Is it your turn or mine?

Some singers sing along the piano part during transitions and postludes.

What would happen if pianists sang along the vocal lines during the song?



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How to create an online choir

In case you've missed it, this video is a must see for all of us!

How to teach singers a difficult interval

The best solutions are sometimes the simplest.

When singers struggle with a particular interval, have them repeat the two notes of the interval out of rhythm and at a quick pace, over and over again.

Simple. Efficient. Works every time. 



Picture from http://www.vocalessentials.com/therapy.html

2 things to avoid when marking

Marking is an important part of a singer's life, so here are the two ways of marking that are more detrimental than useful.

1. Mark constantly
   If you mark every time you sing other than during the performance, you actually lose your stamina and your vocal strength. You end up more likely to hurt yourself when you suddenly go back to singing full out.
   
   By marking constantly you miss the chance to create muscle memory, which will make it harder for you to hit the high notes and the fast runs during performance.
   
   
2. Mark all aspects of the music
   Because you give less vocally when marking, you will tend to give less in all other aspects of the song. You create bad habits when you stop paying attention to diction, energy and musicality, so make sure you stay engaged.  

Marking is a great tool to protect your voice as long as you make sure to remain focused while doing it, and to use it as a side kick of full out singing.

Picture from http://blogs.voices.com/voxdaily/conferences/Pict

How to get young belters not to be scared

Young belters are often afraid to injure themselves while singing. When they try to belt and they feel "something," they immediately assume that it's bad.

Everyone has had experience working out and feeling their muscles work hard, and knowing that that's safe. And at other times we've actually felt a muscle tear or pull, and knew that that was not safe. The same way students know what is right or wrong when they work out, they need to know that they can trust themselves when they're belting as well.

Belters fear they'll get injured unknowingly, that they won't be able to tell if something is going wrong. Instead of preventing any injury, their fear usually prevents them from finding the right placement. They need to know that they are aware enough of their own body to tell which is which. 



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How to make it as a jazz singer

When you're in grad school, everyone is motivated to make a living as a performer, but not everyone will make it. Jazz singer Amy Yassinger is one of the ones who made it, in just a few years after we both graduated with our masters from Western Michigan University.

You moved to Chicago after your masters degree. How did you get from being new in a new city to doing gigs most nights of the week?
I started working side jobs. At one point I had side jobs between demos, singing, teaching, and I worked at Victoria secret. I was going crazy for a while. December of 2009 this teacher was fired at the high school I was teaching at, and I was handed the studio. I quit all my jobs and I started leading my own group in July 2009. I just kind of built it from there. First gig I had, I had responded to an ad and I gave them my website and they hired me on. Other places I would sit in with other bands. Venues liked me and they wanted to hire me with my own group. Full time performing started in January of 2010, with about two to five gigs a week.

"Venues liked me and they wanted to hire me"

Do you feel that the education you received helped you in the real world?
It didn't help me with dealing with the business end of it, but it helped just learning songs and working with people. I started my own company for weddings and restaurants, and places wanted to write one check only, so I had to open up my own business (LLC Yazz Jazz). For tax purposes I pay musicians through the business versus myself. I learned that from other musicians, not in school. I didn't learn how to schmooze with people, constantly emailing and calling and showing up, following up. It's annoying.

"You have to convince people that 
musicians are people too"

What do you know now that you wished you knew while in school?
That I should have had a job at the school and pay towards my education while in school, because student loan debt is pretty obscene. I feel like I got a diverse experience musically between University of Miami and Western Michigan University. I was in big band and rock band in Miami, and Western was more rigid and strict with Gold Company and more complex jazz songs. Miami gave me the real world experience, because I had a teacher who would send me on her gigs to sub.

"There's always someone 
willing to do the gig for free"

What aspects of your job surprised you?
How often you have to convince people who are hiring you that musicians are people too. For example they don't realize they need to feed musicians and pay them a decent wage so that they can live. I just flat out tell them: "listen it's typical to feed and pay the musicians at least this amount. If that's not gonna work out in your budget let me know what will and we will figure something out." You don't want to anger them because you want them to hire you, and there's always someone out there who is willing to do it for free or cheaper. You have to convince the musicians that they should be happy that they're working at all. It's better to work and make $80 than not work at all. 9 times out of 10, that $80 gig will lead to a private party that will pay $150.

"You can't be complacent"

What do you think is the main challenge of people of your generation who want to be or are performers?
Getting a chance, getting an opportunity. I think a lot of people want other people to do the work for them. A lot of it is being at the right place at the right time, knowing the right people, Ultimately being flexible, being willing to sing or play songs that they don't like or that they deem stupid. Great example, we had a woman on Friday night screaming at us to play dance music, and we're playing jazz standards and love songs that couples were dancing too, and she wanted rowdy music. We ended up playing Chain of Fools, because you have to please every one you can.

Any other thought?
You can't sleep. You have to constantly email people and make phone calls. You can't be complacent.

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Are you fit to be an opera singer?

Maybe you loved basketball growing up. You thought of pursuing it but soon realized that you were way too short to ever go really far with it. No big deal. 
Or you always looked at those beautiful models and thought that it would be a pretty cool job, before you came to the conclusion that you were never meant to be a skin-on-the-bones blond.

What you do love is singing and you definitely want to pursue it. Have you asked yourself if you were physically fit for it, like you would have asked yourself for other jobs? Sure it's an art, but it uses your body so is your body right for it?

Let's take a look at what your vocal folds need to be like for you to have a chance to ever possibly have a full working career as a performer.

• Volume: I don't know why but there are people with small voices and people with big voices. Audiences pay to hear singers. As in, audiences want to be able to hear a singer sing. It seems to me that there is a correlation between how sustained and successful one's career is to how big their voices are. While there are some good secondary roles for medium voices, there are only rarely roles for small voices. Training might help you add a few levels to your basic volume, but if by the end of your bachelor it's still not there, or a year off after that with a different teacher, it might just not be an option for you.
• Strength: this is the most crucial one because it links to other important qualities a performing artist needs to have, such as consistency. Can your vocal cords hold up when you are sick and tired? Can you sing a lot and still sound like you just started? Do you have stamina? A common belief is that training and good habits will teach you how to strengthen your voice, and while it's true that poor training will make your voice weaker, there is also a very important part of plain physical nature in this topic. While learning new habits might reduce the frequency of your voice breaking, you would need to sustain an amount of hours of practicing, rehearsing and performing at the professional level that would most likely be too high, and that would make for an inconsistent and short career.
• Tessitura: that one comes straight from the Fach system. You have to fall into a clear category in order to be cast. If you don't go low enough to be a bass, and not high enough to be a baritone, singing loud and pretty won't make a difference, you just won't get hired. 

Before you spend all your money on a degree that may not bring you a return on your investment, make sure you ask yourself and your trusted entourage if you do have volume, strength and range. Of course other qualities are important to make it as an opera singer: musicality, tone quality, acting abilities, technique, physical type, etc. But those are only considered by employers if they are built on to the basis of volume, strength and tessitura.

I have personal friends who have all that it takes to make it, and yet it is already such a hard career to break into, why try to go there if your body doesn't let you?

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What if you couldn't play or sing anymore?

What if adversity struck and you were told that you could never practice your art ever again? Would you let it go or would you fight to find a way to carry on as an artist?

Here are two amazing stories about performers going to incredible length in order to keep on making it as artists.

The first story, here, is about the principal oboist of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, who suffered from one of the worst injuries musicians can have, focal dystonia.

The next story is about a drummer who became paraplegic and invented a new way to play drums without the use of his legs.

What is the most dedicated thing you have ever done for your art?

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What it takes to be an opera translator- Part 2

The first part of the interview of Jeremy Sortore focused on his training and on what the job entails. This second part gives advices on how to become a translator, how much it pays and what is great about it.

How should a young person go about being an opera translator?
              Obviously, languages are really important. I minored in French in college, and Italian wasn't a difficult step to take from the French, because so much of the grammar is similar. When I sat down with a dictionary I found that I could translate an Italian libretto fairly easily. Language coursework was indispensable for me. I was always the voice student who was really good about doing a lot of translating of my own material, so that was something that I was used to doing. So it didn't seem like such a daunting task to sit down with an entire opera score and try to do the whole translation. It still takes a lot of time and sometimes it is very tedious work, but that was something I was willing to do because it wasn't completely foreign to me. So language and practice, and asides from that, the best advice I have is to do what I did. Talk to someone local, to someone you know already and see if they're going to need a translation and if so, if you can find a win win situation. They might pay a little less than they would normally and you get your first job.

What else did you do in terms of advertising yourself?
              I found a list of opera companies through Opera America. They have budget tiers, and I knew that the Met wasn't probably gonna be interested in my translation right now because I'm sure they have a lot of people to do that, so I started looking at some of the smaller companies and some of the companies that may not have used sub titles up to that point and may be interested in going in that direction. I also contacted a lot of university departments. I went online and got the contact information of directors of various opera programs in academia.

"My rates are extremely flexible"

What is the pay scale of a title translator?
              My rates are extremely flexible depending on who I'm working with. I charge a lot less for university programs or my alma mater. I sort of know what their budget is and how much they can afford. I try not to price myself out of range for those companies. Often I base my rates on how many performances, how large their venue is, and from there I can get a sort of a rough idea of what they might earn in revenue and ticket sale, and from there I can judge how much they might be willing to spend. Some smaller companies may only be able to give you $500 for the rental and then they will find their own person on staff or volunteer to run the titles. Some of the larger companies will pay you royalties like any of their other designers, so you're talking in the thousands for that. That's for rental and licensing. I get two contracts from Opera Colorado, an authorship contract and an operator contract.

Can anyone make a living doing just that?
              Probably not. There might be one or two people in the States that make a significant amount of money from that because they rent all over the place. I remember before I started doing titles for Opera Colorado they had somebody that they had worked with for a very long time. I think it's harder and harder to make a living at it, because in 1983, 1984, around the time when opera companies first started using titles, there were probably only a few people that knew anything about it. Now, most companies hire somebody in house to do their translations.

"I try to make the slide transitions happen at 

logical places in the phrase structure" 

Could a non-musician do that?
              Non musicians could, but I find  that being a musician is so much more helpful. Part of my process in preparing the score is listening to it without really looking at the text, and making marks in the score where I feel that a slide transition would not be distracting. I try to make the slide transitions happen at logical places in the phrase structure. I think that it takes somebody with some musical sense to operate the titles because the timing of the operation is very crucial in that aesthetic so that it doesn't look mechanical or on a timer, like a machine is doing it. So that if it's a slow and soft aria, maybe the singer comes in with the first phrase and the slide might lag behind a little bit, or fade in more slowly instead of popping up there.

"When I run titles I get to feel responsible

for the audience reaction" 

I've been to so many operas where there might be humor and the audience will laugh before the right time because they're done reading the title. Is that something you're aware of when you write, to make sure that people laugh at the time where it makes sense  in the music?
              I do try to do that, both as an author and as an operator. That's one of the most satisfying things when I'm running the titles, and that's one of the reasons why I prefer running a comedy, because you get to feel responsible for the audience reactions sometimes. As an author, what I try to do is if there is a funny line, I try to break it up into two slides so that the operative word of the punch line begins its own new slide, so that I can time that to happen with the corresponding operative word in Italian or French, so that the audience laughs at the right time. I have had singers thank me for that, because it is so much more fulfilling as a performer to have the audience laugh in the place where it makes sense.

"I make sure the companies know that I am not

a hardware person, or a software person" 

So you have to be good at languages, good at music and you have to be good at technology as well because you program it all yourself. 
              The technology isn't too terribly difficult. I make sure that the companies that I rent to know that I am not a hardware person, or a software person. I just send them the files and they need to have their own technical staff make sure that it runs with their system. I'll do everything that I can to help that, but that's not my expertise. I write in power point and I also write in a program named Innovation by Figaro system that a lot of opera companies use for their seat back titles, where you get to read the titles on the back of the seat in front of you.

What is your most favorite aspect of the job?
              I love that I get to be involved in productions that I wouldn't otherwise be involved with. I get to have some passive income when I get to rent some of the translations to some other companies. I've already done the work and I send a score in the mail and collect a check. I like the sense of being connected to many companies all over the country and having some contact throughout the industry.

"Having another job is not something to fall back on, it's something to do in the field before you succeed." 

Any last piece of advice?
              Having a lot of different skills, especially as a music student, has really allowed me to have a lot of freedom to pursue my performance career to a certain degree. I think that a lot of students feel that there is a stigma to developing insulary skills that are not purely related to your ideal career path, as if that's some kind of cope out or admitting defeat. But having another job is not always something to fall back on, it's something to support you in the time that it takes for your performing career to manifest itself. It's about having something to do in the field before you succeed.

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What it takes to be an opera translator- Part 1

It was on a hike in the Colorado mountains that I first talked with Jeremy Sortore about what he does as an artist. As impressive as is his background in voice (he holds a master's degree), acting and teaching, what really intrigued me was his experience as a translator for super or sub titles for operas. This interview is an extension of that original conversation, focused on what the job truly entails, how one gets to do it and what are the pluses and the minuses of the job. 

"I asked the director if I could do the translation 

and they offered to pay me" 

How did you get to work as a translator for opera super-titles?
              I'd always been around an opera company because my mother worked for an opera company when I was a kid, so it was always in the back of my mind. When I was in school doing my undergrad in music and voice, I was cast in an opera and realized that the opera company at the school was gonna need title and I stepped in. I just asked the director if I could do the translation and they offered to pay me, probably a little less than they would have had to pay someone else, and that's how I got started. So I built up quite a library as I was going through school and then started advertising when I was done with my masters and already had a library available to rent.

"I had enough experience that professional 

companies started to take notice" 

How did you end up becoming a professional translator?
              It was a process. At first I was just working with the university music departments, and then other universities' music departments, and from then it went on to small semi professional companies. After a certain point I had enough experience doing that that the professional companies near by started taking notice when they needed somebody to operate the titles. From there I started doing their translation as well. It was step by step.

Do you specialize in one language or do you translate them all?
              My most comfortable language is French although I end up translating a lot more Italian than French, simply because it seems to be what is produced a little bit more, so I'm becoming more comfortable in the Italian. So far I just have French and Italian libretti, and a translation of the Magic Flute because I had done the show couple of times and I knew it very well, but German is my worst language.

"The most difficult thing is to show up to work"

What are some of the main challenges you encounter when you translate?
              The most difficult thing is to show up to work because I do it all by myself, so consequently when I get up in the morning, the hardest thing, as it is for any writer I think, is to sit down and start. Once I've made that commitment and sat down for the day and decided that I'm at work, then it's fairly easy to stay focused. It's a discipline because nobody is really keeping track of me, how much I work or how little I work. So that's the most challenging thing. But for a most technical standpoint, the main concern with translating is trying to find a balance between being too literal and taking too many liberties.

How much creativity do you have when you translate?
              Some. Certainly nobody, from an audience's perspective, wants to sit there and read a word for word translation of what's on stage. It doesn't flow very well. The purpose of the title is not to give you the complete libretto, it's just to help you follow along. It's not supposed to be  a poetic device as much as to help an audience member follow the plot and not be lost. So often I have to work with directors who have really disparate views on how literal or non literal the translation should be.

"Older directors leave me to my own devices, 

younger directors are very hands on" 

So it is a collaborative project.
              It can be, and it is becoming more so for better or for worse. When I first started I would just show up at my job and nobody paid any attention to the titles, so I had complete freedom in what I was doing. With some of the younger directors that are coming along now, directors who have never known opera without titles, the titles are a real integral part of the production. A lot of the older directors still leave me to my own devices and some of the younger directors are very hands on. And it's difficult because sometimes they have very different views about the translations.
I worked with someone recently who wanted a very literal translation, and so I had to end up re-writing most of the translation to be nearly words for words and I hated it, but as the super titles author coordinator, I'm not particularly high on the totem pole as far as getting to make those decisions, so I had to redo that one. And I found that the next time I tried to do a translation, my bias was a little more literal. So the next director told me:  "you translated too much." So I had to go back and redo that one. So it taught me a lot. It taught me to stick to my guns.

"I write the English translation and send it to a Spanish translator who translates my translation" 

How much in advance before an opera is produced are you given the job?
              I do most of my translations right now for Opera Colorado. They have been very  generous in the past year or two to give me my contract for the entire year all at once. So that gives me a lot of time to plan and figure out when I'm going to do the translation in between other jobs and performances. At Opera Colorado we do both translations in English and in Spanish. So I write the English translation and send it to a Spanish translator, and they translate my translation. It's not the ideal situation but it is much easier to find and English to Spanish translator than it is to find a French to Spanish translator. I like to give that company a month before I will need it back a week before using it in tech rehearsals.
I like to give myself about three weeks to get through the score. The preliminary translation takes me one and a half to two weeks, and then I spend some time polishing it and making it more readable.

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Do you need to go to musicians' rehab?

According to the A.R.T.S Anonymous, some of us might need to go to music rehab. Here are the questions to answer to know if A.R.T.S is for you or not.

• Have you grown up in an environment where your creativity was not validated?

• Have you made needless sacrifices for your art but not the needless sacrifices?

• Do you think that you are too old, not enough, not ready, that you will starve, making it hard for you to pursue your career as an artist?

• Being multi-talented, do you have a hard time finding your true artistic vision?

• Do you become impatient with the process and have difficulty following on projects?

• Have you felt intimidated by other artists' success and did that block you creativity?

If you answered yes to some of these questions, you should follow the A.R.T.S. program.

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Are vocal warm ups just for the voice?

As a music director, I plan warm ups that are specific for the particular show, as I wrote in this post.

Besides the vocal aspect, here are the top three things I look for before deciding what vocal warm up to do.

1. Time of day: If rehearsal starts in the morning, I spend a lot of time on gentle warm ups, such as: 123454321 on "n," scale up and down on lip trills, 13531 on "ah," 54321 on "zi-i-i-i-i," 16765654541 on "ee."
   
   I warm up the middle range, and start by going to only about the e a tenth above the middle c before going down by half step.
   
   
2. Vocal health of the cast: This really depends on how (un)healthy the cast is. If a few people are congested, I have the cast block one nostril, and sing through the other one on "n" 54321, going up to no more than d (11th above middle c), before switching nostril.
   
   When cast members have done too much belting too suddenly, I emphasize warm ups on mixing. If they're feeling tense from the rehearsal process, I have them jump on the word "love" for "I love to sing" on 18531.
   
   
3. Energy level: When a cast spends all day in cue-to-cue or in tech and gets into relaxed mode, it can be hard for them to transition back into the energy necessary to do a run.
   
   I do more of quick warm ups, with emphasis on diction. belt and mix, such as: 54321 "how are you," 13531 "gna gna gna," 132435421 "bee dee bee dee," 135---31 "ay" (with no diphtong, IPA epsilon).  

Vocal warm ups are for both the voice and for the transition between  life and rehearsal.




Picture from http://www.vocaltrainingsecrets.com/vocal-warm-up/ 

Should singers have to be scoped?

I have played for voice lessons for many years, many taught by wonderful voice teachers, and some by less wonderful voice teachers.

It is usually known in any institution who the good voice teachers are, but many freshmen get put with the less good teachers, and because freshmen are eager to learn and want to do well, they trust their teacher no matter their reputation.

It kills me when I play for freshmen who sound healthy at the beginning of the year and who slowly loose their voices in just a few months. I've noticed that by as early as February, there is a clear difference between the students of good voice teachers and the rest of them. And I always wonder what keeps the students of the less good teachers from noticing that they are not advancing as fast and as well as the other ones. I figure that if they realized that they were loosing their voices they would ask to change studio. I feel so powerless in those situations, because I can't say anything without being out of line.

 In talking about this issue on a hike today with my friend Laura Jo Trexler (who is a wonderful singer actor), she came up with the idea that there should be a mandatory scope exam of the vocal folds at the end of freshman year. It certainly would help shine light on the teachers that overall keep their students healthy, and the ones that overall don't (of course there is always the individual exception). 

The students would see if they have any injury, which one, get treatment for it and see a vocal health specialist. If realize that other students in their studios have issues as well while students from other studios don't, they can make the connection between their vocal health and their voice lessons faster than if they wait to audition for grad school to hear from other teachers that they need to start learning how to sing pretty much all over again.

Do you think that a mandatory scope would help students find and stay with good teachers? What other solutions are there to help young singers realize if their voice lessons are helping them or hurting them?

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How to teach music without saying a word

For anyone who ever wished music was an easy thing to teach!



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