Two years ago I graduated with my Masters Degree in Voice/Opera from a top-five school. For the past two years I’ve been working as a legal assistant.O_o
(International symbol for mind-boggled eyes. Duh. )
I’ve been unmotivated when it comes to auditions because I feel somewhat trapped by my degrees. For example, let’s say someone graduates from law school and takes a job in a law firm somewhere. The pinnacle of having a law degree would be to make partner in a firm, right? (Yes, I know there are holes in this theory. Work with me.) So, said lawyer would work X amount of years knowing that the probability of making partner is directly related to the number of cases won/handled. It may be a somewhat long journey but it is reasonably predictable as long as you don’t lose someone else’s millions/sleep with a client/become an alcoholic/sleep in your office/yell at the plants.
The world of opera, however, provides no such guarantees. You might graduate from the best schools, do all the young artist programs, have super-smokin’ headshots and be friends with Jimmy Levine’s cousin’s granddaughter’s manicurist, but that doesn’t mean diddly squat when it comes to having a lasting and viable career.
So. Back to being motivated. I am prepping for an audition at the end of October, and wanted to find a new (to me) recording of an aria. So off to itunes I went and then BAM! I found her. I had heard mention of her (only because I had expressed interest in other Wagnerian sopranos not because my teachers ever really gave me listening assignments, not that I’m bitter). I knew only that she was a farm girl who happened to have pipes of steel. Well holy mother of things big and beautiful. This woman is officially my heroine of the day.
Reading back through her many interviews and the hundreds of obits that were written upon her death in 2005, I found that this was a woman I could totally look up to. She was hale, she was hearty, she sang what she wanted to, and she paced herself. Married at 30. Met debut at 40. Singing Strauss and Wagner well into her 70’s. Plus, the woman had a badass sense of humor. If I can’t find motivation in that, then schwarz ist meine brust.
Here she is, singing one of the most beautiful arias ever written: "Mild und leise" (aka the "Liebestod") from Wagner's Tristan und Isolde.
2 comments:
Hazaah for inspiration! I'm at work so I can't listen but I shall. Looking forward to it.
Congrats on the inspiration. I am just somewhat amazed that through all of your masters degree you never heard of Birgit Nilsson. In the area of opera, her name is big. I assume you know who Dame Joan Sutherland is. For a top-five rated school, that is poor education.
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