Don’t miss the chance to work with brilliant mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato! Receive one-on-one coaching in her annual master classes at Carnegie Hall. Submit your application before December 15:...
The deadline is coming up! Submit your application before December 15 here
Join U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, author Donna Leon and I in conversation about the role of music in finding peace! It’s a free event but tickets are required, so make sure you get yours that same day by standing in line at the REACH.
For those unable to attend there will be a livestream on Youtube!
October 16 - Teatro Mayor in Bogotá, Colombia
October 19 - Teatro Nacional Eduardo Brito in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic
October 22 & 23 - Teatro Cultura Artística in São Paulo, Brazil
October 25 - Fundación CorpArtes in Las Condes, Chile
October 28 & 30 - Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires, Argentina
November 3 - Atlanta, Georgia, USA
November 6 - Houston, Texas, USA
November 8 & 9 - Washington, D.C., USA
Learn more about the Jette Parker Young Artists Programme!
I’ll be teaching three master classes to four lucky singers. December 15 is the application deadline, but everything must be uploaded to YAP tracker by October 11!
Whether you are an opera singer, professional singer of some other kind, or perhaps are in a chorus or only a shower singer, we all experience a physical and emotional surge when we sing. Yet we don’t always pause to reflect on this.
In April I attended one of Joyce DiDonato’s wonderful master classes at the Weill Education Center of Carnegie Hall. I had been thinking about the question of “Why do I sing?” when I read the program and discovered that DiDonato had asked each applicant to write a brief essay on that very topic as part of their application process.
Soprano Alexandra Nowakowski wrote, in part, “I sing for my mom. Thirty years ago, my parents came to America with $30 in their pockets. … My mom had nothing but hope when she came to America. She passed that hope along to me when I decided to pursue singing, and for that I will owe her my career.”
Tenor Aaron Crouch wrote, “My favorite thing about being a singer is being a communicator. I truly believe that music is the universal language. My goal is to always have some sort of effectiveness through my singing — whether that comes in the form of tears, laughter, or simply a smile. It’s not about the high notes or the fast notes. It’s about being vulnerable and having something to say to people. That is why I sing.”
American soprano Madelyn Renée, who has been based in Italy for many years, told me, “Singing is a transformative experience in that it unites the physical, emotional, and spiritual part of us. As our most important means of communication, our voices convey all of our emotions: joy, sorrow, anger, fear, etc. When we sing, we are connected to our respiratory system, and the outpouring of sound is a healthy way to relieve stress and calm the mind and body, engendering a sense of harmony and well-being. As a singer, it is what I love to do best. It brings me back to myself and I always feel like a new person after a good sing! As Ella Fitzgerald always said, ‘The only thing better than singing is more singing!’”
The excellent South African bass-baritone Musa Ngqungwana is as eloquent a writer as he is a singer. He is the author of Odyssey of an African Opera Singer, a candid account of having responsibility for a mighty gift (his voice) that has given him joy, but also of the many challenges he has had along the way. In the book and a recent social media post, he spoke of “how writing and singing saved me from depression as they became my free therapeutic tools and sessions.”
What I have come to love is the way people sing together. In fractious, difficult times such as ours, hearing and seeing people achieve harmony through listening to one another is a model we should all try to emulate.
There are some countries in the world that I think of as singing nations. These are often places that have been subjected to repression. Estonia is such a place. Between 1987 and 1991 its people waged what was known as the Singing Revolution, which included acts of defiance that were often incorporated into singing by individuals or crowds of hundreds of thousands. I first visited there in 1979 when it was part of the Soviet Union. I came to know brothers Toomas and Tarmo Urb, who courageously merged voices in their own language at time when that was dangerous.
Estonians still gather to sing songs such as “Tuljak," which gives them an opportunity to share identity and revel in their language, and had been suppressed by the Soviets and other occupiers. To sing in this way, for Estonians, is to breathe as one.
One of my favorite examples of how singing unites people is of male and female firefighters who went from South Africa to Canada to help put out huge fires. They used music to form a remarkable bond of solidarity.
Sometimes music of identity is performed by groups of only one gender. South Africa’s all-male Ladysmith Black Mambazo exemplifies the deepest expression of self and of identity with its singing, whether in unison, harmony, counterpoint, or call and response. The women’s choruses of Bulgaria have achieved a huge worldwide following.
In the United States, singing has a long tradition of resistance and affirmation. Sam Cooke sang in many genres. He is famous for his powerful solo rendition of “A Change is Gonna Come." Cooke began as the lead singer of The Soul Stirrers, a gospel group that harmonized beautifully. They often performed a cappella or with minimal instrumental accompaniment. Listen to them and think about how they use their voices as instruments.
Pete Seeger’s classic song “If I Had a Hammer” was first recorded by The Weavers (with Seeger) in 1949. Peter, Paul and Mary did a famous version in 1963. Sam Cooke sang it solo, and soulfully, in 1964.
Each version of this song is deeply moving and emotional for different reasons. The lyrics are eloquent in their simplicity, but also for the power they wield. The melody, too, is simple and sweet, but it accommodates the words and allows each person who sings it (and hears it) to feel a special glow. It is the magic of this song that makes one feel happy and connected to others when singing it.
As I was completing this article, I happened to attend a new work, Octet, by Dave Malloy at Signature Theater, described as a chamber choir musical. Eight superb performers, with voices ranging from soprano to bass, play participants in a support group for people who have difficulty coping with the impact of communications technology in the 21st Century. So beautiful is the music and so sublime were their a cappella performances that I almost found the words pedestrian and intrusive, even though they were meaningful.
One of the simplest and most eloquent expressions of why we sing was also one of the first I encountered, in the film version of Carson McCullers’ The Member of the Wedding, in which Ethel Waters consoles two distraught children by singing the gospel song “His Eye is on the Sparrow.” You might wish to watch the whole video, which includes the scene leading up to the song, which starts at 6:40. The words and music say it all: “I sing because I’m happy. I sing because I’m free.”
People are pretty much never just one thing. Each person is made of the stuff in their individual history, including the music. That includes Grammy-winning opera singers. Mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato recently completed a project that brought the disparate parts of her own musical history together. And because she’s Joyce DiDonato, this meant bringing top notch performers from across the musical spectrum into the studio to work together. In this episode, she talks about the fascinating process of bringing jazz and Baroque together, and the surprising connections between the two.
Visit the website of the Classical Classroom Showto to listen to my interview and the music in this episode!!
Criss-crossing North America, opera lovers have been enthralled by Tom Volf’s highly-praised documentary “MARIA by CALLAS”. If you thought you knew all there was to know about this revered singer, you need to see this film. Giving voice to the heart-wrenching letters she sent to beloved friends was an incredible, humbling experience for me as I helped to tell her story in her own words. In honor of the 40th Anniversary of her passing, do see this film, and gain a deeper, more intimate understanding of the woman behind the diva.
DiDonato partnered with Carnegie Hall’s Weill Music Institute and dozens of other artists to bring the arts to young people at a crucial stage in their development: infancy. After asking, “Wouldn’t it be beautiful if every new born child was not only given a lullaby when they leave the hospital, but a personal one from their parents?” The Lullaby Project was born.
Mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato and conductor and pianist Antonio Pappano are two of the most successful musicians in the world. Ahead of a recital at the Royal Opera House, we spoke to them about the mental strain of being a musician, the importance of music education and what they’d tell their 18-year-old selves
I’m doing three days of master classes at Carnegie Hall on April 21, 22, 23 (at the Resnick Education Wing). They’ll be open to the public so come see it! If you can’t make it you can also watch it live online tomorrow.
Alice Coote and I are doing a benefit concert on April 26 in Hudson Yards and The Zaha Hadid Penthouse in support of Time In Kids. It’s a wonderful organization that works to grant chronically disadvantaged public school children equality, opportunity and access to the arts, through the arts. I’m really proud to be working with them <3
And finally, the Cendrillon on April 28 will be broadcast in movie theaters. You can find out if your local movie theater is showing it clicking on this link! Don’t miss it!!
Buy tickets for Joyce DiDonato, mezzo-soprano on 4/15/2018 7:00 PM, Granada Theatre. In her only West Coast appearance, mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato will make her Santa Barbara recital debut with a sumptuous program featuring Rossini bel canto and Handel’s “Lascia ch’io pianga.” Presented by UC Santa Barbara Arts & Lectures.
Letting everybody know about this recital, which seems to have flown under the radar! I’ll be flying to CA between performances of Cendrillon, so if you’d like to come see Craig and I, this is your chance!
UCSB Students get a discount, so make sure you bring your student ID ;)
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