my blog was born from -- a diary of a gig, intended for my music friends who don't happen to be here. So.

Friday I drove up with the DD. We stopped for lunch at Sylvester's, as is traditional. I had the roast beef BLT: too much meat, but a nice smear of avocado and their wonderful sunflower bread. We got to Jordan Hall and set up our room and then I joined my fellow Western Wind members in taking inventory of our sheet music library. I discovered a few delightful pieces which I had not known we owned, and squirreled away the Charles Wood Oculi omnium for use during the weekend. EZL and LC joined us for dinner at a pasta restaurant. LC's salmon looked terrific. I had the chicken on black pepper fettucini. DD had the sweet potato ravioli. Stuffed, and with a mouth still in shock from all the pepper, I got ready for our concert. We rehearsed on the stage of Sage Hall, the most perfect place to sing, and then let our workshop audience in (the lobby floor had just been polished, so everyone came in via the stage entrance). We gave an excellent concert, and for once the program wasn't too long. Then EZL ran a rehearsal of his new piece while the rest of us auditioned new participants. We all went back to the dorm for a reception, with fresh strawberries, and then met to arrange the groups for the next morning. I picked pieces for us to work on, and then crawled into bed.

Saturday was hot and muggy. LC and I started the day with warmups, and EZL resumed working on his Emerson setting. I found myself singing bass, since we were short in that department. Lots of low Gs! We called the groups and split up to work for the day. DD and I went into town at lunch. She found a great t-shirt at Faces: "Come to the dark side, we have cookies," but they didn't have it in her size. The manga store was gone. The afternoon passed in steady work. DD went to Nancy's movement class while I snuck back to the dorm for down time. At seminar my group did pretty well, and KB's group of high school girls pretty much sang us all off the stage. Fresh young voices in a pliable state of musical learning coached by a master. DD and I went to Herrell's Ice Cream shop but found the line too long, so we went to Haymarket and had the Thai noodle salad instead.

Sunday was even sultrier. My group voted one song off our island and learned two new ones. The final concert went very well. I sat in total wonder as DD sang, alone on the middle part of Now Is the Month of Maying, with (almost) total assurance and beautiful tone. When it was over we packed up and drove back to NY.

This morning I woke up in my own bed, right by my own air conditioner (sigh). I packed and set off to return to Smith, with a stop in New Haven for lunch with my old friend CB. The day was splendid, sunny and hot. No traffic, and Turandot with Nilsson, Moffo and Corelli on my CD player. Boy can those guys sing! And it wasn't so much loud as brilliant and penetrating. Both sopranos have lots of whistle register in their high notes. Not the way dramatic sopranos are trained today.... And now it is time to resume workshop head and go hear some newbies.

Shakespeare Lady

2008-05-25T07:23:00.002-05:00

I was in New Haven Friday evening, and walking with a friend. We were accosted on Whitney Avenue by a tall, skinny African-American lady who turned out to be the locally (in)famous Shakespeare Lady. She claimed to have gone to Yale Drama School and offered monologues for donations. My instinct was to flee (I am such a New Yorker!), but D wanted to stay and listen. She declaimed the Sleepwalking Scene from the Scottish Play, the Greek alphabet, and the opening of the Canterbury Tales; all with a pronounced Caribbean flavor. She was engaging and horrifying all at once. We gave her some money and she moved on. Here is more about her http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1482639/posts