Fears, cheers, and tears...

Fears:
Today was in a word: amazing.  To begin my blog for today, I am becoming increasingly nervous about our masterclass with Claudia Catania.  Although voice is my primary instrument, I have my own reservations about my technique.  I am extremely honored to have been selected to participate in this immersion trip, but I do get nervous because the majority of our cohort are performance majors.  Despite these fears and my own insecurities, I am excited to hear from another voice teacher about my singing and vocal technique.  On an even more selfish note, I am singing the piece I will sing for the masterclass in my senior recital, which will act as my final vocal representation at UWEC.  In this sense, I am thrilled to receive as much help as possible to be able to enhance my technique and improve my piece.

Cheers:
Four students also had the pleasure of participating in a vocal coaching with David Sytkowski.  This experience, although I did not sing, was amazing!  David was such an extremely talented man who I really admired how he encouraged performance practice and textual expression to portray the pieces more effectively and even correct issue with tone.  I particularly enjoyed listening to him, because I am considering a possible graduate school degree in musicology, he used a lot of performance history to support his interpretations which I thought was really impressive.  It was also impressive how expansive his repertoire bank is and how, on the drop of a hat, he can reference so many lieder, arias, ect.  It was also very exciting to find out that David had arranged for Michael Fabiano, a popular and successful up and coming tenor who is now performing the role of Alfred in the Met's Die Fledermaus, to speak with us.  I admit, I was starstruck.  Luckily, all of the questions I had were answered because I know that had I asked them myself, I would have fumbled over my words.  I thought he was very honest and upfront with our group, but in a sincere and genuine way, which I really appreciated.  It was also great hearing from an individual who is now performing in a leading role at the Met.

Continuing with the cheers portion of this blog, tonight we also had the pleasure of attending "Fun House" at the Public Theater.  The show was amazing!  The plot revolves around a forty something woman who is lesbian who self narrates her life and her relationship with her father.  The story switches from the past and the present while the present aged protagonist, Allison, is active in all of the scenes.  The cast was small, but insanely talented and included three young children actors who perfectly carried the stage with grace and intensity throughout the drama.  What I found to be most impressive was how strongly acted the musical was throughout.  The singing was also impeccable from the actors, which enhanced the intensity of the show.  I would recommend this show to everyone.  Throughout, the musical addressed such themes as sexuality, parent-child relationships, first loves, loves lost, growing old, and self discovery in all capacities.  

Tears:
Due to "Fun House" being such an amazing show, I am not ashamed to say that I cried throughout the entire second half.  The relationship between the father and daughter was so real and was handled so beautifully that I genuinely felt for the characters.  What made the musical even more devastatingly fantastic was that within the first few minutes, we were told the fate of the father and the daughter.  This made the plot even more intense for me because I needed to know the journey of this family, and boy when I found out and it hit me hard.  I took solace in knowing that everyone sitting to my right and left were also in tears at the end of the show.  Overall, as I stated before, the musical was beautiful!  I would certainly see it again.  And, as an added bonus, Judy Kuhn, who was the voice of Pocahontas, played the mother in the show and I was lucky enough to get a picture with her, which basically made my life!

With now having the ability to cross "get a picture with a Disney princess" off my bucket list, I am hoping to have a new found sense of confidence for our masterclass tomorrow!  WWPD-What Would Pocahontas Do?  She would go around that river bend and so shall I!

Cory Bristol