This post continues the previous one.
What do you do when you feel uncertain about pitches, rhythms, and entrances?
The soprano performing Samuel Barber's Sure on this Shining Night did not find it the easiest song to learn, but she loved the poem so much that she stuck with it until she could pretty much sing it in her sleep. However, when it was time to perform it for the class she started second-guessing herself - it was as though she'd forgotten how well she knew the song! While she actually sang it pretty accurately the first time through, so much of her attention was eaten up wondering whether she was getting it right that there wasn't enough left over to fully express the text and music. As a result, her power, resonance and breath reserves were significantly diminished from what I know to be her potential.
The voice responds to your intention to communicate, so without a strong intention you won't elicit an optimal response from your voice. I reminded her how much she loves the poem and how well she knows the piece; I also asked her to give herself permission to make mistakes, because under most conditions a committed and passionate delivery will mitigate musical inaccuracies. Once performance nerves kick in, it can be difficult to restore your focus the creative process! But this particular soprano has been disciplining her mind at the School for Practical Philosophy and did a really impressive job of getting her attention back where it needed to be. If all you're thinking about as you approach the phrase "All is healed, all is health" is how high and sustained it is, the result is that we hear is you reaching for something you think is difficult. But if you're fully invested in expressing something gently ecstatic, you create conditions where your voice can respond effortlessly, validating Barber's intentions when he set the phrase that way in the first place.
That's what happened with this singer - the first time through, the phrase was under pitch and breathy; the second time, it was superb. Everyone was impressed with the difference. Intention is powerful. Technique and musicianship are important, but they're only there to serve your communicative intent.
What can you do to minimize the appearance of performance anxiety?
This class was also a first for a mezzo with an exceptionally rich, deep sound who has worked with me for about 8 months. As the pianist played the introduction to Sondheim's "Losing My Mind", her extreme nervousness was evident in her body language as she rapidly shifted her weight from one foot to the other and pulled at the edges of her sleeves. And then she let loose with the best singing I've ever heard from her, while continuously shifting from left to right, tugging on her sleeves and looking at the floor.
The steadiness and confidence in her voice was so completely at odds with what was going on in her arms and legs that I wasn't sure what her own experience had been. So I asked her whether she felt nervous, and she replied, "Yes! I had no idea whether anything was even going to come out!"
I think you're pretty lucky if your nerves manifest in a way that causes you to discharge excess physical energy without actually messing with your technique and musicianship! I asked her to lean against the piano, sink down into her legs slightly to get grounded, take firm hold of the piano lid with her left hand, and focus her eyes just above the audience instead of looking down. as she performed the song a second time. She may have had a death grip on the piano lid, but she was able to sing with minimal extraneous movement.
Even with a serious meditation practice and a prescription for beta blockers, for most singers it just takes a lot of experience to master performance anxiety. As you're getting that experience, do what you can to make yourself more comfortable and mask the more obvious signs of nervousness. Anything you can do to feel physically more grounded and supported will be a help. As depicted below, I guess you can always clasp your hands the old fashioned way to keep from fidgeting! But for a song like the Sondheim it's fine to let the piano hold you up and keep you from pacing around.
How do you make a long aria interesting in a recital setting, especially one that depends on orchestration for a lot of the drama?
If you're a soprano with a sizable voice and you don't love Massenet, finding the perfect French audition aria can be a challenge. The operas that Verdi originally composed in French offer some good options. I personally prefer Toi, qui su le néant (a.k.a. Tu che la vanità) from Don Carlos in French, but singing it in French doesn't make it any shorter or easier to put across out of context!
How do you give an effective performance of a long, complex aria out of context, with piano accompaniment? You respect the difficulty and give it your best shot. The soprano who performed this used the class as an opportunity for a first text drive, so we focused on assessing what she'll need to do to take it to the next level.
Toi, qui su le néant is structured A-B-C-D-E-A and runs about 11 minutes. The most important challenge is crafting a dramatic arc for Queen Elisabeth so that when the A section returns, everything that she's been through since the first time she sang it has significantly transformed the way she relates to and expresses the material. Verdi created a unique orchestral environment for each of the intervening sections, and without that changing aural scenery the singer and accompanist have to be as specific and creative as possible to play up the dramatic significance of each leg of the journey. We worked on defining where the character is emotionally at the beginning of the aria, where she might end up at the end, and chipped away at the relationship between voice and during the first intermediary section.
Some arias require a lot more preparation than others before you can perform them effectively in auditions or on recitals. Another that comes to mind is Zerbinetta's aria from Strauss's Ariadne auf Naxos. Well-prepared, it can be highly successful in auditions; underprepared, it just feels like it's endlessly meandering!
What can you do about unconscious, extraneous movement?
Our final singer was a bass-baritone who gave a sonorous performance of O Isis und Osiris from Die Zauberflöte. He's a more seasoned singer than the woman who sang the Sondheim, but the main issues were the same: his physical presence did not match the gravitas of his singing. There was constant, rapid movement in his hands and shoulders that was totally out of sync with the slow, meditative movement of the music.
Once again, awareness is often curative – he hadn't realized that he was doing this, and he was able to inhibit a lot of the twitchiness. But the main reason that it was there in the first place was the fact that he hadn't yet given any thought to how to physically embody Sarastro. This is such an important part of preparing an aria or a role, yet often singers will slave over the musical and vocal aspects of a piece and only as an afterthought consider how the character moves and stands. Just as with any other part of your preparation, if you do not intend something, habits and other concerns will take over. If you consciously define a character's vocabulary of movement and practice internalizing it, there will be far less room for any unconscious, extraneous movement to distract from your performance.
I also take the opportunity during these classes to have the singers practice basic performance etiquette, because the biggest challenge for many of them is not the actual singing but relating to their audience: how to enter and exit the stage, and especially how to receive and respond to applause. Very few of them can tolerate it long enough to just stand there, bow or curtsy, and smile, until it subsides – and some of them have trouble seeming to acknowledge it at all! Even after practicing this and seeing one another have trouble remembering to respond graciously and receptively to applause, I suspect that not all of them will remember this important part of their job.
Whatever you may think of your own performance, always allow your audience to show their appreciation for the amazing thing you just did. It was amazing, whether you think so or not! And with practice, you will gradually become capable of tolerating it a little more each time – and hopefully, to receive their admiration and gratitude in a way that truly affirms your expressive gifts and lets you know that you were able to connect with them in a profound way.
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