I'm leaving Seattle on Friday to embark upon the audition season. It's like hunting season, really. You fill out all of these forms and someone gives you a little piece of paper that entitles you to stand with other people in the wilderness and hunt. For a job, that is. Armed with conjugated verbs in many languages, dresses of many colors, and sundry paper products that hopefully represent the favorable side of oneself, we go into the fray. I haven't had much time for personal reading lately, but I was reading the Wolf Trap Opera Blog yesterday and something really spoke to me - a guest posting from Joshua Winograde, singer & administrator. As singers we are all prone to horrible kinds of head games, some of which Kim Witman addressed in her posting today (same blog). Do they hate me? Did they hate my shoes? I hate myself in these shoes, they probably knew that. I wonder if this dress makes me look fat. Holy shit, she's wearing the same dress I wore last year, but in green instead of pink, are they comparing me to her? Did she just start with my aria? But that's MY starting aria, now I have to go after her and I can't deal with this fucking shit, where the hell is my parapet, I'm going to pull a Tosca and throw myself into the fucking Arno.
Kim and Joshua both talk about the importance of NOT playing these head games with yourself, but more to the point, Joshua addresses what we should be doing with our time and effort: focusing on the things that we can do something about. Diction, real interpretation based on character study and commitment to an emotion, singing freely and healthily, but most of all doing things to build up your physical and emotional immune system. Not waiting until you get sick to fight the cold, but instead sleeping and eating healthily, exercising instead of crash-dieting just before audition season, and (I'm extrapolating a little now) being good to yourself on a personal and spiritual level that enables you to ride the waves of this tumultuous career.
My husband is a smart person. He knows when I'm low. It usually has a few big flags that amount to one or more of the following statements:
1. I wonder if I can get in to the salon today, I think I'd like to color/cut my hair.
2. I feel like shit and I want to eat everything in sight. (His question: Have you gone to the gym yet today?)
3. I didn't go to bed till late. (What were you doing?) Nothing. (Were you up on that stupid classical singer navel-gazing forum lamenting about the jobs you don't have but really don't want anyway?) Yes.
But every now and then, he really puts his finger on me. I was walking home from the gym the other night, talking about how I wanted to color my hair (are you sure I wouldn't look better as a brunette? Maybe people would take me more seriously....) and he once again pointed out that I was in one of those little lows in the mood swing. And he told me that ultimately I do know the right answer to all of these little quandaries. When I'm feeling like myself, and not questioning my career choices and really trusting in my intelligence/talent/work ethic/acting abilities I'm in the 'fuck you' state of mind that says "Fuck you if you don't think that I'm the most amazing thing that's ever walked through this door because I love what I do and I'm a badass at what I do. Because I'm about to flex my guns as I exit, just in case you haven't figured out that I would be an asset to your company." This may seem a little harsh and confrontational so please relax and be assured that I don't actually SAY this to anyone in an audition, but it's my little pep talk that puts me in game mode. But when I'm feeling unsure, that's when I start trying to fit myself into a different box. Maybe if I were shorter/taller/thinner/had smaller feet/higher or lower voice/blonder/browner I would feel better and not question what I do.
I'm in a subjective profession. People get paid to come watch what I do and pick it apart and then publish what they think. And more people read the picking-apart than actually came to see what I did. But ultimately, when I'm on stage it's just me and the audience and the musicians around me, doing our jobs and trying to keep it real. But I have to keep reminding myself that the singer I am does not define the PERSON I am. I used to think that it did, or that it had to. So even on a day like today, when my hormones are absolutely out of control and I probably have no business even writing a blog about it, I'm going to make today a 'fuck you' day and put on my makeup and my amazing Steve Maddens and go out tonight with my friend Marianna and when she introduces me as her fabulous opera singer friend, I'll just say 'thanks' instead of all the self-deprecating bullshit that comes to mind. Fuck you head games, my hair looks amazing and thanks to all those evil machines in the gym, my ass does too. So there.
2 comments:
Thanks for this. Recently I've been caught up in exactly the kind of neurosis you describe. One commenter described my recent blog posts as "watching a train wreck". That's how it felt living it, too.
So it was very good timing for you (and a handful of others) to write about this. It got me back into a positive, proactive frame of mind about my career. I've had a major refocus, and I'm back in the game now.
I'm sure you don't blog for your readers, but every once in a while... your writing really does someone a service. Thank you.
I just popped in from Campbell's blog and read your entry. Good post, my only comment is that Tosca hurled herself into the Tiber. The Arno crosses Florence.
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