2005 Year End Stats

Here are some end-of-2005 stats from my Site Meter account. Do note that this site started up on Nov. 7 and my Site Meter account only began around the 12th.

• Total visits 707
• Average visit lenth 2:21
• Total page views 1557
• Average page views per visit 2.5

Not a lot of traffic by any stretch of the imagination, but slow and steady. The most heartening stats are the average visit length against an internet-wide blog average of 96 seconds and the average page view against an internet-wide average of 1.7.

• Country Share: US 46%, Canada 41%, UK 3%, Australia 3%, Singapore 2%, Unknown Country 2%, Norway, Spain, and Germany 1%
• Browser Share: Internet Explorer 60%, Firefox 23%, Safari 11%, Netscape 3%, Mozilla 2%, WebTV 1%

Happy New Year and best wishes to everyone for a healthy and prosperous 2006.

Bathroom Divas Premiere Jan. 7

One of the more interesting and unique projects I've been involved with in the last year has been rehearsing and performing with the singers featured on Bathroom Divas: So You Want To Be An Opera Star? a brand new reality show that premieres January 7, 2006 at 9pm EST on the Bravo Channel in Canada.

Over the course of the first few months of 2005 when the show was filmed, I witnessed....well, I won't give anything away. Let's just say that Bathroom Divas will be a great forum to watch singers of many differing backgrounds and ages undergo the process of artistic development up close. Very close.


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Season's Greetings to the visitors from danielpipes.org.

And a very fond Happy New Year to tomness, an old acquaintance from Eastman and more recently the Bowdoin Festival.

The above image is hosted by Bathroom Divas.

Schubert DSM links

Since I have previously posted some Winterreise links, now is the time to do the same with Schubert's first song cycle, Die schöne Müllerin, although the online pickings are nowhere near as plentiful.

The best website on the subject is James Liu's Notes on Die schöne Müllerin, with complete texts and translations, info on composer and poet, recommended scores, recordings, and readings, all exhaustively hyperlinked. The only links from his site that don't go through are the online documentation at urtext.com, to which ordinary mortals do not have access. The William and Gayle Cook Music Library site of Indiana University has an online version of the Peters Edition.

The Schubert Institute UK has a complete Die schöne Müllerin discography, including pirated recordings, accurate to November 2005.

Also, here is a Schubert chronology by John Bruzas.

Mozart before Modernity?

Some sad news from Iran, that president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has recently banned all Western music from the country. Daniel Pipes' 1998 article "You Need Beethoven to Modernize" examines the relationship between Western music and culture to everything from technology to economic stability. Here is one excerpt:

Playing the Kreuzer Sonata adds nothing to one's GDP; enjoying an operetta does not enhance one's force projection. And yet, to be fully modern means mastering Western music; competence at Western music, in fact, closely parallels a country's wealth and power, as the experiences of two civilizations, Muslim and Japanese, show.

With the apathy that many classical musicians habitually bear in the course of their musical pursuits, it's almost comforting to hear that some people are genuinely offended by the music that we make.

See also Richard Florida and his theories on the Creative Class and its correlation to economic activity.

Christmas Day

Here are two pictures from our place on Christmas morning, the top is before and the bottom is after the mayhem.

Christmas Eve

Here are the four us of at my mother-in-law's on Christmas Eve.

Boffo Boxing Day

Well, Christmas has come and gone for another year, with Wendy, the girls and I all having a wonderful time, as well as bouts of the flu. Fortunately, my version wasn't so bad since the girls needed a fair amount of, shall we say, cleaning up in the last few days.

I have discovered a newfound addiction to Sudoku, and my youngest girl Emma (16 months) has just discovered a taste for chocolate of the rather expensive variety. Perhaps I'll have to wait a few years before I introduce her to the really good stuff.

Season's greetings to Noble Viola, on whose fine weblog I recently found the CPB listed. And additional season's greetings to the legions of viewers from The Well-Tempered Blog, one of the most informative online sources of piano-related news and resource links on the planet, and the concert, whose creator shows that writing a blog with honesty and candor can easily complement building a career on the concert stage.

Collaborative Piano vs. Piano Accompanying

Today's live matchup is being held from Google Smackdown, the site where two duelling search entries go head-to-head on Google to see which one appears more across the web.

Today's match features the challenger, Collaborative Piano, a young upstart with a short but excellent track record as a dynamic team player as it goes up against the champion, Piano Accompanying, with its long record of competence, albeit with a certain sense of subservience and discretion.

The entries are loaded into the search engine. And they're off...

And the undisputed champion is:

Piano Accompanying with 2050 hits over Collaborative Piano with 1080.

Collaborative Piano is furious and demands a rematch---Piano Accompanying very modestly agrees. There will be a rematch sometime in 2006. So until then, create that web-based content with your favorite candidate and we'll see you next time on Google Smackdown.

Off-topic tech stuff

Tim Berners-Lee, the creator of the world wide web, has just begun a weblog. From a link on his first post (followed by 455 comments), I was blown away by a rare screen shot of the Nexus browser, circa 1993.

Operas for Opera To Go Announced

From the Tapestry New Opera Works press release of Dec. 20, here is some further info on Opera To Go, running March 1, 2 (previews), 3, 8, 9, 11, 16, and 17 at the Young Centre for the Performing Arts in Toronto's historic distillery district:

Opera to Go showcases six 15-minute chamber operas by composer-writer teams who were matched in Tapestry’s Composer-Librettist Laboratory, an annual opera "boot camp" that brings together artists of various disciplines to explore the operatic art form. The librettists are playwrights, poets, journalists and screenwriters; the composers have written for film, orchestra, chamber ensembles, soloists, choirs, and multimedia collectives. The programme features composer Richard Payne and librettist Joseph Maviglia’s Binoculars: looking at high art and feeling low, two friends see double at a Dali show; A young woman is caught in a dark triangle of longing, lust and loss in The Enslavement and Liberation of Oksana G composed by Aaron Gervais with libretto by Colleen Murphy; Netsuke, a poetic meditation (in Haiku) on the precious Japanese objects by composer Rose Bolton and librettist Jill Battson; Ashlike in the Cradle of the Wind by composer Andrew Staniland and librettist Jill Battson, in which the arc of life and the shape of love are changed by AIDS; a grown man seeks his birth mother in Gotcha by composer Darren Fung & librettist Betty Jane Wylie; and a young man finds himself alone in a circle of friends in Unfamiliar by Darren Fung and librettist Dave Deveau.

Classical blogging from the Van

Vancouver, that is. My Other Life blogs from Vancouver and abroad about matters vocal and pianistic.

More classical blogging from TO

The sleekly designed Help! I'm a Postmodernist! writes eloquently about her musical activities and concert-going, with archives going back to January 2000.

The Young Collaborative Pianist

What are some possible entrance points for young pianists into the world of collaborative piano? How can their formative first experiences in this field create positive outcomes that will give them the curiousity for further exploration? Joyce Grill in her article Accompanying Skills: Where to Begin? from the September 1998 Piano Pedagogy Forum mentions the idea of team participation that is central to sports, but seemingly discouraged for pianists:

Young students like the idea of "team", of camaraderie. But except for the occasional duet, piano students practice alone and go to their lesson alone. The vocalist or the instrumentalist gets to sing in a choir or play in a band or orchestra, but the piano student goes on alone, never getting to know the joy of making music with others.

She goes on to list several ways that accompanying in various musical settings can develop critical listening skills from musicians of other disciplines.

Susan Keith Gray writes in a similar vein in her article Summertime Collaborations from the June/July 2004 American Music Teacher. She encourages teachers to do the footwork to get ensembles going at an early stage:

I visited with my local violin colleagues (although most any instrument would work), who were excited and eager to work with me. Much to my surprise, we were able to pair the students quickly. Even in our small town, performance level and age were well matched. For all the teams, we selected appropriate repertoire for informal, short-term goals. As the students began practicing independently, I monitored their progress and determined when they were ready for their first meetings with their partners and with me.

Again, the emphasis is on building team experiences with well-matched partners. It is almost as if the social aspects of the encouter are as important as the musical content. Teachers need to make this element of music-making fun in order to succeed.

Halfway through high school, my interest in piano playing had hit a plateau. I suffered from terrible stage fright, had trouble keeping my focus at the piano, and got the bug of something that I can only describe as pianistic loneliness. Then one September, I was pressed into service as the rehearsal and performance pianist for my high school's musicals in Grades 11 and 12. The impact this had on my life at the keyboard was immediate. I enjoyed incorporating piano playing into working with others on a common goal, enjoyed the shows we put on (Cabaret and Guys and Dolls), and most of all enjoyed the process, which is central to any successful activity in the arts. And although I didn't enter a specific collaborative piano degree program until many years later, the seeds of the spirit of teamwork were sown at an early age, the experience was positive, and it provided a framework for what eventually became a career.

Amanda Johnston's In Concert series

On January 6, 2006 at 8pm, Amanda Johnston and Colin Ainsworth will be presenting a recital in Toronto's Heliconian Hall as part of Amanda's In Concert series with works by Poulenc, Leguerney, Poulenc, and Glick. Tickets are $20/15. For more information, see Amanda's website.

New Off-site Resource Links

Here are a couple of new links added this evening to the permanent off-site resource section of the sidebar:

From Mostlywind, a link to a flute and piano repertoire list.

From the William and Gayle Cook Music Library of Indiana University Bloomington, a large listing of online musical scores in the public domain.

Ken Weisner's Accompanist Poem

Santa Cruz-based American poet Ken Weisner has written a poem entitled "The Accompanist", which first appeared in the Porter Gulch Review.

Here is an excerpt:

"And always--
like soft foliage beneath the bloom
or the birds that fly in, fly out before
the storm, or the ticking and creaking

of the house where you were born,
or the rain that settles in and soothes you
with its sound, or the sweet hands that work
your tired back--a place that surrounds you loves you today,

and is determined to grace
the swell of your song..."

Full text of Ken Weisner's poem

Another accompanist poem

More on Stop CBC Pop

The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's decision to run more pop music on its Radio One service has been drawing the ire of many a concerned citizen. sometimes bored in ottawa writes on not just the CBC's programming choices but also the questionable HTML layout of the playlist for the CBC pop-oriented show Freestyle. There is also a discussion thread on the Yak with Yara section of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra site. Michael Geist from the Law Faculty of the University of Ottawa writes on the CBC's decision to stifle dissent on its Two New Hours listserv by changing to a moderated format.

Link to Petition

Petition against CBC Radio 1's Top 40 programming

Toronto percussionist Ryan Scott is circulating a petition against Canadian publically-funded station CBC Radio 1's recent decision to run mainstream popular music on the station, claiming that the current and projected programming violates both the CBC's mandate by the CRTC and the Broadcasting Act of 1991.

Stop CBC Pop website

Some Essential Books for the Collaborative Pianist

Note: This page will be updated fairly regularly as more books are added.

Diction

Colorni, Evelina, Singers' Italian. New York: Schirmer Books, 1970.

Grubb, Thomas, Singing in French: A Manual of French Diction and French Vocal Repertoire. New York: Schirmer Books, 1979.

Marshall, Madeleine, The Singer's Manual of English Diction. New York: Schirmer Books, 1953.

Odom, William, German for Singers: A Textbook of Diction and Phonetics. New York: Schirmer Books, 1981.

Opera and Art Song Translations and Guides

Bernac, Pierre, The Interpretation of French Song. Translation of Song Texts by Winifred Radford. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1970.

Bird, George, and Richard Stokes, trans. The Fischer-Dieskau Book of Lieder. New York: Limelight Editions, 1984.

Castel, Nico. The Complete Puccini Libretti, Vol. I, II. Geneseo, Leyerle Publications.
_____. The Complete Verdi Libretti, Vol. I-III. Geneseo, Leyerle Publications.
_____. The Libretti of Mozart's Completed Operas, Vol. I, II. Geneseo: Leyerle Publications.
_____. French opera Libretti, Vol. I, II. Geneseo: Leyerle Publications.
_____. Italian Bel Canto Opera Libretti, Vol. I, II. Geneseo: Leyerle Publications.
_____. Italian Verismo Opera Libretti. Geneseo: Leyerle Publications.

(more information on the Nico Castel series)

Miller, Philip L., sel. and trans., The Ring of Words: An Anthology of Song Texts. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1963.

Shoep, Arthur, and Harris, Daniel, Word-by-Word Translations of Songs and Arias, Vol. I-IV. Metuchen: The Scarecrow Press, Inc, 1972.

Piano Playing

Bruser, Madeline, The Art of Practicing: A Guide to Making Music from the Heart. New York: Bell Tower, 1999.

Chase, Mildred Portney, Just Being at the Piano. Berkeley: Creative Arts Book Company, 1985.

Poetry

Fussell, Paul, Poetic Meter & Poetic Form, revised edition. New York, Random House, 1979.

Hirsch, Edward, How to Read a Poem and Fall in Love with Poetry. Fort Washington: Harvest Books, 1999.

Kinzie, Mary, A Poet's Guide to Poetry. Chicago Guides to Writing, Editing, and Publishing. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1999.

Professional Writing

Turabian, Kate L., A Manual for Writers of Term Papers, Theses, and Dissertations. Chicago Guides to Writing, Editing, and Publishing. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996.

Former Lodgings

Taking a quick peek at my old site this afternoon, I was amazed at how much it sucked what a journey it has been. I first acquired the domain for collaborativepiano.com in 2001 and linked it to a space I created on Tripod. After adding my professional info and a few resources, I was happy for a time, but realized after a while that my idea of a personal site was somewhat static in nature, that there was nothing interactive, nothing leading outwards from the site, and very little in it to engage a viewer more than once. In fact, the old site hasn't been updated since 2003.

It's probably time to pull the plug on the previous site, but I'll leave it open for a few weeks more. I did happen to find another interesting resource I haven't put up on the CPB yet, a bibliography of works for the collaborative pianist, to follow in the next post.

Recital tomorrow at Victoria Chapel

Here is the program for the concert I will be playing tomorrow evening.

Tess Menet, oboe and english horn
Christopher Foley, piano

Wednesday, December 14, 2005
Victoria College Chapel
University of Toronto

• Sonata in C minor F.XV n.2 for Oboe and Piano by Antonio Vivaldi
• Sonata for Oboe and Piano by Francis Poulenc
• Fantasie for Solo Oboe in b-minor, TWV 40:4 by Georg Philipp Telemann
• Sonate for English Horn and Piano by Paul Hindemith
• Fantasy Pieces for Oboe and Piano Opus 2 by Carl Nielsen

Admission will be free

Muß der Winter kommt so bald

As the winter here in Canada gets underway with its characteristic sub-zero temperatures, now might be a good time to mention a few sites devoted to Schubert's Winterreise. At the top of the list is Margo Briessink's Winterreise site, notable for its depth of information, simplicity of navigation and beauty. In addition to song texts with MIDI files, it also contains rarities such as Lotte Lehmann's brilliant Winterreise illustrations.

At the William and Gayle Cook Library at Indiana University, there is an online version of the Peters Edition. American tenor David Pisaro walked across northern England in January 2004, performing Winterreise 13 times with pianist Quentin Thomas along the way (he doesn't mention if his pianist also made the walk). Ernest Johnson, Ted Perry, and Richard Morris have compiled a complete discography of Winterreise, including pirated recordings. And finally, Ian Bostridge has starred in a movie version of Winterreise for British television directed by David Alden.

Monday 2:30pm--I also received the following suggestion from a reader this afternoon: Schubert's Winterreise: A Winter Journey in Poetry, Image, and Song published by the University of Wisconsin Press, with contributions by John Harbison, Susan Youens, Katrin Talbot, and Louise McClelland Urban.

Get the Pianist Onside

From the illuminating Wolf Trap 2006 blog, Kim Witman, Donna Loewy, and Thomas Lausmann recently put their heads together for some advice to singers on how to properly present music for audition accompanists. Their list includes cut markings, xerox quality, pagination, binding, and tempo indication.

Here are some highlights:

Staples. Exposed staples in the center binding are a rare but serious hazard. As a last resort, pianists will press down the center fold to make a book stay open. Each one of us has ended up bleeding on the keyboard after a run-in with center staples.

Pages in backwards. Or upside down. Or not there at all. You laugh. It happens.

The last one happens more than you might think. Once in an audition when I noticed a page missing on an unfamiliar aria, I stopped playing and drolly said "Um. You're missing a page." to the horror of the singer and amusement of the panel.

Another potential problem occurs when singers do not or cannot lead a tempo when singing. An audition is one situation where the singer must take the initiative tempo-wise, rather than hoping that the pianist will push them along. The singer who sings behind the beat in an audition creates a double-whammy: the pianist can either 1) push them ahead and risk leaving them in the dust, or 2) follow their tempo and watch them fall flat. Neither option bodes well for the singer.

On a serious note, one of the single most important intangibles a singer can get to work for them is presenting properly organized and marked music to their pianist at the audition. That sends a signal to the pianist that they are playing for a professional and someone to be taken seriously as a potential degree candidate (at the university level) or potential colleague (at the professional level). This first impression goes a very long way, not to mention minimizing risk in the high-stakes one-shot game of auditions.

A Fine Evening

In spite of getting hopelessly lost thanks to incorrect directions from a certain online map service, I nevertheless made it to the Opera Ontario Director's Circle Christmas Party held in a spectacular converted farm house just outside Hamilton. Part of the evening's festivities included a short performance of verismo arias by soprano Sarah Valentim with myself at the keyboard. Sarah is a recent graduate of Wilfred Laurier University and will definitely be a singer to watch in the coming years.

Piano Trio-rama

From the Archive section of the Altenberg trio site, they have a huge list of repertoire for piano trio. Also on the Archive section is a list of worldwide performing piano trios. For example, here is their entry on the many incarnations of the Beaux Arts Trio:

BEAUX ARTS TRIO (I) [ New York, NY (US) ] (1955 - 1968)piano: Menahem PRESSLER * 16.12.1923 Magdeburg (DE)violin: Daniel GUILET cello: Bernard GREENHOUSE * 03.01.1916 Newark, NJ (US)

BEAUX ARTS TRIO (II) [ New York, NY (US) ] (1968 - 1987)piano: Menahem PRESSLER * 16.12.1923 Magdeburg (DE)violin: Isidore COHEN * 16.12.1922 New York, NY (US)cello: Bernard GREENHOUSE * 03.01.1916 Newark, NJ (US)

BEAUX ARTS TRIO (III) [ New York, NY (US) ] (1987 - 1992)piano: Menahem PRESSLER * 16.12.1923 Magdeburg (DE)violin: Isidore COHEN * 16.12.1922 New York, NY (US)cello: Peter WILEY

BEAUX ARTS TRIO (IV) [ New York, NY (US) ] (1992 - 1998)piano: Menahem PRESSLER * 16.12.1923 Magdeburg (DE)violin: Ida KAVAFIAN cello: Peter WILEY

BEAUX ARTS TRIO (V) [ New York, NY (US) ] (1998 - 2002)piano: Menahem PRESSLER * 16.12.1923 Magdeburg (DE)violin: Young Uck KIM cello: Antonio MENESES * 23.08.1957 (BR)

BEAUX ARTS TRIO (VI) [ New York, NY (US) ] (2002 - )piano: Menahem PRESSLER * 16.12.1923 Magdeburg (DE)violin: Daniel HOPE * 1974 (GB)cello: Antonio MENESES * 23.08.1957 (BR)

N.B. One group not mentioned on the Altenberg site is Vancouver's eclectic Joe Trio.

Auditions Yet Again

Today I had the pleasure of playing at several auditions in Toronto for the talented Montreal-based soprano Christina Tannous. Winner of the 1999 CBC Competition for Young Performers, Christina was in town for a quick audition jaunt before heading back to Montreal later this week.

Run like hell

Yesterday was one of those days that was so busy I didn't even have time to get to a computer until I was too exhausted to do anything worthwhile.

Here's a rundown:

10am--a rehearsal at the University of Toronto Faculty of Music with oboist Tess Menet, whose recital at Victoria Chapel I am playing on next Wednesday (program to appear soon).

11am--a quick lunch, even quicker espresso, and a run like hell to get to

11:30am--the Haleconian Hall in Yorkville to play voice auditions for several of the excellent singers from the Dean Artist Management roster, who are today singing for a panel of representatives from Arizona Opera, Edmonton Opera, and Opera Ontario. Much performing of arias both rehearsed and unrehearsed, and additional sight-reading of arias never seen before.

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Completely unable to get to:

1pm--Remembrance Service for Diane Lewarne Partin at a packed Timothy Eaton Memorial Church with performances by organist Michael Bloss, baritone Tom Goertz, tenor John MacMaster, pianist Jim Bourne, and piper Rory Gus Sinclair.

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1:30pm--walk briskly to Bay subway, transfer at Yonge, go north to Eglinton, transfer to Eglinton East bus, get off at Bayview and walk to

2:30pm--Leaside Presbyterian Church to play further voice auditions for several of the excellent singers from the Gossage Artists roster (including Wendy), who are also singing for Edmonton Opera. Much more leisurely this time, with plenty of time to sit and chat since both Greg Oh and Jim Bourne were also playing for several auditions.

4:45pm--sushi at Yonge and Eglinton, unfortunately Wendy and I not ending up meeting with the rest of the Gossage and Edmonton folks, who have gone to another Japanese restaurant altogether since we weren't sure on names and locations, pay bill and then drive like hell through traffic to

6pm--Tapestry New Opera Works Christmas party in Forest Hill. Private Toronto premiere of Darren Fung and Colleen Murphy's First Day with mezzo-soprano Jessica Lloyd and tenor Keith Klassen, myself at the keyboard with completely uncooperative damper pedal, then Montsalvatge's Cuba dentro de un piano sung by Jessica and O Holy Night sang by Keith. There were announcements of further funding from private and public sources, excellent dishes from Barone & Tong Catering, as well as an unveiling of the poster for the upcoming 2006 Opera To Go.

9:30pm--Wendy and I drive home, I drive my mother home after babysitting the girls for the night, I drive home, check email, sleep.

Graces Notes to Premiere in Vancouver Tomorrow

Grace Notes, a celebration of words and song written by Leslie Uyeda and Crystal Bergman will be premiering tomorrow and run through Friday at the Vancouver Academy of Music as part of the Music in the Morning Series. The songs that Leslie has written are based on poems of Hafiz, Miriam Waddington, and Denise Levertov. Here is a listing of the singers and musicians who will be performing:

Heather Pawsey, soprano
Raphael Wagner, soprano
Caroline Harder, mezzo-soprano
Barbara Towell, mezzo-soprano
John Arsenault, tenor
Ben Schnitzer, tenor
Angus Bell, bass
Kevin Sean Pook, baritone

Mary Backun, clarinet
Lawrie Hill, violin
Peggy Lee, cello
Isabelle Roland, viola
Leslie Uyeda, piano/conductor/composer

Link to Music in the Morning site

Best of luck to everyone involved. This work will be recorded for CBC Radio 2--information on broadcast times will be posted as it comes available.

Diane Lewarne Partin Remembered

I was very saddened to hear of the passing last Tuesday of Diane Lewarne Partin, one of Toronto's most beloved performers and voice teachers and devoted mother of two children. I first met Diane in Vancouver after moving back there in 1994, where I had the pleasure of performing and working with several of her students. When I moved to Toronto, we renewed our acquaintance and worked together at Tapestry in the 2004-05 season. She will be fondly remembered and her many contributions to the performing arts community in Canada will live with us.

A public remembrance and celebration will be held tomorrow at 1pm at Timothy Eaton Memorial Church at 230 St. Clair Avenue West in Toronto.

Notice in the Globe and Mail

The Aeroplan Mini-Opera

This Tuesday will see the Toronto premiere (albeit at a private concert) of a short operatic scene I had the pleasure of premiering in September at the Aeroplan convention in Montreal. Aeroplan prides itself on being a fluid organization, and as part of their annual convention they schedule unconventional activities in order to build community and teamwork. This year, Tapestry New Opera Works was the guest organization invited to participate.

As the managers and executives entered the convention space on the first day, they were required to fill out a card on which they listed an Aeroplan moment that changed their life. From the collected cards, the composer/librettist team of Darren Fung and Colleen Murphy then chose five scenarios that the convention delegates, divided into teams of ten, would then expand into mini-operas on the following day, complete with a selection of pop songs that the teams would have to rewrite lyrics for and perform.

The other task of Darren and Colleen would be to choose one scenario from the assembled cards and create a five-minute mini-opera that would then be performed by tenor Keith Klassen, mezzo-soprano Jessica Lloyd, and myself at the keyboard the following day. The scenario they finally chose, one that they noticed kept on being mentioned in card after card involved the recent death of a trusted and valued Aeroplan employee in a tragic car accident.

The scene that Colleen and Darren came up with involved an employee on his first day on the job (tenor) who kept on getting lost and barging into the office of a manager (mezzo). After the first-day employee bursts into the manager's office a second time they strike up a conversation. Just then, the manager fields a telephone call in which she finds out that the woman who trained her on the job has just passed away after a car accident. The first-day employee then ends up comforting the devastated manager.

Since this scene was based on a real-life situation in the life of the company, the emotions of the actual event were still very much with the Aeroplan employees when they saw the performance. There was not a dry eye in the house. What was also fascinating is that the woman who fielded the telephone call in real life was in the audience and was able to actually experience herself being portrayed on the operatic stage.

This scene, with a working title of First Day, was an operatic first in that it was commissioned by a major corporation (Aeroplan) to portray an actual situation in the life of that company in a positive and community-affirming light. I was also impressed by the quality of the scenes that the Aeroplan teams created and performed and how completely they surrendered themselves to a process that must have seemed absolutely alien to them at first.

Although Tuesday's performance is invitation-only at a Toronto location I cannot disclose on the blog, I hope that there will be public performances of First Day in the coming months.

Another take on how to learn a song or aria

Here is another approach on the process of learning a song, by Daniel Yurgaitis, Director of Theatre at Northern State University.

To paraphrase:

1. Select a song
2. Complete a music, lyric, and character analysis
3. Learn the melody
4. Make the song your own
5. Begin memorization
6. Take the song into your body
7. Refine the song

What I like about this method is the emphasis on physicalization as an element of learning, the early emphasis on memorization and understanding the song at the identity level.

Contrast this process with the Gwendolyn Koldofsky method:

1. Read the poetry or a translation of the poetry
2. Learn the pronounciation of the poem in the original language
3. In the original language, read the poem aloud
4. Read the poem in the rhythm of the vocal line
5. At the piano, play the vocal line in the RH and the bass line of the piano in the LH
6. Learn the song

The Koldofsky method emphasizes a text-centered approach to the first stages of learning that pays big dividends once you follow the steps and learn the song. The Yurgaitis method seems to emphasize the latter steps of learning, specifically learning how get the song both under your skin and into your body as preparation for an eventual performance.

These two approaches complement each other well and are useful to both singers and pianists learning music, whether in opera, art song, or musical theater idioms.

Another Fine Piano Site

This afternoon while searching for more online essays on the collaborative arts, I happened upon a huge, eclectic, and extremely useful site by Martha Beth Lewis. The piano section of her site includes articles on teaching rhythm, note-reading, artistry, technique, practicing, accompanying, and ornamentation. As if that wasn't enough, she also writes many articles on teaching philosophy, studio management, fees, marketing, business tips, copyright, taxes, and what parents should expect from a teacher.

I'm astonished at the breadth of information on Ms. Lewis' site. There is information here for not just piano teachers, but teachers of any branch of music, as well as information on things such as the process of practicing that could be used by professionals as well as students.

And in addition to all that piano information, there are even more sections on Ms. Lewis' site on needlework, chocolate, poodles, and sailing.

Randall Hawes at the RCM tomorrow

Tomorrow Detroit Symphony Orchestra bass trombonist Randall Hawes and I will be performing a short recital as part of his master class at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto. The recital will be at the beginning of the class at 10am in the Concert Hall of the RCM.

Them that plays together....

It has been a pleasure reading through the many online issues of the Piano Pedagogy Forum, edited by Scott Price, Jane Magrath, Barbara Fast, and Steve Clark. The variety of the articles encompasses piano pedagogy, performance, technology, style, and history, as well as the collaborative arts.

One of the many articles on collaborative piano in the PPF is the excellent Don't Be Late! Rhythmic Visualization in the Collaborative Musical Ensemble by Scott Price of the University of South Carolina in the May 1999 issue. Here he looks at ways at energizing the rhythmic sense of an ensemble as a route toward solving the details of playing together.

A short quote from his article:

...one of the first things I have my students do is to put down their instruments and take their parts to an area where they have to rely on the visual score and aural visualization of the musical sound. They are forced to read the score and and know what sounds they desire before they touch their instruments. I often require that my students and their partners use nonsense syllables to vocalize their way through the rhythmic gestures of a section or the whole piece. By speaking the rhythm to each other, they are actively communicating the natural rhythm of the piece in a manner that is most natural to themselves.