Definitely, or not.

I am writing this weeks blog from my living room, 20km north of London, in England where I arrived sometime yesterday afternoon. Apart from the days after Christmas, this is the longest break with no performances (9 days) I have had in Stuttgart so I am making the most of that time to catch up on singing lessons, coachings, time with family and friends and generally enjoy being home for a bit. I am also taking part in a competition, meeting up with some of the generous people who have supported me financially in the last 18 months, and singing the arias in Bach’s John Passion at St. Alban’s Abbey. In fact I am surprised I have time to write this given how much I have packed in to the 7 days.

Matter of factual opinion

Following last week’s informative audition in Stuttgart and the advice of what to start auditions with, what to and what NOT to offer, I was glad to have the chance to sing to another panel on Monday. This time the panel were in Munich and were representatives of ‘ZAV’, the state agency in Germany and a sort of Job centre for singers who are looking to fill gaps in the following season.

ZAV offer a few days of auditions throughout the country and then, if you get through the initial round, there is a bigger audition at which lots of representatives from ZAV and various Opera Companies hear you, with the potential of work being offered to anyone that catches their ear.

So as per the agent last weeks instructions, I started my audition with Mozart’s Ich Baue Ganz from Die Entfuhrung. An aria I have auditioned with regularly for about 5 years and one that got me a place in Opera school in London, the chorus of Glyndebourne and my place at Oper Stuttgart. It is a faithful friend. The second aria, chosen by them, was Il Duca’s Questa O Quella from Rigoletto, an aria that the lady last week thought I shouldn’t open with and should possibly drop all together at this stage.

After singing the two arias I was invited to discuss them with the panel, who very directly told me to drop the Mozart and open with the Rigoletto aria, completely the opposite view to last week. I could only laugh. They gave their reasons, I agreed with them, I was a bit tired from the performance the previous night and then getting an early-ish train to Munich, which I ended up falling asleep on – not so ideal preparation for an audition – so that probably didn’t aid the Mozart but hey. The panel told me they wanted to invite me to the next stage, in Cologne in March, and asked me to have a ten minute rest before singing two more arias to them in order for them to decide what I should offer in March.

Tour

I am obviously delighted that I have reached the next stage of the auditions and, after singing the main arias for both Nemorino and Tamino to the panel, with very positive responses, their preferred programme for the audition is established.

It will be great to visit Cologne. I have only ever sung about it in Schumann’s Dichetrliebe. I have a friend in the ensemble of the opera there and I look forward to catching up with her briefly.

Six months into living in Stuttgart and I have also been to Frankfurt, Munich, Hannover and Zurich, with Cologne to come. It is great to be able to visit these places, if briefly, and I look forward to hopefully visiting more over the next few months. Having said that, it isn’t cheap, all this travel and although we are given some money for the work we do in Stuttgart, it isn’t very much at all and doesn’t stretch to cover 100+ EURO train tickets or flights back here.

Support

If it weren’t for the support I have sought and received, I wouldn’t be able to afford this year in Stuttgart. I am hugely grateful to those people who have supported me and am looking forward to catching up with a few of them while I am back in the UK.

As I wrote in my many letters, sent far and wide last year to whoever I hoped might consider supporting me, the arts has always relied on the generosity of others and in the UK this is more true than it has been for many years. I’m not sure the Germans realise how good they have it with state funding.

Not having state funding, though, shouldn’t be an excuse to stop. If I stopped at the first point of needing to raise money on this Operatic path then I wouldn’t have got through the door at Music college in 2009. In fact, in these 6 years of  Postgraduate study, singing lessons, Opera studio time, I have had to, and successfully, raised the best part of £60’000 to enable my career. That is no small sum, but I am not a specialist fundraiser, far from it. I just had a goal and went about doing as much as I could to raise the necessary funds be it through fundraising concerts, various jobs, writing letters to hundreds of different people and so on. That I had almost no replies to the letters and when I did most of them were rejections didn’t stop me. What it does do is make me appreciate more the support I do receive and gives me more inspiration to continue and try to make it.

What else

Aside from the audition, we had the third and final Vologeso performance of this block. It comes back in May for another 6 performances. There was also Nabucco performances 6 and 7, three more to go of those.

Half of the opera studio are in Belgium performing Jakob Lenz in Brussels, but I managed to catch Karin, the Mezzo in the studio, in Janacek’s Jenufa. A heart breaking opera, it was great to watch this bleak production by Calixo Bieto and in particular great to catch Rebecca Von Lipinski, an English lady in the Ensemble, who was amazing as the title role.

Away from the theatre I got to play football twice this week. Once in a 6 a side game and then on Tuesday in a 3 aside game, a game in which I threatened to upset one particular local with my enthusiastic defending. He wasn’t very impressed and got quite upset, either because I won the ball or because shoulder barges aren’t so popular in German football.

England

As I mentioned, I am now in England. Today I have a rehearsal with the pianist for my competition next week, followed by a singing lesson with Gary Coward, probably well over due!!

Having spent weeks ignoring everyone speaking around me since I don’t understand most of the language, I find myself catching conversations and being surprised they are in English. I have said ‘danke’ a few times to people and I assumed my train was going to be on time yesterday. Joking aside, its lovely to be back for a few days however busy they will be.

I’ll tell you all about it next week.

Till then.

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Brits abroad

I had a very interesting audition yesterday afternoon, just before the second performance of Jommelli’s ‘Il Vologeso’. A lady, who had been sold to me as extremely influential  and busy in the German opera market, had offered to hear the Opera Studio members before she saw the show and I jumped at the chance.

On the advice of colleagues and coaches in Stuttgart I started with Verdi’s Questa O Quella from ‘Rigoletto’ and then was invited to sing Belmonte’s last aria from Mozart’s ‘Die Entführung’ as my second aria. I felt I sang both of them well enough and rushed off to my performance. During the interval of the show I received feedback from the audition and I found it very interesting and useful.

The best

Various points were made including: Why as an Englishman do I not have an aria in English down on my list? Why don’t I offer Tamino? Aria X may be good for you in the future by why not try aria Y and Z now because you could be sold as that more easily now. Why not add some Operetta? You need to offer the things that you are the best at.

These are all good and interesting points. That I will quickly address…..

Why no English? – Because I don’t want to not be considered for other work just because I sing in English. Though it strikes me that actually in the German market, having an ability to sing well in English as well as do the Mozart operas really well may actually be a good USP. (Unique Selling Point – business jargon).

Why don’t I offer Tamino? – Everyone offers Tamino in auditions here, I instead offer the aria from Die Entführung which is harder anyway. Interesting to note that the agent asked specifically for Tamino in the audition even though it wasn’t on the list. I guess from an agents perspective knowing whether or not your Tenor can sing Tamino is quite important.

Aria X may be good in the future – Very good point. How much do we as the singers try and guide our listener to where we are heading in the future. If the listener is worth their position on the panel they should actually be able to hear potential for other roles further down the line and so maybe singing arias that you would perform on stage tomorrow is a better idea, however conservative a choice that may seem to you.

Why not Operetta? – I have never considered offering Operetta. Maybe I should.

Offer the things that you THE BEST at – For this point I am particularly glad to have sung to this agent. There was no beating around the bush. The feedback I received stated quite categorically what she thought I should offer in the future in order to be ‘the best’ person for the job at any audition. From her point of view she wants the best odds for getting the gig, inevitably. For her I am a strong Mozart singer and I should offer three Mozart arias in audition, not to say I won’t sing the other repertoire that I offered in the future, but right now offer Mozart.

Stereotype

I tend to find feedback of any type useful. So to receive feedback from someone who is in the business of trying to get singers work is particularly helpful.  

It is easy sometimes to forget that you can’t just work for the future, be it towards singing Rodolfo in Boheme or the title role in Eugene Onegin. Actually working towards to gaining employment for what you can do NOW is very important. It is probably one of the differences between Music college and Opera studio/being a young artist.

That is not to say you can’t be studying the roles of your future, of course. But if they are for the future what are you going to do to earn a living in the present….

For me, I have to accept an ounce of stereotyping and use it to my advantage, not feel it is preventing me do other work. If, as a British Tenor, I am higher up the list of potential Britten and Mozart singers in Germany than I would be for the Bel Canto repertoire, which I love, then maybe I should embrace that. Not to say I’ll never do the Bel Canto repertoire, I think I could do that very well too.

I have another audition, this Monday in Munich. It will be interesting to see if their response is similar to this agents.

The week

We started the week with the final dress rehearsal and then opening night of ‘Il Vologeso’ by Jommelli. An extremely well received premier and enjoyable do afterwards at which I met a number of interesting people including an Englishman over to review the show.

On Tuesday Stuttgart sent me off to Zurich for a coaching with Jane Thorner, a lady who has previously been here giving the Opera studio masterclasses which I wrote about before. I had a very good 90 minute coaching in an amazing building in which the Zurich Conservatoire is based. We continued the work we had previously done together and it was useful particularly with these auditions coming up.

I managed to meet up with a friend from the Zurich Opera studio while I was there, we compared Opera studio notes and also our experiences of being ‘Brits abroad’ albeit Brits working abroad.

Routine

The routine of daily opera house life continues. For most people it wouldn’t seem like a routine, every day is different and I don’t know what tomorrow will bring until our 1pm ‘tagesplan’. But I am used to it now.

This afternoon I play football again, get in! And I have the end of next week to look forward to, when I am flying back to the UK for some auditions, lessons and time with family and friends. I can’t wait!

Hope you are all well.

Thanks for reading.

Tom

ps: Lost 4 pounds in Weight this week. That is a good thing. 

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Almost show time!

The build-up in excitement and tension during the final week of show rehearsals is always significant. On this occasion, when we are performing a work by Jommelli that has been performed only a handful of times in the last 300 years, in a new production by the Intendant Jossi Wieler and his directing partner Sergio Morabito which is being seen as one of the biggest events of the season, those feelings are even stronger.

Constants

For the singers, and I guess I include myself in that despite not singing much in the show, the final week of rehearsals is a chance to cement the work we have been doing for many weeks back in the rehearsal room. A chance to settle into the theatres space, acoustic, lighting and so on. It isn’t made easy though. From rehearsal to rehearsal things are added, changed and taken away with the various decision makers doing their final tinkering, for me it can feel a bit unsettling.

The first time we get the complete set and costumes is during the piano-dress, a complete run accompanied by piano. This is the first time you realise that certain costume changes are impossible with the real costumes, or that the real costumes don’t have the flexibility for you to move in the same way when you are, for example, cleaning blood from the stage floor. I tend not to worry anymore when I hear the odd rip in the new costume as it settles into its working life with me.

After the piano dress everything ‘real’ is taken away and we return to using rehearsal props and costumes, in the knowledge that they are quite different to the real thing. For this show we then had 5 stage and orchestra rehearsals. That’s 5 three hour rehearsals continuing to develop the show on stage whilst the orchestra gets used to the piece and the conductor settles into the pace on stage. With so much action on stage the conductor always needs to be alert. Often, early in stage orchestra rehearsals, little pauses that have been rehearsed for weeks in the practise room disappear and the well established pace of the scene is lost, only to return towards the end of these rehearsals.

After each stage and orchestra rehearsal we singers have notes from the Director. In the case of this show, notes have tended to last an hour or so with every little detail noted and discussed. This is not a show that is under-cooked, there has been so much time and care taken to make each scene as strong as possible.  The care and time is extended to the two Imperial guards too, we have been made to feel part of the process throughout, and this week extra time was found to add depth to many of our new silent stage appearances.

Following the end of the stage and orchestra rehearsals we then have the pre-dress rehearsal, which was last night. Back come all the original set and props and on again comes the original costume, though with a few additions to make movement even more difficult though also with an extremely comfortable pillow sown into the jacket which would make leaning against walls a breeze.  

Big team

One of the niceties of these final few rehearsals is that you get to see all the people that go into making the show. For weeks on end the company feels tiny, the 8 singers, Directors and music staff creating the piece miles away from the theatre. Then, as the stage and orchestra week develops, more and more people turn up and you realise how much work has gone in to creating the piece.

I may have mentioned before but Stuttgart is the biggest multi-discipline theatre in Europe, with theatre, ballet and opera all on the same site and over 1000 people working here. Everything is done within house and so when I stand and stare at the stunning art work that is the backdrop of our set I know that someone within our theatre team has created it. I know for a fact that the intricate material used for our jackets in the show was made by hand in the theatre (I’ll show you a picture next week). Its stunning work and we are very lucky in Stuttgart to have such skilled craftsmen.

What else

In addition to all the stage rehearsals this week we had one performance of Nabucco, my 30^th performance of the season.  I also took some time away from the theatre to enjoy the start of the 6 Nations Rugby Championship in which England made a very good start.

Having chosen to watch the match in the Irish bar in the middle of town I was surprised to be the only Englishman. A scattering of red-Wales shirts  appeared just before the match but the bar was mostly full of locals whose response to the big tackles and hard hits was more shock and horror than anything else. They were also quite alarmed by my vocal support and string of expletives when England finally started playing well. This weeks game is an earlier kick off so I imagine the bar will return to being almost completely empty, I hope so.

Next

Tonight is the final rehearsal, or Dress Rehearsal, or General Rehearsal (whatever it is called in the different theatres) for the Jommelli with the opening night on Sunday. I am excited to finally be performing it and to get onto other projects again. I have a couple of auditions coming up and a little trip back to the UK at the end of the month which will come just at the right time!

Hope you all have a good week. Thank you for reading.

Tom 

ps: Weight gone in the right direction this week. Happy face

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Social media?

I would never write anything horrible about other people on Facebook or Twitter, I would never jeopardise my work with an Opera company or Orchestra by expressing stupid views or insulting someone for everyone to read. Yesterday evening I was in a terrible mood, and I could quite easily have written something on twitter about it, for all 953 followers to read instantly.  

It is this immediacy and potential reach that can scare people about 'social media', two things that are also great about it. The ability for 'John Smith' to tweet about delays on the London Underground and for that to be read, within minutes, by hundreds of thousands of people across the world, not just in London, is quite remarkable and useful if you happen to be heading to the Underground. More seriously it can give power to people to spread important news quickly, mobilise, even fight oppression like in Egypt during 2011 or the Iranian election protests of 2009/10. 

In a world where good PR and being perfect is imperative, large organisations are petrified of being found out through social media. Of having an employee speak honestly about the goings on in the company, or have an employee say something controversial and potentially detrimental to their public face. They only want social media to help spread the news of their great work and all the positive things they have done. Further to that, we as individuals are scared of not seeming perfect, fun, busy, successful. The amount of self congratulatory Facebook statuses or Tweets often far outweigh the negative and if I compared my life to the life I think my friends are leading through their social media stories then I'd be quite depressed. 

Social art form

Arts organisations are just as afraid of social media as any one else. Famously a soprano was recently sacked in Australia on the back of a post she had written, on Facebook, expressing some unsavory views. But like other organisations they want to use it to increase their reach,  

People could learn a lot from The Wigmore Hall, the wonderful recital hall in the middle of London. They have a great social media presence and approach, a selection of people from their office take it in turns to man the twitter feed and due to their relaxed engaging tweeting they have created a real personality. Occasionally funny, often interacting with others, the occasional adverts for concerts make more impact as a result and I would suggest that they are doing more than most to champion classical music through this modern medium. 

So what about Social Media as an Opera singer. How does it help? Whats the point? Why do some agents encourage their artists to have twitter and instagram and a facebook page? 

Social media is not compulsory, but assuming you do sign up for it there are no obvious manuals for how to be. There are, though, some people who do it very well. Like Mezzo-Soprano extraordinaire Joyce Di Donato. Through her instagram and twitter, and particularly through her vlogging, video blogging, she has developed a fan base who feel like they know her. She has become a darling of the media in fact and she does it very well. Then there is Scottish Bass-Baritone Iain Paterson, who blogs eloquently and intelligently, often addressing serious issues within Opera with well thought-out arguments and, at the same time, tweets about his frustrations with South West Trains and the challenges of memorising a role with 5000+ words in it. In contrast there are people with twitter accounts who are terrible at it. One particular artist who was recently launching a book had his twitter account set up so that it re-tweeted every tweet that mentioned him, which just annoyed his regular followers and made it obvious that he didn't really care. And we all know that its easier to lose someones interest than it is to get it back. 

My experience of using Twitter in particular has been positive. On the back of Tweets and retweets, as well as shares on Facebook, my blog has now had over 25'000 page views. That's on average over 1000 views for each post I have written. I find that quite remarkable for a guy who is just writing a little blog about trying to be an opera singer. Yet despite 950 Twitter followers and 5'000 hits a month on my blog, my personal website gets about 400 per month on average and I have 'only' 160 likes on my Facebook page and 100 listens to my soundcloud clips a month. All in all though, any of those views on my website via social media results in more people knowing about me and the hope is of course that that will lead to people coming to hear me, becoming fans and buying my (yet to be made) CD's or even for agents and opera companies to be interested in me. In the wider scheme of things it is also a hope that more people will be interested in Opera as a result.

The balance

For me, I think there has to be a good balance with using social media to further ones career as a singer. A balance between selling and engaging. I hope to follow good examples like the Wigmore, Iain and Joyce, interact well with followers, write interesting posts, not just about music, engage with society and genuinely trying to extend the reach of our art form. I try not to bore people, let alone myself, yet try to actually tell people about what I am doing. As I have mentioned before, honesty is very important to me and a lack of honesty on Social media is as much as a turn off as retweeting every time you get mentioned. I try to show some of my personality yet also keep a lot to myself, for the important private side of life. 

Take this blog, I didn't contrive to write it as a way to become famous. Far from it, I wrote it originally as a way to let friends and family know what I was doing and also for anyone who may be interested to read about life in an Opera studio. That is it being read in many countries by quite a few people is a product of its honesty and not of me trying to sell myself. That is may be helping increase interest in Opera among Facebook friends and Twitter followers is a really good by-product and if I can get more people interested in this world of Opera which I love then that's great. 

This week

That brings me, finally, onto this week. Don't worry Oper Stuttgart, I am not about to write a load of negatives about the place and my life here. In all honesty, there is no need. I think Oper Stuttgart is a great house and place to work. Anyone who has read all twenty of my posts so far will know how positive I feel about the house and my colleagues. 

If I glossed over my frustrations this week, though, I wouldn't be being honest with you all and would be giving any future Opera Studio members a false sense of happy contentment. The truth is that, as I was warned, sometimes being the opera studio guy can be annoying. I want to be Pavarotti, at the front of the stage singing great arias, in great opera houses and to great crowds of people. The current Opera I am in I am not that. I am the guy at the back of the stage, clearing the table and playing the statue, and making sure the floor isn't slippery for the next scene. Sure enough I sing a bit in the show, not very much, and it has been great to be part of the process of creating a new production, but I sure can't wait for my next chance to get my hands on a proper role which I can live in and develop. Given that the only calls I have had this week have been for my role as the servant you will understand my frustrations even more. It is my challenge to not allow those frustrations to show, to do a good job, take from it what I can and move on. 

As a result of this my other current focuses feel even more important. The role of Ferrando in Cosi Fan Tutte, which I cover later in the Stuttgart season, continues to settle into my voice well, which is good. I am preparing the music for three choral society concerts I am doing back in the UK in March and April and I am also trying to piece together the repertoire for a UK competition I have entered for around the same time. Choosing repertoire for competitions, and in fact recitals, can be bit like doing a jigsaw puzzle and it takes time for the final picture to emerge. 

The early planning for some recital CD's continues, a more complicated jigsaw puzzle than that of choosing competition repertoire which includes thinking about programmes, collaborators, venues, timing, costs and fundraising etc. I am, though, very excited about the potential end products and the process as a whole, and will keep you all updated as this develops. 

Away from the Opera

Outside of the Opera life (what... there is a life outside Opera??) I have been enjoying running through the local park, despite the freezing weather. I have also laughed at the reaction I get from other park users when they see my bare legs whilst it is minus 4 degrees Celsius. They obviously haven't played Rugby on frozen pitches in a howling gale or sung Christmas carols when its so cold that you can't read the music through the thick fog your breath is creating. One guy stopped and started shouting at me and pointing at my legs..... maybe he liked my knees, I didn't stick around long enough to find out.

I had a lovely evening with some of my opera studio colleagues and a member of the ensemble, and his wife, last Saturday evening. Sharing food and wine, watching films and generally having a normal evening. Just what the doctor ordered.  I returned to the same house later in the week to join a friend of mine from the Royal Academy who is here covering the main tenor part in Il Vologeso. Away from Opera he is a massive Board game fan and he introduced me to some of the most complicated and actually most enjoyable Board games I have played, though I didn't win any which annoyed me. I'll have to read up on strategy before the next time. 

Happily this evening I am free to watch the start of the 6 Nations Rugby championship, which will keep me well occupied over the next few weeks. Come on England!!

So in the meantime, hope you all have a great week.

Tom 

ps: Fitter again, 95.5% of Starter weight.... Next week will be better.

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