Singing for my supper

I am regularly reminded by my Dad that I have taken blogging Epic Failure to a whole new level. Five months without a post? Pathetic. I've thought long and hard about why I've found it so hard to write this year. I've half-started any number of posts (at last count, I think there are at least 6 in my "drafts" folder, and those are only the ones I actually got so far as to start writing down), but none of them seemed to gel. Part of the logjam has been diverted attention: 2011 was unquestionably our "Year of the Puppy", and that young, fluffy bundle of energy has taken up A LOT of time. Last puppy we raised was in 1994, and we lived in the middle of nowhere in the UK, with loads of footpaths and hills at our disposal; there's no denying that doing the same thing (with the same high-energy breed!) in a US suburb has been a very different - and time consuming - experience! It's been wonderful, though. For those who've only known me since univ...

Click here for rules Short version: summarize an operaplot on Twitter in a status update of 140 characters or less. Tweet must include the hashtag #operaplot. Even if you're not an opera fan, it's worth tootling over to Twitter and searching the hashtag #operaplot to check these out - anybody who thinks opera, opera singers and opera fans are boring fuddy-duddies is in for a surprise!

A well-timed nudge expressing pleasure that I'd "finally posted again" (!) reminded me I hadn't yet posted my annual roundup for the year. Somehow while working on that I was also moved to experiment with a "new year, new look" for the blog so apologies for any glitches - work in progress! So, without further ado: In 2010 ..... I finally caught up on about 5 years of British television I'd managed to miss; this project started out merely as entertainment, but quickly became something much more artistically important and, in a way, prompted the theme of dramatic exploration that drove my performing year. We started the year with North & South and were bowled over by this amazing production - it would be hard to overstate what a tremendous artistic "reboot" it prompted (it even warranted its own blog entry ). Impressed as we were, we decided to give some of Richard Armitage's other productions a try which led us first back to S...

Nul points for me on the blogging front this month, I think. Student juries and recitals, a delicious string of Messiah performances, Christmas preparations and a feast of food and family (groovy alliteration, huh?!) have kept me good and busy. It's been an unexpectedly joyful season this year, which was a lovely boost - good music and good people do a lot to restore one's faith in humanity, and I had ample supplies of both this month. Looking forward to adventures in January with a family trip to the UK, and a new production of Mozart's Marriage of Figaro starting rehearsals in February, giving us much to be excited about - hopefully this time I'll have enough energy at the end of the day to write about it! In the meantime, the happiest New Year to readers: 2010 has seen things start to look up again after such difficult times for so many in 2009 - keeping fingers crossed that 2011 continues the trend!

As mentioned in yesterday's post, I was one of the lucky 15 invited to join David Hobby on an "advocacy journalism" shoot (definitely a case of being online on the right day at the right time and thus responding before he closed the opportunity!!). The landscape and architectural subject matter is very different from the kind of thing I usually shoot, but I really wanted to take advantage of the opportunity to stretch my legs and, of course, work with Mr Strobist himself, David Hobby, the genius behind www.strobist.com . Other than the fact that I have little experience with this type of photography - most of what I do involves people in relatively controlled environments rather than buildings or fields and at the whim of nature's light! - the most intimidating part of the day was that we had to turn over our unedited files to David. The protocol was for us to shoot - jpg, no less (I always shoot raw if only as a CYA measure!) - mark the ones we liked b...

Preview of "Telltale Hearts and Twilight Fancies" from The Baltimore Sun here

True confession: I finally started following Twitter. I made an account a while back but didn't quite catch on to how it worked, and it's only now that I've been making a point of checking it regularly. (You can find me @MezzoMG if you're interested in following.) After two weeks of active participation, while I can see how it could be a potential time drain - especially since so many of the accounts I follow are linked out to articles, news stories and blogs - it has also drawn my attention to some really interesting things I might have missed otherwise. So with that in mind, in no particular order, a blogroll of some sites which have recently caught my interest: A Hit, a Very Palpable Hit (@vlavla). I found this linked off an article about the Hamlet, John Simm, but the blog itself is a wonderful account of what we all go through as performers as we put together a significant show. Excellent stuff. I Value the Arts (@ivaluethearts) Widely circulated through soci...

I realise that this blog has gone in all sorts of different directions since I started it. Initially, I envisaged it focusing specifically on the challenges facing an "opera mom" out there in the trenches. Well, clearly there have been plenty of entries about that (welcome to my life!), but also a lot of entries on things rather peripheral to that. In a way, that's a bit what 2009 has been like, so it's no surprise I suppose. My focus has been forcibly shifted by events and, while it hasn't always been happily so and has certainly rocked the boat, it has perhaps had some small hidden benefits. It's all too easy to become hyperfocused as as singer, to ONLY be able to think about singing, things that relate directly to singing, what other people think of your singing, what other people are singing and where, where and what you want to be singing, ... it's no wonder that the caricatures of the self-obsessed singer are rife! Some of those attentions a...

... I happened to stumble over this marvellous blog/column by casting director Bonnie Gillespie. While written for actors and presenting things from a film industry point of view, there is much of relevance to just about any branch of the performing arts, and I'm finding it refreshing to read things seen from a slightly different angle. Recommended.

to blog anything that isn't bad news in the arts at the moment. Another regional opera company bit the dust this week and has publicly announced they are ceasing trading and I think we're all getting worn down by article after article expressing concerns over the future of the arts in general. While this last collapse didn't affect me directly, the demise of the company where I held contracts for the spring means this is now dead time for me, and I have too much time on my hands to think about it all. I have things to look forward to later in the year, but this current period is the first time in many years that I have had this much downtime between gigs and I can't deny that I miss being onstage dreadfully. As the saying goes, however, I've been "making lemonade". Without being at the mercy of the "daily schedule" (professional companies seldom give you a solid schedule more than 24hrs ahead of time, and the only BINDING schedule is the one t...

I think it's feeling neglected. Between the holidays, getting back to school, starting to prep some (small) forthcoming projects, and becoming completely and totally immersed in picture-taking (what can I say? I'm hooked), I've fallen badly behind. More substantial musings to come, Little Blog, I promise! In the meantime, a project I've started for myself, namely the Photo a Day gallery, which can be found here . It may offer glimpses of my life at the moment, although many of them are simply studies as I wrap my head around the technical side of picture-taking. Enjoy! ====================== I recently found several comments which hadn't been published - my apologies to those who responded! I've posted them now.