Singing for my supper

To start at the end instead of the beginning... June 29, 2012 brought some pretty awful storms to the region. Our area was one of the worst-hit, with trees down pretty much on every block; we consider ourselves beyond lucky that neither of the two big elms in the front yard came down on our house and that we suffered no material damage.  Still, no power for 4 days and 16hrs - during a 3-digit heatwave - is a whole lot of not fun (and, at writing, some people are STILL waiting to be restored nearly a week after the event).  Short version: never underestimate a thunderstorm, and if your weather channel ever says the word " derecho ", check your insurance policy, hunker down, and make sure you have somewhere to go after the fact.  Every bit as bad - or worse - than a hurricane, and more like tornado damage. Earlier in the month, our daughter graduated middle school and moves on to high school in September. When did THAT happen?! Last time I looked she was a cute littl...

I'm losing track of whether I'm living a double, triple, quadruple or other -ple life these days!  It's been pretty crazy - in a good way, I hasten to add, but crazy! Last weekend was singing what may be my favorite work in the entire world: the Verdi Requiem .  I'm a fan of most of what Mr Joe Green gave us, but the Requiem is extra special (and especially for the mezzo).  The schedule this time out was very compressed and singing a massive work like this (the equivalent of a full opera, and then some!) four times in three days definitely demanded every ounce of stamina I posess,  but so worth every single moment. I'd do it again in a heartbeat. This is the third time I've been privileged to sing this extraordinary piece, and each time I've discovered new things not only in the music, but in my own singing. I've found reserves of strength, stamina, colour and nuance I didn't know I had - could anything be more satisfying than that?  I only wish...

(Disclaimer: Mom, I adore you, and am grateful to you for everything you've ever done to educate me to this point, and for allowing me to continue to challenge things, to learn and to grow .... even when you vigorously disagree with my opinion!) It's been typically busy (seems like it's seldom anything else these days, with both the pros and cons which come with it!), but my parents somehow managed to find a date when we could all go and see a splendid production of Sondheim's Into the Woods together.  We all enjoyed it immensely - my husband and I have long been fans of Sondheim's work in general, and particularly this show - it was a treat to take our daughter to a top-notch performance of a work she hadn't seen before,  and even my Sondheim-resistant parents agreed that perhaps they had been hasty in describing him as "tuneless" and "not their thing" as they loved absolutely every minute of the performance as much as we did (kudos to the...

This post has nothing to do with singing, parenting (2- or 4-foot), photography, or any other stated brief. It's about paint. You know, that stuff that people put on their walls because it's "cheap" and (as the magazines cheerfully say) "such an easy facelift!". I have friends who paint regularly. And by "regularly", I mean pretty much as often as the Pottery Barn catalog comes out, or a new colour-scheme suddenly takes their fancy. In theory, I think this is a great idea. But the reality of it is that we are not "paint to change your mood" people. In fact, I'm beginning to wonder if we're even competent homeowners. Apparently, I completely and totally SUCK at choosing paint. When we did our renovation four years ago I went through about 15 sample pots before I found one I really liked (love, in fact). This time round, our weird variable light was complicated by a need to sometimes use the living room room for photoshoots, mean...

Some more photos from "The Daily Coop" (as my buddy over at The Next 100 Pounds has dubbed my tendency to post pictures of the little guy on Facebook): I promise that he isn't really a stuffed toy even if he looks like one! Baby Beardies are unspeakably cute - puppies for this breed (which of course look nothing AT ALL like their adult selves) are hard to ignore. This is, in fact, one of the reasons the breed society is so outspoken about the demands and challenges of this breed once they reach adulthood, so that people aren't seduced by The Adorableness and wind up with an adult Beardie who they can't handle. While they are indeed wonderful family dogs and beyond friendly, they do not stay fuzzy little fluffballs for long and grow into big, high-energy, long-coated dogs who need a lot of time and energy to be happy! Since this is our third Beardie, we knew exactly what we were getting into, even though it's been a while and it's only now I'm rememb...

This packed (intensely hard-work, but ultimately very successful) semester is over and, although I have a new role to prepare for next month and there will no doubt be theatrical musings once I get into rehearsals, life for the next couple of weeks is entirely focused on the newest member of the family:

Ok, so a day late - although I don't think a dollar short, and no less heartfelt. Those endless hours at the typewriter in Los Angeles! You were determined that there were never going to be any real financial concerns to scare a kid into wondering if everything was going to be ok. To make sure that I really could keep up with the horses and the horseshows. That I could go back to the UK to study, first to reconnect with those important childhood years spent in England, and subsequently to complete my performance training at one of the most prestigious conservatories in the world without having to work 5 jobs just to pay the rent. Strangely, one of the things I remember most of our LA years was the Sunday night family steak dinners at The Mainsail in Marina Del Rey (or was it Venice?). The dark-paneled, underlit gloom which they billed as "New York Steakhouse", somewhat California-ized by funky murals on the walls and typically Los Angeles servers who almost certainl...