Puccini and Pastries Yes. That was the name of the concert. I love stuff like this. It is right up there with Sherry and Sopranos from Opera North. My friend and sometimes coach Michael Monroe thought that we should continue the series with Basses and Brewskies, Mezzos and Merlot, and Tenors and Tequila. I think it would be a riot.

This past week I was on vacation and took a little vocal rest after the Puccini concert in NH, I was also off from work. It was a welcome respite. Now I am back to work and feverishly trying to decide my list of 5 arias (of contrasting styles, 3 different languages, one in English). Everyone wants your list to be something like that, so I figured I would cover the bases.

One of the new arias I am adding to my audition list is "Addio, Fiorito Asil" from Puccini's Madama Butterfly. I performed that aria at the competition and it seemed to go well. I also sang it this past week at the Puccini concert. I have uploaded the video onto the interwebs for viewing. Let me know what you think.

I also had a discussion about covering with some of my friends this past weekend. If there is enough interest in this I will make a detailed post of my opinions and get some feedback.

- Gregory - ¶ 9:51 PM 0 comments

So the Duke of Mantua walks into a bar... Today I finished fixing up the new archive section and I have made that live as of right now. It does not line up perfectly in Firefox or Safari but I am not going to mess with it anymore. One interesting thing that I discovered is that you cannot view my site properly using Safari 3 in Apple OSX 10.4 (Tiger). Safari renders the site fine in Leopard, it is just Tiger that is giving me the issue. I recommend using Firefox for now if you wish to check up with my site. I will try and work on this in the future.

Today I uploaded a small portion of the Gordon College "Opera Scenes" program. Right now I only have the Duke's aria up but I plan on getting the quartette finished up and posted soon. Enjoy!

- Gregory - ¶ 2:45 PM 0 comments

Apology I have to apologize to people who have been viewing my site from Apple computers or through Firefox. I have known for quite some time that my archive section was not friendly to those browsers. The code was not made that way intentionally and I thought I had it working properly. Alas, I did not. However, in an attempt to salvage some dignity, work has begun on a new format to the archive page that should work better. It still is not perfect on Firefox and I have not checked it on an Apple machine, but I will work diligently to make this site accessible to all users.

- Gregory - ¶ 4:48 PM 0 comments

Technique The concert this past weekend went very well. The audience loved it and the singers all performed admirably. There are always a few minor hiccups, but nothing caused any real damage.

Someone commented on my voice recently. They told me that some of the vocalizing I do is much to low or baritone-like. I have had people tell me that I am ruining my voice my warming up to sing a low G. I know that most of the rep I sing will never go lower the C below middle; however I still see the need to keep my voice moving in those ranges. My motto "You have to have the bottom to have the top". Now I know this is not a motto for every voice type or even for every tenor, but it does work for me. Some people think that their technique is the only way to sing and anything else is horrible for your voice. I am of the mind that for each individual voice, there is a right way and a wrong way.

My voice is fairly powerful. I attribute that to the beatboxing that I use to do. It is a very taxing ability and the only way I was able to do it was to practice until my muscles were extremely strong. This was good and bad for me. Singing high notes came easily even if they were forced and strained. It took some time before I was able to relax my throat enough and open up my voice, especially through my passagio and into the upper register. Since I could control my throat that well, concentrating on the chest buzz and bringing that low feeling up throughout my range. It has been said that I will blow my voice out within the year if I continue like this. 3 years later and my voice is still growing.

People who sing with the top-down approach, bringing the falsetto down into the lower range, are good singers. Singing that way can protect your voice, however it is not going to achieve the top results for everyone who uses it. Singing with a different method would not work for me. There have been successful singers who use this technique and sing their whole lives and they did not damage their voices too badly(Jerome Hines, Franco Corelli, etc). To say that one technique is for everyone is completely wrong and if anyone ever tells you that, get away from them. If you have a teacher that says it is their way or bust, choose bust. That mindset is not healthy and will not help you.

If you have any questions about my technique, your technique or any advice you have heard about singing, feel free to leave a comment or send me an e-mail. I look forward to any discussions in this area.

- Gregory - ¶ 9:42 AM 0 comments

Love Songs in Lynn I had rehearsal for the Love Songs concert with Mass Theatrica last night. It was a very good time, should prove to be a great show. There are a lot of really talented artists singing in this show and I am looking forward to it.

On another note, I heard back from the Boston Lyric Opera and I have another audition with them. I auditioned for them last year and surprisingly enough, never heard back from them. /sarcasm off. I had sung "Una Furtiva Lagrima" for them, expecting it to be a not very highly auditioned piece. As it turned out, they were putting on "L'Elisir d'Amore" that season so I'm sure they heard that same aria about 50 times that day. Combined with the fact that I was still refining my technique, well, it just was not very good.

This year I have a (semi) full resume and will be singing "Che Gelida Manina" for them. I think my voice has matured enough over the past year that I will at least get their attention and hopefully they will remember my name. We shall see...

- Gregory - ¶ 8:11 AM 0 comments