August 25, 2012

Almost in Houston (again)

I am a week and a half away from my first rehearsal in Houston of Rossini's Otello, and I'm a combination of excited and nervous. I have been working on Otello like crazy the second half of the summer. When I've directed before, staging has always come easily for me. However, full length operas are a lot different than individual scenes and the 45-minute opera I directed at USC. There are so many repetitive sections (this is Rossini, after all), and it's hard figuring out what to do with all of them. I really want the opera to be interesting all the time, but I feel pretty limited at times! I think I have come up with a pretty good-looking opera - now I have to see it on stage with actual singers instead of my imagination.

In addition to the staging part, I've also come up with daily schedules, written synopses for the website and the program, sent introductory emails to the cast and chorus, and written a director's note for the program. And whenever I think everything's done, something else pops up (like singers emailing me with conflicts, ugh!). My next project is making an outline for what I'm going to say at our first cast meeting - I have to go through the detailed concept of the opera, character analyses, talk to the chorus about what I expect from them, and go through some basic cast rules and regulations (when to wear stage shoes, when to sing out, etc.). I haven't started my list yet, but I don't want to forget anything important.

Like I said, I'm excited but nervous. I think everything is going to be great, but I'm worried about singers with egos who don't want to do what I tell them, and staging taking too long and having to redo the entire schedule, and finding time to go to the grocery store and cook, among other things. I'm also worried about staging the chorus well (I've never worked with chorus before), and about whether my staging will look good at all and not be super boring. I'm excited because I don't think too many of my worries are going to come through, and I can't wait to step into the role of director at a real company. I will be sure to give updates if I have any energy left after rehearsing daily from noon-11pm. :-)

In other excellent news, I auditioned for New York City Opera for the cover of the Maid in Thomas Adès' 1995 opera, Powder Her Face. It's an extremely difficult leading role that I sang during my doctorate at USC with the composer conducting. I auditioned on a Friday, and was offered the cover the following Monday! At my audition, I started with Madame Mao's aria from Nixon in China, and the general manager of the company said "Wow!" the second I was finished singing. I wish all auditions were like that! I'm thrilled to get my foot in the door at NYCO since they do a lot of modern music, which I love to sing. I'll be rehearsing in January and February, with the shows in February.

But first, off to start a new adventure in Houston. I'll keep you posted!