A Fresh Start

Returned late Wed. night. Miraculously my mac is working and there is internet to be jacked. Thank you to all for your well wishes. The wedding was a week ago today and I could not have asked for better weather. My mum tells me that if we had gotten married today none of the family would have been able to make it off the island - it's been so foggy they can't see the ferries pass in front of the island! They day itself was the perfect mix of sunshine and clouds, breeze and warmth. A limo picked up the wedding party from our respective "getting ready" places and we had time to kill so we stopped by a liquor store and procured two bottles of champagne: one for the ride to the glacier and one for the post-wedding ride to the reception. I highly recommend this to all who are planning a wedding. Takes the edge off and provides room for much laughter. Having a slightly tipsy wedding party is a good thing, in my book.

The reception too was nice. As it turns out I am glad we did not have a band play. Everyone was chatting away and angrynewcomer's jazz playlist and miss_ogony's more upbeat selections were just perfect for conversation.

There will be picture soon. Promise.

However, upon my return all the stress has finally caught up with me. I have been ill for a few days. It's nice to be back in California, as this is where my life is and where most of my friends are these days. There is an energy here that gets me amped up for my life. Although, the peace and beauty of South East Alaska feed that still place inside my soul. I miss the myriad shades of grey and green that the ocean and rain forest provide. Still, though, it's nice to count on sunshine every day - especially when one only has a bike for transportation.

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In other news, I have read numerous books inthe last two and half weeks:

*A book on Meher Baba, the title I forget. He is considered the Avatar, a reincarnation of Jesus, Muhammad and other great sages. I enjoyed reading this a lot. Much of what I like about Jesus was present in Meher Baba's own life, words and deeds. Much of what irritates me about Jesus was also present, but I found those things (a dislikeable self-righteousness, a need for unquestioning obedience, calling God 'He,' and a tendency to only teach and assist men. In fact Jesus may have more interactions with women than were noted in this book on Meher Baba.) less acceptable in this day and age.

*Two Jasper Fforde books, The Big Over-Easy and The Well of Lost Plots. Sheer ridiculous bookish silliness. Mind candy for those obsessed with books, especially detective genre fiction.

*An Agatha Christie mystery - something about murder in Iraq, Hercule Poirot, archeology, and bludgeoning.

*Jay McInerney's Bacchus and Me. Fantastic essays on wine. Makes me want to buy a bottle of everything he talks about so I can follow along better. After reading this book I also suspect that I have never had really good champagne. And I am reminded that I know shit about French and Italian wines.

*Eat Pray Love. I found this book Thursday morning at the place where Adam and I had breakfast on our way to get groceries. I need to mail it back to the woman who left it there since it had pay stubs, a pay check and other items in it marking her spot. I devoured this book in less than 24 hrs. It's fantastic. It's a spiritual memoir/travel journal book, but doesn't fall into the generic pretentiousness of most modern memoirs. If you love travel, yoga, Italy, India or Bali, I highly recommend this. goddessofmercy I'm looking right at you.

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Lastly, I did not get in. However, I made it past the first cull and I had only once suggestion on my feedback sheet for improvement: more depth. This is easily fixable: more singing. I cannot believe that nothing else was listed. None of the musicianship stuff I feared I'd bungled came up! I am not disappointed at all by this news. The audition was the most successful I've ever had and my schedule is much, much more free this year than it would otherwise be. And there's always next year. After more singing.

It's been a whirlwind of activity around here. This weekend I attended a lovely baby shower, as well as a bridal shower. I love having an excuse to drink gin before noon! I also went shopping at H&M, battled the guilt I inevitably have over purchasing new department store clothes, and then rolled around in love with a teal dress I found at Banana Republic. I like to say that I am just following Bush's post-9/11 plan: being a good consumer patriot. I also had some deep thoughts while reading the Economist. Maybe I'll get around to developing them.

But most news worthy is that I got to go into a recording studio yesterday and sing a loop for a rap song! I'm not sure what I was expecting, but it was an honest-to-god studio: huge mixing boards (once belonging to Michael Bolton), keyboards, and gold records on the wall. One of the studio owners has produced for Master P, Snoop Dogg, and Silkk the Shocker (which has to be one of the stupidest rap names ever). I believe the name of the song I breathed/sang on is called "West Coast, We Rock" by a nice guy called J-Stunna. When his myspace page stops looking juvenile and the track gets mixed I'll link to it. So fun.

The last thing I want to do when I leave work is go home and do my vocal exersizes. When I get home the cats need attention, the mail needs reading, food must be had, etc. And once I start to settle into evening-at-home mode I just don't want to get into work mode. The last two weeks I've had urges to do my scales and whatnot around 2 in the afternoon. But there's not a good spot in my building to sing. Sadly, I am close to the music building at UCBerkeley, but the practice rooms are locked and reserved for Cal students. Fie on their stingy attitude!

I'll figure something out.

First example: Last night I went to a birthday party for my longtime friend in San Francisco. It was an okay time. Trendy restaurant/bar with very good food, but lousy acoustics and I was stuck in the middle of the long table and therefore sandwiched in between conversations. My friend's friends are all very interesting, but there's a certain level of expectation and femininity that I am unaccustomed to - lots of squeaky "Oh that's so cute!" over things like cards with sparkly shoes on them. I felt not quite glamorous enough for the crowd, nor did I feel I had enough money for the night's meal.

But that's not what was good about last night. As I've mentioned before this friend's boyfriend is a rap and hip-hop producer. He asked that I and the Future Governor of Alaska sing backup for a track on a record he's producing! Of course, now that I've said it I'm sure I've just jinxed the whole thing, but since I don't really believe in that I'll say just a little bit more about it. Basically the Producer wants to start the album off with a rap song featuring opera singers. I really like this sort of thing, when genres mingle. However, I hope the Producer doesn't expect "traditional" (by that I mean stereotypical) opera voices. The Future Governor hasn't sung opera in years and honestly was born to sing country music. I certainly do not sound anything like the women we are usually fed as opera singers: large bodies, thick voiced, Wagnerian singers with horns on their heads. But he has heard me sing, so I guess he knows what he's getting into. Plus, I'm free. In any case, I get to sing on a rap song!! How cool is that?!

Second good thing: I am leaving in the wee hours tomorrow for Ohio. I am going to visit hrafntinna (that's Dr. Hrafntinna to you). She is in dire need of some company and some fun. I can certainly provide the former, no guarantees on the latter. I've never been to Ohio and everyone who's been tells me there's a reason they don't live there now, but clearly millions of people still live there so it's got to have something to recommend it.

While there I plan to drag the good Doktor to see Pan's Labyrinth. I saw this film over the weekend and I loved it. It's much darker than I expected, but still very beautiful. I was expecting the film to be more like 70% fantasy and 30% real life, but it's more like the reverse, which seems odd given that it was hyped as such a fantasy film. One complaint I've heard from friends who have also seen it is that the characters aren't fully developed. This is true, but I think this is appropriate since the world is set up to engage us in the life of Ofelia, the 11 year old protagonist. At that age, in those circumstances, adults are either Very Good and Safe or Very Bad and Scary. That's what we see; we don't see the complexities of what drives a man to be so cruel or why Ofelia's mother actually married such a cruel man. This flaw did not hinder my engagement in the film. The fantasy parts are beautiful but not overwhelming. Often fantasy film, and films with lots of CG in general, rely on the technology to propel the story rather than the imaginations of the characters, viewers, of film makers. This film uses the graphics as an enhancement of the imagination not as a crutch for lazy film making. The ending is also atypical - it is both happy and sad. I confess I cried. I look forward to seeing it again.

For 'perfectionism' and 'parties.'

( Party number one- A Christmas party/good-bye at the Orthodox Institute up at the GTU. )

( Party number 2 )

I'm getting really sick of being a perfectionist. It's just no fun.

Talking about any one of the following topics inevitably means talking about the others: weddings, family, money, Alaska. The confluence is guaranteed to make me cry.

I would rather expend my energy on music and singing these days. Been dreaming about singing and music. I am seeing two shows this week: Hem on Tuesday and Bernard Fanning on Friday. Last Friday I received a singing challenge: find and sing a Dolly Parton tune. I own no Dolly. I am taking requests. What shall I down load and learn?

Last week I knocked and something in me opened. I have been thinking about how to engage musically again after a dry spell/hiatus/period of creative block lasting approximately 2 years. I shuffled over to craigslist last week and low and behold found a perfect band listing. I loved their instrumentation line up; they sounded like something I'd be good for. I replied, arranging an audition for today.

But between then and now I went to 3 different music events. Last Saturday I went to the SF Opera to hear Le Nozze de Figaro. It was a fabulous performance. The sets were gorgeous, the music was Mozart (which means it was brilliant), the acting was surprisingly spot on, and the singing was all of the adjectives above. I was most especially moved by Ruth Ann Swenson, who sang the role of Countess. Her high soprano was breathtaking: full, rich, poised, warm. I found myself tipping forward during her arias, as if drawn forward. Several lines in her arias started on (what I'm guessing was) a high B. Swenson plucked these notes from the air delicately and not a shrill tone was to be heard. I have been converted to the Swenson fan club.

The other two shows were Red Meat, a country band with a rockabilly persona, on Friday night and Jolie Holland, a jazzy-pop-indie-drunken-sounding-warbler, on Saturday. Both shows were highly enjoyable, although I had to get over the not quite on pitch female singer of Red Meat and the oddness of Holland's affected style and her unfortunate banter. Once I did that though, the music more than made up for my admittedly anal retentive critical issues.

Onto my singing. Let's say that today's audition was a success on many, many fronts. Let's also say that I am no rock star, nor will I ever be one. Perhaps never even a pop star. I have delusions of both things. And fantasies of either being an R&B queen or Ella Fitzgerald. Alas, upon hearing the audition - the group recorded everything - it is clear that I am a high soprano. I have a light, though not thin, soprano voice that obviously wants to sing high soprano. I am going to sit on this information for a few days and see how I feel. Do I want to try to sing pop/rock music? It's doable, though I fear I'll hurt myself (my throat is tired after singing only 7 songs). Do I want to commit to my instrument and dive back into the world of formal operatic and choral singing? Both? Neither?

Tune in next week.

As Mary begins to fade into in my mind like the setting sun - beautifully at an end and yet also only for a time; for She waits to rise again in the morning - other ideas and issues percolate to the surface. I am attempting to approach singing as something for others and not for myself. I have issues of selfishness that I dress up in other clothes, when really, I just can't share. I have been hoarding my voice, out of self-protection, but hoarding nonetheless, and like the Dead Sea that has no outlet, my voice sits and stagnates.

Also percolating: a few theological ideas. One, I want to learn more about Trinitarian theology and pneumatology (holy spirit stuff), and rework the Trinity into God as genderneutral with Jesus and Mary as the other two. This is heresy, but it avoids the filioque issue, on which the Catholics and Orthodox disagree (the Catholics added the filioque clause into the Creed, which says the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son; the Orthodox thinks it proceeds only from the Father). Second, idea is about a eucharistic approach to food and our consumption of it. I think this is a fruitful connection for ecofeminist theology. Third, I'd like to learn more about Mary Magdalene and do somekind of Mary/Mary work on them, like them as bookends to Jesus. I hope to explore these ideas over the next few..... decades.

Working on this thesis, working so obsessively, so constantly, so hard, has really changed the way my brain works. I don't want to lose momentum. I want to dust off my Latin! I want to go check out periodicals in French! I want to sit and drink coffee and dawdle under trees reading the crusty ol' Fathers!

I want to go boldly forward with this oh-so-slim boost in confidence, skill, and opportunity. I desperately don't want to stop now.

So, I'm done with Dido and Aeneas, the little opera I was singing in over the weekend. I wish I could say it was inspiring. My heart just wasn't in it. Could have just been my week. Could be that I hate singing alto. Sat night my voice just sucked. Plus, the intonation of just about everyone and every instrument was off at some point during the show. But still. It's nice to make music and that piece is a very nice piece of music. Apparently, the Friday night Dido won the Met competition (I don't know if that meant CA regionals or like THE Met final competition...) Cheers to Adam for hooking me up. I now have the opportunity to continue singing with them: Mozart's Don Giovanni (can't do it because the performances are in Bakersfield during my last week of school) and a concert of madrigals. So yay. Yay for music.

(the title refers to the opening line from the big aria in Dido and Aeneas, just in case you were wondering)

Back to good grad student habits.

suck