Surprise Lesson So my voice teacher, Craig Hart, gave me a call on Sunday which resulted in a 3 hour drive to CT for a lesson. He and his wife Susan worked with me for a full 3 hours until my voice was sufficiently shot. During this time they were able to pick apart my arias and give me some great stylistic insight. You are never as prepared as you think you are. There will always be things you can improve on. Never let yourself be fooled into thinking that you are done practicing and preparing until the audition is done.

One of my favorite things about lessons with Craig is the fact that he is so patient. No matter how many times I do the wrong thing he just explains it a different way and helps me to understand and remember. Craig, this audition is for you. To all who say we should never sing the rep that we do, I will be doing my best to prove that my teacher is not just some crazy bass, but a great teacher as well.

- Gregory -
¶ 7:48 PM 0 comments

Two Weeks In two weeks I will be boarding my flight to Chicago. Things are starting to fall into place for me. Recently practice has been a bit discouraging. My voice has felt a little tired and slow. However, this week my good friend Nathan was kind enough to give me a coaching. It felt very nice, fluid and comfortable all the way up and down my range.

This leads me to believe that I am not warming up properly and at the end if the day, work has annhiliated my voice. I need to give myself more time in between warming up and working on my rep. As for being tired after work.... well I can't really do much about that yet.

- Gregory -
¶ 6:06 PM 0 comments

Testing a New App My birthday was this past weekend and now I have a new toy that I am testing out. Still getting ready for the big audition in less than 3 weeks. Hopefully I will be able to fit in a lesson and a few coachings before then!

- Gregory - ¶ 7:45 PM 0 comments

Audition Date The confirmation has come in. July 11th I will be in Chicago for my audition. This is extremely exciting and I am practicing diligently every day after work to prepare. They have asked me to prepare 5 arias, I get to sing one of my choice and the judges may ask for a second from my list. So far this is what I have prepared:

Che gelida manina - Puccini, La Boheme - Chosen song
Addio, fiorito asil - Puccini, Madama Butterfly
Ah, leve toi soleil - Gounod, Romeo et Juliette
Una furtiva lagrima - Donezetti, L'elisir D'amore
Kuda, kuda - Eugene Onegin, Tchaikovsky

These are all arias that I feel very solid on but need to be polished a bit. This is a big opportunity and I do not want to mess it up. During the weekend in Chicago I will be doing active "tweeting" of this major audition and hoping for some good marks by the judges.

- Gregory - ¶ 9:35 AM 0 comments