Water under the Bridge – All through the Night

Since writing my last post I returned home for seven weeks over Christmas time.  As I left in late November I was not troubled by the heavy snowfall that blighted many Christmas plans in Europe.  I did, however, arrive in Australia in time to witness my beloved homeland being decimated by floods.  I grew up in an Australia characterised by only the first part of Dorothy Parker’s opening lines of her patriotic poem:

“I love a sunburnt country, a land of sweeping planes 

of ragged mountain ranges, of droughts and flooding rains”. 

The drought of the past 20 years in Australia means I, like most Australians, am used to showers timed for two and half minutes, watering your garden with the grey water run-off from the washing machine and never leaving the tap running while brushing your teeth.  The flash flooding took a population so used to living with the water restrictions enforced by drought by surprise.

To see the newspaper coverage of the devastation and loss of life in the country that I love was incredibly upsetting.  To be visiting with my Uncle and Aunt while they had 48 hours to move half a million dollars worth of cattle to rented paddocks out of the floodplains lest their investment and livelihood floated into the Clarence River was a complete shock.

It kind of puts the singing thing into perspective.

But singing is what I do and a singer is many parts of who I am.  It is a filter through which I view the world and it is also my way to contribute to the sometimes cruel and harsh world we live in.

And when you have no platitudes, which will suffice in salving another’s grief sometimes you can sing and through that act you can offer some relief.

This is why I am very grateful for two recent opportunities to sing for charitable concerts.

“Water Under the Bridge”, was a concert raising money for the Queensland Disaster Relief Fund organised by the Advance Network of Australians in London.  Held in the basement of the club, LUXE, in Shoreditch it was not the most likely venue for an opera singer (or 3!), and while on paper we made strange bedfellows with singer-songwriters and DJ, the end result was a celebration of Aussie graft in strange circumstance.

For my part I can’t tell you the joy of playing to a home crowd after singing some serious opera.  In preparation I wondered whether I was pandering or patronising the home crowd by singing a serious operatic arrangement of our unofficial National Anthem, Waltzing Matilda.  All doubts were put to rest when the crowd prompted the beginning of the third verse with a collective, striney “Down came a Jumbuck” and I knew I was onto a winner.

The success of this event was in no small part attributed to publicist and event organsier Violetta Tosic of Creative Cat (I urge you to check out her website www.creativecat.org and get yourself to any event she devises!).  Also attached is the review which describes me as: “dark and cheeky…” http://www.nznewsuk.co.uk/news/?id=17897&story=Water-Under-The-Bridge-for-Australian-fundraiser

“All through the Night” was one of the most moving concerts I have been involved in all my years of living in London.  The event was organised in response to the sudden unexplained death of thirteen day old Emma Dimitrijevic, which occurred in the community I lived in while studying in London.  Emma’s mother, the wonderfully generous spirited Sasha Pavlovich, and a beautiful service-minded singer friend of mine, Madeleine Sexton, organised a concert based on the theme of lullabys and a silent auction to support the work of UCH Hospital’s Neo-natal ward.

It was an emotional night with music ranging from Handel’s Waft her Angels, through Brahm’s Wiegenlied and a selection from Cateloube’s Songs of the Auvergne to Saint-Saens’ Mon Coeur s’ouvre a ta voix.  I sang Rusalka’s Song to the Moon and felt like I was soaring over the magnificently sensitive accompaniment of the Royal Opera House’s Richard Heatherington – who managed to make an orchestra out of the baby grand.

The sensitive music selections and committed performances of many of my dearest colleagues united in a cause greater than themselves made for a moving and emotional concert, that was a testament to the power of music to allow people to grieve, rejoice and give.  Days later, Sasha gave all of us singers the most beautiful complement which I want to share:

“Through your singing I felt my voice was heard, I felt Emma’s voice was heard”

Well if that isn’t a reason to sing, I don’t know what is!

Both events raised substantial amounts of money for wonderful causes, and the old adage that applies to acts of service, that it is only by giving that you truly receive certainly held true for me in both cases.

Mixed Metaphors – Droughts, Deserts, Riding the Waves

My mother used to call me Miss Malapropism, long before I knew what the word meant or how to use it inappropriately. With this in mind I give you my apologies in advance as this entry in my blog will undoubtedly involve a mixed metaphor or three.

Since moving back to London from Berlin in the beginning of 2010 I found the transition more difficult than I could imagine. I had spent the previous 6 months being supported in my new voice type change by my teacher, mentors and a wonderful scholarship. I also felt that Berlin – a city that is still rebuilding its visibly scared architecture and home only to 3/5ths of the population it was built for – was the perfect place for me to have the space to rebuild and renew my singing. However, after all that space I was not ready to be crammed back into the city of London.

Having been out of London from the beginning of the Global Financial Crisis I had missed the worst of the Credit Crunch, but the effects were unmistakable on the commute into the City of London. The grey drizzle of London’s weather was reflected in the faces of commuters as they faced another day in offices reeling from redundancies, not only fighting for a space on the tube, but fighting for their jobs and livelihoods.

Having never had a problem finding temp work to supplement my singing work, I was shocked that with 4 recruitment agents I could only scrounge up 5 weeks work in the first 15 weeks of the year. I have to admit I was filled with doubt about the likelihood of me being able to remain in London or even in the Northern Hemisphere. While I dreaded returning home to Australia without fulfilling the promise of the work I had done in Berlin, I did not know how I could survive as a nomad going from friend to friend and couch to couch. The circumstances concerning my time in Berlin had been so serendipitous and all flowed so easily. In comparison moving back to London had no sense of flow – the city was financially in drought and I was too.

Julia Cameron, the author of “The Artist’s Way” suggests that the artistic life involves periods of drought and with this drought comes doubt. With these doubts and droughts in mind I had enough savings to do one of two things “up stumps” and move home or take up an invitation I had received while in Berlin to travel to the desert.

So I headed to the Sahara.

My time in Berlin changing voice type had been a period of intense study that helped me to be more flexible and adaptable than I had allowed myself to be in my singing life. In exploring this change I often felt vulnerable, but I also felt free to try new things, to be courageous. This opening up has had some far reaching effects including that I decided to open myself up to the possibility of something else, something far removed from the daily discipline of singing – taking some time off and HAVING A HOLIDAY! (not to mention traveling with someone I barely knew – but that is a whole other story!)

While taking a camel ride out of the Saharan desert I was able to observe the shifting sands of the Erg Chebbi desert and notice that even in the desert, which looks like a still sea of sand, nothing stays the same, there is constant ebb and flow.  I can say that watching the sun creep over the seemingly endless waves of sand one still morning was worth it.

As soon as I arrived back in London everything changed again. A part-time job in a law firm run by opera loving employers enabled me to consolidate my new soprano repertoire and eat!  With the basics of food and shelter covered again I was able to start to audition and perform again.

My first audition as a soprano was for master classes with Sir John Tomlinson at the Royal Academy of Music and ended in tears of relief as the panel, which included Sir John Tomlinson, agreed that I was indeed a soprano. As a member of the masterclasses, it was inspiring to absorb the attention to detail that Sir John Tomlinson gives to every vowel in each language he sings and the support and “nourishment” he gives every note. He was clearly passionate about process of his life’s work of singing. My acceptance into the masterclasses was a turning point for me in accepting that I am a soprano. This acceptance and ownership of where I have come from and what I have achieved has seemed to be as important to the process of a vocal transition as the actual technical work!

While participating in the London Master Classes we were also able to sit in on the conducting classes run by Benjamin Zander, an incredibly charismatic conductor who as well as being the chief conductor of the Boston Philharmonic and teaching conducting, also travels the world giving lectures about “The Art of Possibility” – using his experiences as a musician and conductor to inspire leadership in many other sections of the community. When talking about the intense week and a half we were all having at the Master Classes, Ben reflected that we were all surfing an immense wave and that once the masterclasses were over there would be a period of waiting for the next wave to come along – a period of sitting on a (metaphorical) surfboard waiting.

As you can imagine for an Aussie like me the surfboard metaphor resonated deeply. Doing the audition and working on the master classes was a little like catching a beautiful, wild, salty wave and riding it to shore on my new surfboard, fashioned during my time in Berlin (I told you there would be metaphors!). I had no idea whether my surfboard would hold up under pressure or whether I might end up falling off and being rolled around in the surf or God forbid whether I had chosen a “dumper”!

For the record, surfboard rides pretty well – like all good boards it needs regular applications of wax (o stop me now, before I go on to remember the teenage boys in the camping ground who would spend disciplined hours on their boards), but I am definitely enjoying the ride. Additionally, rather than being stuck in the middle of a drought I much prefer the idea that I am waiting for the next wave while enjoying the calm ebb and flow from atop my surfboard.

Regardless, one thing I have learnt over the last 6 months, whether I am in desert or on the ocean, if you just stop and look around both have exceptional views.

Working Girl

Moments of great transition need support – and I was so lucky to have had the support of The Finzi Trust to live and learn in Berlin while transitioning from Mezzo to Soprano.  The time spent in Berlin has afforded me one of the most important stepping stones in my career.

I am now back in London and determined to capitalise on the changes I have made as a singer.  While I am excited about reintroducing myself to my contacts in the industry, there are a few basic needs to satisfy before I can get onto these more lofty creative goals.  The most important of these being food and shelter and of course both these needs, require income.

Now, Dear Reader, do not fear I have not, gone all Belle de Jour on you – although doing so might up the hits on my blog significantly.  Instead I have resorted to that stalwart of the jobbing singer’s repertoire: Temping.  My dear mother always said I would be grateful to have completed my law degree and I am (certainly temping is preferable to packing bags in Safeways or other employment requiring limited qualifications!!!!!).  However, I am not sure she envisaged me spending an entire day looking busy, but trying to resist the lure of all internet sites not protected by the firewall.

It is, however, interesting to see how the other half lives and to imagine what my life might have been like had I not pursued my passion.  The particular firm I am at supports its workers with all kind of perks virtually unheard of by the struggling artiste.  The state of the art offices in the centre of London’s business district have more in common with a luxury cruise liner than a place of work.  It sports 2 roof terraces, a restaurant, coffee house, an onsite gym, dance studio and music rooms (something I am taking advantage of for several hours a day).  When you add to this salaries only Bryn Terfel can dream of and bonuses beyond the imagination of all but the most fortunate of performers, there is a lot to recommend this vocation and it’s lifestyle.

Ah except the laborious, attention-to-detail-work regarding capital markets and real estate finance which have seen the bottom fall out of them and their clients lose their jobs in the last year or so!  Oh a missing out on the feeling of complete release and joy when you find that magical spot for a note that allows it to spin and vibrate with minimal effort.  Not to mention when all that work in the practice room allows you to actually convey the emotion of a song or a role.  When all that work allows you to live a little bit of Mimi’s frisson upon meeting Rodolfo, Tatyana’s excitement of pouring her passion for Onegin into a letter, or Micaela’s triumph over her fear of finding Don José amongst Carmen’s band of smugglers.

Back to the practice room then!

Here and Now

The week between Christmas and New Year often feels like a kind of limbo to me. The year is not yet over, but the excitement that has geared up during the preceding weeks has well and truly been expended in the excitement of feasting and good cheer.

After the guests have left and the loads of washing are done and drying on the airer, after the Boxing Day Nana naps have been taken (one must make use of the sky getting dark at 4.30 in the afternoon somehow) and an entire book read and finally after the Christmas leftovers have been eaten leaving only bananas and chocolate fudge in the fridge,  I find myself in a state of reflection.  It still feels a little too early to write a list of New Year’s Resolutions, but with the threat that I will be back in the United Kingdom in only two weeks my mind is happy to wander and wonder over the past year and particularly over the three months I have spent in Germany.

In short I have loved it.  The opportunities granted to me by the Finzi Trust have provided me with the most freeing experience of my life and given me the space to regenerate and reinvigorate my artistic practice.  

Often as I have ridden home along the bike paths in the middle of the night I have reflected upon how strange it is to feel so free in Germany, particularly in Berlin, a place that just over 20 years ago with stories of the Stasi and the Berlin Wall was viewed as the antithesis of freedom.  This is a town that wears its scars:From Checkpoint Charlie to Potsdamer Platz to the Brandenburg Gate you can follow the line of the Berlin Wall as bricks cemented into the street, en route you pass the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe designed by Peter Eisenmann.  Berlin is a town built for 5 million but now only inhabited by 3 – leaving it with less a feeling of emptiness and more a feeling of space.  From my short experience the people left in this space seem to have an energy to create a new city that is diverse and tolerant, that is keen to move on while acknowledging the past.  

Berlin seems to be full of metaphors for regeneration, it is attempting to rebuild itself to recreate some of its former glory but many of the rebuilt buildings combine modern styles of architecture with remnants of the original, sometimes partially destroyed, building.  The best example of this for me is the bombed out church on Kufurstendamm – at first glance you wonder when they might rebuild the structure, but upon closer inspection the Church and Bell Tower have been rebuilt around the half destroyed original – incorporating the scars of the past into the function of today.

What better city could I have come to in order to regenerate my singing.  The time and space I have had here has enabled me to challenge my old ideas regarding my technique and repertoire away from the pressures of London.  Like the church on Kufurstendamm I have a new structure for how I sing that looks and sounds different. In stretching the metaphor I like to think it is more solid than the old one and will be standing strong for some time to come.  On a personal level this freedom to shake off old habits and accept and integrate something new has given me a flexibility I did not think I had and with that has come a sense of possibility that I know will sustain me through my next transition and beyond.  

Speaking in (foreign) tongues

Learning a new language in the country of where that language is spoken quickly makes one very humble, after all the 3 year old children speak more fluently than you do. Traveling in France one doesn’t easily forget the sound of children pointing and expressing their delight in something or other with a musical: “Ooh la la Maman”.

Still, like a child learning to walk and getting great pleasure out of every step, I have begun to see progress.  For instance we are currently in class doing a chapter on cars – sadly for me I don’t know most of these words in English, let alone German.  

However, my local bike shop were very congratulatory when I was able to explain (for the 2nd time in two weeks) that “Der Reifen am mein Fahrrad ist Kaputt“.  This provoked lots of laughter, and a bit of head shaking (translation “weren’t you here last week?”).   I remained strong and with the help of lots of pointing said: “Lezte Woche der Reifen, hinter, ist Kaputt, diese Woche es ist der andere“. Smiles and nods all round!

In German class we also had a free discussion on cars which touched on das Benzin (petrol) and specifically whether Benzin in Deutschland was mit Blei oder Bleifrei (lead or lead-free).  This segued into another discussion: Ist das Wasser in Deutschland Bleifrei? (this is of course a side issue, but as I am drinking it stright from the tap I was quite interested…?).

The result of all this discussion was that on my way home I could understand the ad for a new Krimi (Crime drama) on die Fernsehen (TV).  It’s the little things:

 

 

Not Lead Free, but Super!

 

And it seems I am almost trilingual.  Last night, when leaving my  local Backerai to head to the practice room, I was engaged in conversation by a man who noticed my bike falling over.  When I excused myself by saying “Pardon” he (quite naturally) assumed I was French.  We had a bit of a conversation in French till he noticed me faltering (not on the language, mind you, I just did not want to answer whether “Chez moi est-elle près d’ici ?”). He then asked the question in English, which I (falteringly) answered in German.

Looking for escape I took a step back which caused me to loudly exclaim, first in my Mutter Sprache and then, when he asked what was wrong, in both German and French.  It seems there are a couple of words I can say in 3 languages, and I unfortunately stepped in it!

 

Crows

Three weeks into my Berlin adventure: the golden leaves of Goethe poems have all but fallen off the trees making my bike rides slippery and perilous and the excitement of seeing jugglers and fire-eaters on my approach to the Sigerssäule has been replaced by the sadness of seeing 3 or 4 prostitutes that line the same road on my return journey.  The golden light that bathed the beginning of this journey has been replaced by a perpetual grey and I have it on good authority that this colour is with us till March (long after my scholarship has run out and returned me to London – which also sports a fetching grey coat till Easter).  

Of course this was to be expected.  Having moved to London from Australia in mid-2002 I have already lived through many a claustrophobic winter while longing for the high heat filled skies of my home.  The excitement of a white Christmas has long since warn off and while I don’t want the Christmas of my childhood where it was too hot to bake a turkey (but the attempt was made regardless) I do dream of being under a high wide sky, near a salty rough ocean sharing bowls of stonefruit and shelling buckets of prawns with the people I love.  I know very well the feeling of not quite being homesick, but being sick for the people I’m missing (this little turn of phrase is I think lifted from the Finn Brothers song “Homesick” or from a song by the front man from Men at Work – I can only find the Finn Brothers track…but maybe someone out there can help me out with the other one):

• http://www.last.fm/music/Finn+Brothers/_/Homesick

Yet I am still here in Europe still following my dream of being a singer and not ready yet to leave and trade all the culture and learning I am experiencing here for a high wide sky.  The people I love are in almost daily contact via email and skype keeping me up to date with news from home and reminding me that I am in their thoughts and giving me the strength to keep struggling and striving to find my voice as a singer and as a person – letting me know that although I must do the work of finding my voice alone they are supporting me on this journey.

And of course I am not really alone.  I have a wonderful and supportive mentor in Liane Keegan, who knows too well the compromise of wanting to achieve in opera and realising this is not possible if you stay in Australia.  I also keep meeting other artists who are not from Germany and who are here for the same reasons I am, to find their voices in the art forms they love.

These meetings with other artists almost always fell serendipitous and remind me why I am here.

Last weekend I had an email from a singer-friend in New Zealand who encouraged me to see a cabaret in Berlin being performed by an Australian she had studied with in Queensland (really how did we survive before the internet?). Like so many things connected with this adventure I have been having in Berlin, this turned out to be another serendipitous event.  

 

Basil - potentially part of one's family in Berlin

 

Montmorensy and the Montmorensy Orchestra sang songs that had tears of recognition running down my face and into my glass of Weißweine, particularly when he sang about moving to Berlin and living by himself for the first time in his life and realising that his Basil plant was the only living thing in his apartment aside from himself and as this was now his only family he would have to look after it well (I sighed as I realised I did not even have a basil plant).

I laughed in recognition as he sang of the difficulties of being in a new country and knowing no one, but going religiously to sit in an internet cafe with a dozen other people in the same situation who connected not with each other, but with a myriad of friends through the internet.  

My favourite moment was when he compared the songs of the German crow and the Australian crow.  Both birds have distinctive, but very different cries, the Australian crow sounds like he is crying out “Art, Art, Art”.  

 

Such an evil looking bird, but he might just have a message...

 

It took the sound of an Australian crow and an Australian boy from Grafton (my mother’s home town) to remind me why I am here in Germany far away from the high wide skies and the noise of the birds that fly in them.  I am here for Art, Art, Art – and for the moment that is enough.

Please head to Montmorensy’s myspace page to hear “Crow” and other songs that somehow mix an Australian sense of humour with a German sensibility:

http://www.myspace.com/montmorensy

Kopfstand

There are a little set of meditations sitting near my kitchen in Berlin and I randomly choose a different one every couple of days (by random I mean I select one at random and then if I don’t like it I throw it back until I get one I like).  Yesterdays’ “random” selection was:

“Can you imagine what you would do if you could do all that you can”  Sun Tzu

I thought this was fairly appropriate for the little challenges I am facing at the moment.  I really do mean little challenges, I realise singing is not finding a cure for cancer or (as some American singer friends of mine used to say) rocket surgery!  However, these little challenges are part of the journey to finding my own voice (and I mean that in a macro as well as a micro sense).  

Firstly, I have come to the realisation that I am indeed a Soprano.  The journey towards this realisation has been long and sometimes confronting – peoples’ singing and speaking voice are deeply personal and help shape their self-image – our voice is the main conduit with which the majority of us engage and communicate with the world.  

The idea that I was singing in the wrong fach (voice-type) was mooted by various different coaches in about September/October last year, I started to accept this possibility in January this year with the assistance of some very kind mentoring by Jane Robinson, Head of the Young Artist’s Programme at ENO and some equally kind lessons with Liane Keegan, principal at Deustche Oper Berlin.

During every coaching, where I would bring progressively higher lyric mezzo repertoire, Jane would very kindly smile and say: “Are you sure you have never wanted to sing Countess, Fiordiligi etcetera”.  I would immediately feel something akin to dread in the pit of my stomach and say: “No, I have always preferred being the bridesmaid to the bride”.  Eventually, I admitted to Jane that everytime she asked I felt scared that I was being asked to be open and vulnerable and I found this frightening. She laughed and said: “But that’s exactly it, that’s what singing is”.  I would add, that is what singing with your real voice is. 

Liane’s approach was slightly different, she didn’t engage with my debates about what singing in a different fach might do to my psyche – she got me working.  She would get me doing singing exercises intended to re-train new muscle memory and with a smile told me that once we had “decrappinated” the old muscles I was using to sing, my voice would tell us where it was happiest.  And so it has.  

So now is the time to accept that I could do all that I can.  I now need to accept that my body has done the hard work.  The muscles memory is there, the technique is in.  I have to keep working it, massaging it, fine-tuning it. But I have all the information I need and I can sing again – this time in a much more sustainable fashion with a voice that expresses and communicates what my brain wants it to!  (nb: To give credit to Liane many of these phrases come straight from my lessons with her and I am in effect plagerising her motivational lingo)

It is time to start learning roles and coaching them and allowing myself to show them to people who I may not be as comfortable being open and vulnerable with.  The great thing about having a technique is that it gives me confidence and the knowledge that, even if I am open and vulnerable, I am safe – and if something goes wrong I can go back to the practice room and work out why, fine-tune and move forward.

This little journey of training the muscles and then putting them into practice in a vulnerable situation was summed up for me in yoga class last night.  I went to my first yoga class in German.  When it came time to do the Headstand the entire class went straight up into the posture  (I would usually have a chat with the teacher about the technique or do it by the wall as a safety support).  Without being able to chat to the teacher and without thinking, I followed the class and went straight up into Headstand (Kopfstand).  As a friend said, she was glad they weren’t doing the “Jump off a Cliff” posture…

I then tried a second time, as I got into the headstand I realised what I was doing, thought about it, and then did not believe I could do it – did not trust that the 7 years of muscle memory  would support me.  That moment of doubt meant I promptly did a spectacular half somersault (making sure I protected my neck) and crash landed out of the posture.  The weird thing was that although I crashed out of the pose I was elated that I had even gotten up there, in fact the descent was kind of fun too.  

And I know I can do it again.

Just when you thought it could not get any more German…

Finally after being in Berlin for 2 weeks I have seen my first piece of Regietheater**.  For those not aware of the term see the Wikipedia definition below, suffice it to say, in the context of this blog it is a shorthand way of saying: “Very weird production that, while featuring a lot of colour and movement and at times being highly entertaining, during which I really did not have a clue what was going on”.  

The show in question was Carmina Burana, performed at the Deutsche Oper in a production by Friedrich Götz What follows is a detailed and fairly long-winded description (to those who know my story-telling, this will be unsurprising, but I just don’t want you to miss a moment of the production, after all I couldn’t!) 

The production begins simply enough with the curtain rising to the fantastic sounds of O Fortuna, played sumptuously by the Deutsche Oper orchestra and sung brilliantly by the chorus.  I am already smiling in anticipation of the massive wall of sound that is about to hit me in the centre of the third row of the audience as the orchestra pit rises-up on hydrolics, simultaneously with the curtain, lifting the orchestra almost to stage level.  In the centre of the stage a female dancer in a pale grey body suit (The Dancer) is bound by ropes, tied up for a sacrifice.  So far, so Carmina Burana.

The Dancer stuggles free from ropes, once freed she dances joyfully, finding pleasure in her freedom.  She stops and hides when the Baritone enters dressed in a white linen suit (is she an animal running from human contact or is she just embarrassed at having been caught dancing?).  The Baritone, while singing, makes reference to a banner which contains pictures (a sun, a flower, a singing bird, two naked people making the shape of a letter F and an egg).  This lecture seems to liberate the Dancer to enjoy her dancing and her body.

The Baritone leaves and the Dancer is then joined by a Muscle-Bound Man in very high-cut fluoro green speedos and a fluoro green executioners mask (at this point I suppressed the first of many spasms of giggles and brought myself back under control by musing on what his purpose was).  It seems his purpose was to walk around looking muscley.  His muscles and fetching green speedos encouraged the Dancer to find tins of paint in primary colours.  With these she enhances the features of her face and body, smearing paint on her eyebrows, breasts and buttocks – this does not seem to impress the  Muscle-Bound Man and he walks off.

Two people in egg costumes with phalluses on their heads then descend from the roof and swing suspended in the air, the Dancer swings with them for a while.  She then walks off stage (probably to clean all the paint off her) and the Eggs keep swinging.  Finally they leave the stage as well.

The Baritone then comes back on with the chorus and sings a drinking song (I assume it was a drinking song as they had bottles of beer in their hands, but at this point I am not confident that anything was what it seemed).

After the Baritone falls down drunk another man (the Tenor) comes in looking like he may have stepped off a vintage plane, except that his helmet has a swan on it.  He sings the tenor aria about a swan dying in a fire while pictures of Leda and the Swan flash up on the screen behind him.  An Old Woman with very big breasts and a very big bottom comes in and gives the Baritone and Tenor some chicken drumsticks and puts lots of salt on them (that is she salts the drumsticks and the men, they also see fit to put some salt down their pants, I am not sure why?).

The Male Chorus take pins and pop the breasts and bottom of the old woman – it turns out these appendages were only balloons and the Old Woman is the Dancer from before.  She is wearing sexy underwear and red stilletos under her old woman outfit and is then ganged raped by the Men’s Chorus.

A chorus of children dressed as Parisian-Mime-Artists then enter the stage, they are carrying perspex boxes with dolls dressed in sexy underwear.  The entire Parisian-Mime-Artists-Children’s Chorus are pregnant (I have no idea what they represent, but they sing very nicely). 

Just when you think it could not get any more German a pair of bright red lips tipped on their side descends from the roof with a slit down through which the Soprano soloist enters wearing gold lamé and a very blonde wig.  

This aperture is then used as an entrance for a grim reaper like scythe followed by a dancer in a skeleton costume, (costuming note – the skeleton is not anatomically correct, there are no ribs but many circular bones in the chest area).  This dancer possibly represents death, so for clarity between describing the two dancers I will call her Death (although I admit, that I am now understanding very little of the production and she may not represent death at all).  

The Soprano seems to comfort the Dancer, then the Baritone enters takes off all his clothes and gets into a bath – I think this was meant to comfort the Dancer too.  The Dancer seems to be comforted and gives what can only be described as a lap dance to the Baritone (he looked like he was very much enjoying his job at this point).  Two children enter at this time a Girl in a red party dress and a Boy with a hobby horse.  After rejecting his hobby horse twice the Girl gets on and rides off with the Boy (no prizes for guessing the symbolism here).  The Dancer and Death have a little pas de deux here using the scythe as a dance barre.

The chorus has re-entered wearing corsets and feather boas over their black trousers and white shirts.  Everyone seems to be getting very friendly, including the Soprano, the Baritone, and the Dancer who has taken off almost all her clothes, but is still dancing very beautifully.

The Soprano gives the Dancer a cloak to put on and are joined by the Baritone.  They are then joined by the Muscle-Bound Man and Death.   They all hug and a large crown descends from the ceiling and encircles them all.  The Pregnant-Parisian-Mime Children’s Chorus enter sucking on giant multi-coloured lollipops and are joined by the Corset-Clad-Chorus, they sing the final reprise O Fortuna to end the piece.  The Eggs come back on and light a couple of flame throwers, adding a little fire-power to the final tableau.

At this point I am happy to surrender to the fabulous waves of sound being created by chorus and orchestra and forget about what any of it might mean.

For those of you wanting to do the same here is a little clip from youtube of O Fortuna (sadly not being performed by the DO chorus and orchestra, and more sadly without the visuals I experienced last night).

O Fortuna, Carmina Burana

**”Regietheater (German for director’s theater or producer’s theater) is a term that refers to the modern practice of allowing a director (or producer) freedom in devising the way a given opera (or play) is staged so that the composer’s original, specific stage directions (where supplied) can be changed, together with major elements of geographical location, chronological situation, casting and plot.” Wikipedia

Roundabouts – Something for the Canberrans

This story begins with a roundabout – something I know will appeal to my Canberra audiences of my Dad and 1 or 2 friends.  For the other 3 people reading this blog who don’t understand the significance I attach a small map of central Canberra in all its glorious curly-wurlyness.  

 

Inner Canberra

 

This my friends is a small selection of the exquisite roundabouts which populate the capital of Australia.  Canberra was designed with circles and curves in mind and there are few streets one can drive without having to navigate a roundabout.  In newer suburbs even the most minor of streets is populated with them – leading to the rumour that roundabouts breed.

Roundabouts in Canberra are a source of confusion to those not native to the area, however, to those who spent their formative driving years on Canberran roads, navigating a roundabout feels like fun as you slide round the city streets, merging from one flow of traffic into the other.  The other bonus is you never need to wait at a traffic light.

You can imagine, therefore, how comfortable I felt when approaching Die Siegerssaüle on Straße 17 Juni heading towards the Brandenburg Gate.  It is in the middle of a huge roundabout – just the thing to make a Canberra girl feel at home.  

 

Die Siegessaüle and Roundabout, Tiergarten, Berlin

Unfortunately, in order to navigate this 5 exit roundabout and associated pedestrian zones and bicycle paths, Berlin has seen fit to place traffic lights at every exit and entrance.

 

Traffic lights at Die Sigerßaüle

 

On the rare occasion that you are confronted with a wait at a traffic light in the city of Canberra you are often confronted with a window washer standing by the side of the road with his squeegie and bucket full of soapy water.  As I rode towards the Siegerssaüle my heart sunk firstly as I saw this was not a real roundabout, but one with traffic lights!  I grew even more despondent as I saw two young window washers standing at the traffic lights waiting for the traffic lights to stop.

Imagine my surprise when the window washers did not rush out to wash windows, but instead leapt into the traffic and started juggling batons.  On the opposite side of the roundabout another performance artist was juggling and breathing fire.  It seems even the most prosaic of places is a stage for art in Germany.

 

Jugglers not Window Washers

Serendipity: Small World-Large Currywurst

The operatic world is tiny!  Last night I went to a performance of Falstaff at the Deutsche Oper (my third opera in 1 week, others being Die Frau Ohne Schatten and Die Zauberöte für die Kinder – information to come!).  In the loo after the performance, while assessing the damage of riding to the performance by bike, I realised I was sharing the mirror with an American singer I worked with in 2006 on a performance of Falstaff on Belle-Ile, France.  

After catching up on what each of us had been doing for the last 3 years and what had brought us to Berlin, we did what most singers do – spent several hours talking shop: dissecting the performance, comparing singing techniques and discussing the different requirements for singers in Europe compared to America and England and Australia.  We were also joined by another American singer (fresh off the boat and ready to do European auditions) and an American double bass player from the orchestra of the Deutsche Oper.

Wheat beer with green cordial

This lead to a fabulous night of discussion about music and life and a sampling of some of the more delightful parts of German cuisine: Berliner Weisse mit Schuss grün und Currywurst.

Currywurst

Essentially this is a wheat beer with green cordial and a sausage with tomato sauce and curry powder, both acclaimed delicacies of Berlin (I think like Doner Kebabs you need the beer in order to eat the Wurst).  I have added pictures as seeing is believing.

Aside from the food, this was a wonderful night.  Singers and musicians are, on the whole, a welcoming bunch, particularly in Europe where so many of us are strangers in a strange land. The work is often transitory – friendships are made quickly, stories are shared and even before we know anything about the other person we relate through our love of opera and are genuinely excited by the capacity of the human voice to tell human stories and emotions.

My entire journey to Berlin from meeting Liane Keegan at the same time as my mentors at ENO were discussing my change of voice type to the very first application I made to the Finzi Trust, to the interview stage, to securing my accommodation here has felt serendipitous.  Last night’s meeting also felt like another occasion of serendipity.  I think I am definitely meant to be here and am so grateful to the Finzi Trust for the time I have here to learn about singing in Germany, to meet with colleagues new and old and to enjoy changing repertoire.