Bum bum baa ya padum This past weekend was the showing of the Opera Scenes program at Gordon College. I helped out with the opening scene from Albert Herring as Mayor Upfold and the opening of Act 4 (or 3 depending on your score) of Rigoletto. I got to sing through La Donna e Mobile, which is a very fun aria to sing. It is especially fun to sing this aria for people who do not know opera. As soon as the aria starts, everyone in the theatre got smiles of recognition. Maybe they heard it on a pasta commercial, saw Bugs Bunny singing it or even heard it as the foreground music during a fight scene in the Punisher movie, who knows.

Now that the scenes program is over, I will be focusing on the concerts I have in the upcoming weeks. There is the love songs concert for Mass Theatrica and the Puccini and Pastries concert in NH with Lakes Region Opera. They even have a nice little spot on their upcoming events page about it.

February 17, 2:00 pm "Pastries & Puccini"
Farmington Town Hall
We will enjoy some fine food and glorious music by Giacomo
Puccini featuring Gregory Hanson, Tenor, First Place Winner of our Capital Region Opera Idol 2007!

I am looking forward to both concerts as well as taking the Gordon Opera Scenes program up to Vermont to sing for some Opera North patrons. This month is quite busy but I am free after it is through. I am hoping to pick up a few more concerts for the summer but not too much. Right now it is time for me to refine my technique and work on some roles with my teacher.

- Gregory -

*edit 1-29-08*
Thanks to my wonderful sister for pointing out that my last name was misspelled "Hansen" on the Lakes Region Opera page. I have edited this post and informed the company as well. - G -

¶ 10:32 AM 0 comments

Happy New Year After a nice vacation and a break from singing, I am back. I took a 3 week break from singing since I had been so busy last year and am now working my voice back into shape. I also noticed that I hadn't updated my schedule at all, so I fixed that this morning.

I am preparing for the Opera Scenes program at Gordon College right now. Even though I am not a student, they let me sing. I get to sing some fun scenes and they have one more tenor to work with, so it is a fair trade.

Next month is going to be busy as well. I have a concert each weekend. One is with Lakes Region Opera, a part that I won from the Opera Idol competition, and the other is with Mass Theatrica. I am very fortunate that the first two concerts have the same rep, so I don't need to pound different music into my head each week. The end of February has the Gordon Opera Scenes program traveling up to Vermont to perform for a crowd of Opera North supporters. We get that opportunity because Ron Luchsinger, who is the artistic director at Opera North and Commonwealth Opera, directs the scenes at Gordon.

The vacation was a wonderful and much need rest. We got to visit our family's on Christmas and the week surrounding it. I had a minor mishap and blew up our old computer, so on New Years Day I had to order parts and build a new one, which is running faster the 80% of computers benchmarked with 3d Mark Pro 2006 I might add. All in all, things are going well. I do not have an extremely busy spring lineup, which will give me time to work on technique and get ready for some bigger competitions this fall.

- Gregory - ¶ 10:07 AM 0 comments