Today I had my audition for this fall’s opera. I felt like it went okay. I was so excited about it all day. I warmed up and things were going great. My voice was warm, I was getting my breath coordination, and I was able to keep things light so my high notes were relaxed and vibrant. I left the practice room at five to 2:00. (My audition time was 2:20). I changed into my chosen dress, and gathered my music and resumes and headed down to the hall where the auditions were taking place. I sat there chatting with several other vocalists when I found out I needed not only one but two resumes. So I went and made a copy. I returned and saw that one singer had another form, I looked closer to see it was the Audition form. At which point I remembered that two weeks early they had told us that we were to downloaded it from online and bring it filled out to the audition. I had totally forgotten. My friend ran to print it off for me, as I was up next, and he ran it back. I filled it out as fast as I could- as my muscles tightened, and my previous excitement and relaxed stated vanished. I had just finished filling it out when I was called up.
I sang “Nun lass uns frieden Schliessen” by Wolf as well as “Je vais le voir” the excerpt from the opera. Being that I’m new, I had never rehearsed with that pianist before, in fact I had only had a chance to run through it with a pianist about three times. He took the wolf VERY slow, and I tried to move it along, but I am a sucker for slow rhythms already and so I ended up taking breathes in all sorts of places that I never do. He took “Je vais le voir” really slow too. I came in early on a couple of entrances, despite my incessant playing of them in practice, I just hadn’t rehearsed it with an accompanist enough. I hate not being prepared for things, but alas- I didn’t my best, and hey I didn’t use my music- which was an option. Overall I was really pleased with my performance. For the most part I maintained proper coordination with my breath, I kept my high notes mostly relaxed, and I worked on keeping every note vibrant. My expression was a little off as a result of all this focus. Oh well- I’m sure I looked sappy, and largely uninspiring. But I only had two weeks to learn and master the aria that features all sorts of high A’s not to mention a very long and difficult cadenza at the end, which I’m happy to say, I did beautifully.
I have been working on some pretty major technique shifts with Mr. Billions, which so far is going very well. Mr. Billions has a much more specific approach to breath management. You breath out laterally and then you tuck in your abs. It’s a specific movement, and when I do it correctly it works wonders with my voice, and specificallly my higher register. In the past breath has always been presented so abstractly “feel like you’re riding a bike” “Feel like you have an intertube around your waist.” Despite all the good intentions, and the essentially same idea, the ambiquity of the directions resulted in my having very inconsistent breath control. I guess on the days when my imagination was vivid enough to imagine myself riding a bike, I was “on” and could sing with ease and fullness, but on the days when I was less inspired, my attempts were in vain.
This new method of breathing has resulted in my high notes completely opening up. After a couple of years of fretting high notes, I am now back to warming up to high D’s! I added a high C to the end of the cadenza- because I could. And even better, not only can I sing those high notes- I can sing them quietly.
Mr. Billions has said several times “Don’t sing beyond the beauty of your voice.” Basically, don’t push- except in a much more inspiring way, and you know he’s right. When I relax and let my breath carry the tone, my voice just spins and rings effortlessly. Now instead of focusing so much on getting my voice be vibrant, I am focusing on just breathing correctly and it is making a huge difference. I’m thrilled. It looks like CIM was a great choice, and Mr. Billions a blessing in disguise!