Mindee's 2012 Voice Recital - "Norma"

Every year, I participate in a vocal recital alongside the rest of my voice teacher's students.  We don't perform normal recitals though - her tradition is to truly put on a show!

This year, my sister and I reprised our roles as Norma (Melissa) and Adalgisa (Me) in Bellini's, Norma.  Joining us this year was a very talented Tenor, Chris, playing the role of Pollione. 

Let me set the stage:

Norma is the high priestess in a druid society.  As such, she is unmarried and is to remain, pure.  Her friend and confidante, Adalgisa, is also a priestess, though younger and not as high ranking.  Both women are in love with a man.  Adalgisa is excited to tell Norma of her love, and this is when the two women discover that they are in love with the same man.  In fact, Norma has had two children by this man, in secret, of course.  During this particular scene, this man, Pollione, a high ranking Roman official, is trying to sway Adalgisa to be with him, though Norma is keen to protect her.  In the end, both women value their friendship above the love of a man and leave him and his two-timing ways.

Have a listen...warning, it's a 12-minute listen.

 

Now, even if you're not an opera fan or able to understand the words, you have to admit, this is pretty great (if I do say so myself!).  I have to say, singing opera is challenging and so much fun!

Josh Groban

My sister sent me a text/e-mail (can't remember which) back in March telling me I had to e-mail a local radio station by 2pm with specific information about when a Josh Groban song was played on the air for a chance to win tickets to his show at Key Arena in August.  Ok - I'll get to it before 2pm...

Holy frijoles!  It's 1:55pm - I'm in my car and need to get that e-mail sent!  Yay for smart phones!!  I sent the e-mail with seconds to spare, but it was sent! 

Waiting...didn't hear anything.  Oh well, it was worth a shot.  Then someone at church said to me, "hey, did you win tickets on the radio?  I heard your name and even though they butchered your last name, there can't be many with that name so it was probably you."  Great - they called my name and I missed it!!  Ugh, of course!!  There was probably some rule that I had to call back within a certain amount of time too.  Ok, I'll send them another e-mail.  It can't hurt to try...

Nothing.

Then one May afternoon I decided to check my voice mail (which I do not do very often at all).  Lo and behold, a voice mail from the radio station, "We've been trying to get a hold of you to get you your Josh Groban tickets.  Please call us back at..."  What?  I still won tickets?

Ok, but they're probably nose bleed tickets or something, right?  So, I called them back.

"WHAT? FRONT ROW?  You bet!! 

I'll be down tomorrow to pick them up!!!!"

I went and picked up the tickets (2) the next afternoon.  I hadn't told Missi yet that I won them.  As I was leaving the station, I called her and asked, "Do you have your computer in front of me?  I don't and I want to know where these tickets are located."  So, I gave her the section number and seat numbers (not the row).  She told me that this is a great section, right on the floor, and the seat numbers are right on the inside aisle. 

I responded, "Well, that's great to hear...since that's where we'll be sitting to watch Josh Groban in August!!!"

Missi - 7 months pregnant - at work - had to shut her door so she could jump up and down.  She was so excited!  I took a picture of the tickets and sent them to her...

Fast forward...Missi was due on August 8th...August 19th and still no baby.  The concert is in just over a week (August 27th).  Finally, little Tommy came on the 20th, but via c-section. 

"Missi, are you still going to be able to go, or should I find someone else?"  

"NO!  I'm still going!!"

"Ok, it's up to you..."

August 27th arrives - Missi did really well, hobbling her way to our seats :) 

The opening act, Elew, was great (albeit, he had some very strange facial expressions during his songs...).

The stage set up

The concert was phenomenal!  I didn't like it so much when he used the stage in the middle of the floor (because we were not front row to the middle, we were front row to the FRONT!) but oh well.  He did a lot of songs from his new album, "Illuminations," as well as some classics, including, "You Raise Me Up," during the encore.

Yeah, he's right there.  I'm barely zooming in on this pic!!

Uh huh - this one is without any zoom!

So great!

The orchestra/band were fantastic! 
Truly a talented group, especially the two guys on the right.

So much fun!  I'm curious how much those tickets would have cost if we had to pay for them??  Oh well - winning tickets is definitely the way to go!

Self-portraits never work out right.  Oh well!

Mary Poppins - The Musical

Eddie won some tickets from work to go see Mary Poppins - The Musical at the Paramount Theatre in Seattle.  I was expecting, "Free tickets?  Ok, probably up on the 3rd Mezzanine, but so what, they're free!"  Nope, these tickets were main floor tickets - fantastic seats to see a fantastic show!

We had so much fun - I think my favorite song was, "Step in Time," and it was all because of the dancing.  The guy playing Bert was a fabulous tap dancer, but I was so amazed when he walked up the wall of the theatre, started singing and tap dancing upside down on the ceiling and then walked down the other side!! 

Now, not to leave our title character out - Mary Poppins was truly remarkable!  A close second to, "Step in Time" would be a tie between, "Feed the Birds," and "Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious" (wow, did I spell that right?).  We were so impressed with the entire Company and the sets at this performance.

To top off the night, Mary Poppins "flies" away out over the crowd with her magic umbrella!  Did I just give away the ending?  Nah, you knew the story already. ;)

If you get the opportunity to see this show - take it.  If not - make the opportunity!  It's in Seattle through May 29th.  Be prepared, the show is a bit long (just under 3 hours with intermission) but well worth the time and money!

Enjoy your "jolly holiday with Mary!"

Marvin Hamlisch and "The Music Man"

My mom has season tickets to the Seattle Pops series at Benaroya Hall and last night, she invited me and Missi to go with her. We were also accompanied by my aunt Lois and a friend of hers.


We started the evening going out to dinner (Stuart Anderson's Black Angus...I don't recommend it). Dinner took a little longer than planned so we ended up racing down the freeway to get to Seattle from Lynnwood, parked, and in the theatre in 25 minutes. Ok, so we were a tad late, missed part of the opening number. Of course, it didn't help that when we arrived, someone was in my mom's seats, so we had to wait for the end of the opening number and the usher went over and straightened things out for us.



Ok, so we got all settled in and finally able to enjoy guest conductor and composer Marvin Hamlisch. He's a very talented and funny guy! We enjoyed the orchestra playing the overature from, "The Unsinkable Molly Brown," and Hamlisch on the piano with an original composition. He then welcomed out guest artist, Ashley Brown. Most recently, she originated the part of Mary Poppins in the musical by the same name on Broadway. She has performed other parts on Broadway as well, including Belle from, "Beauty and the Beast," as well as performed several concerts across the country. Brown sang, "Somewhere," "Feed the Birds," "Speak Low," and Marvin Hamlisch's, "The Way We Were."




Following intermission, a Readers Digest version of "The Music Man" was presented. So many talented people in the Seattle area took the stage playing parts in the chorus and the mens quartet. The lead roles were played by actors brought in from other parts of the country, including some who had performed on Broadway and in television and movies. Of course, Ashley Brown played the role of Marian Paroo and did a fantastic job.


Now, if I didn't know the story of The Music Man, the shortened version may have been a bit confusing, but in general, they really did very well in shortening the story but still keeping the storyline flowing. Many of my favorite songs from the movie were performed including, "Ya Got Trouble," "Til There Was You," "Marian the Librarian," "Goodnight, My Someone," and, of course, "76 Trombones." My mom was a bit disappointed that she didn't get to hear, "Shipoopi," and "Pick-a-Little, Talk-a-Little."


If you're interested, there are still tickets for sale for this performance going through this weekend. It was a fun way to spend a couple of hours!!

NATS

Every year I get the opportunity to participate in a vocal adjudication. This is an opportunity to receive feedback from other vocal instructors/coaches and even has a competitive element to it. Why is it called NATS, you ask? Well, it's an acronym that stands for National Association of Teachers of Singing. My voice teacher is a member of the Puget Sound Chapter, thus I get to participate.

This year, I was in a brand new category, again with my sister. Last year, I needed to learn three pieces but this year was a bit tougher - four pieces. One had to be an aria (Italian - check), the others were to be art songs, only one could be in English, and the others had to be different languages (French, German, English - check, check, check).

Now last year, I met with my accompanist several times. We had our timing down! We practiced, we cut interludes, we sped up songs - anything we could do to get my three songs introduced and performed in 10 minutes or less. This year? Well, new category = 15 minutes for the four songs. Piece of cake, right? Ha ha ha - here's where the major praise of my accompanist comes into the equation. I think we practiced twice prior to the day of the adjudication and one of those practices was during my voice lesson where my voice teacher grew very visibly more and more nervous with each piece we rehearsed for her. Why? Well, I didn't know the words to my songs yet (no biggie, when in doubt, make up new words - it's always worked before... :), I had just changed the key on one of my songs and just barely given the music to my accompanist (whoops) AND, since we can only use original music for the adjudication (they do check the music), I hadn't yet given my accompanist the book for one of my pieces, just a copy. She'd need to read from the book during the actual performance (yikes). Hmmm...things weren't looking good!

Have I mentioned yet that my accompanist is so fantastic? Yeah - she's phenomenal! If I were in her shoes, I'd have thrown a book at me by this time! (Thanks, Chari!!)

Ok, so the day of the adjudication arrives, it was a Saturday so I had worked at the Seattle Temple that morning (at the way-too-early-for-a-weekend-to-start time of 5am). Needless to say, I was a bit tired when it came time to sing. By all rights, I should have flopped this adjudication. Yes, I had practiced at home, but I was still so painfully far away from polishing these pieces, in my opinion, there's no way I should have been able to pull this off. You know though, I'm absolutely confident in the power of prayer because that was the calm that allowed me to be able to recall those words. Were there some minor mistakes, sure, but in the end things went great!

Take a listen if you want - if you hear mistakes, I blame the camera! :)

Remember how I said there was a competitive element to this? Well, I was awarded 1st Place in my category again this year (YAY!!) and Missi was awarded 2nd Place (yay Missi!!!)!!

Isn't singing fun?!

RAIN

Nope, not talking about the weather today. Since the downpour outside is so dreary, let's talk about a different kind of Rain...

For Eddie's birthday on Saturday, we went to Portland to see a group called Rain. They are a Beatles tribute band. Oh my goodness, they were great! They looked the part, sounded the part, played the instruments (very impressed that the "Paul" of the group even played the bass guitar left-handed, although, not in this picture; played the guitar right-handed too...), and even the mannerisms were accurate. We had great seats too; front row box seats on the first balcony. They were great because if we had been sitting any closer, it might have ruined the illusion (meaning, we would have been able to tell more easily that without the outfits and wigs, they really didn't look like George, Paul, John, and Ringo). Eddie even made it on the big screen during an encore round of the 'na na na's' in Hey Jude. They performed many of my favorite Beatles songs; Let it Be, Hey Jude, Eleanor Rigby, Paperback Writer, and so many more. There's a YouTube video showing Blackbird - another one of my favorite Beatles songs!

To top off Eddie's birthday, or I guess, more accurately, to begin Eddie's birthday, he opened up his birthday present. We were up pretty late on New Year's Day and I was so excited for Eddie to open his present that just after midnight the morning of his birthday, he got to open his present...BEATLES ROCK BAND!! I think he liked it, considering we stayed up until 2:30AM setting it up and playing the game. Eddie switched back and forth between the guitar, bass, and drums. Of course, I was singing!! :) So much fun!!!

After the show on Saturday, we went out to dinner and then to the Portland Temple. The next day, we stopped in at Fort Vancouver on our way home and wandered around for a couple of hours. When we got home yesterday, we finished putting away Christmas decorations and then...played Beatles Rock Band again until after 11PM. No wonder I'm so tired today! What a weekend!!