whaddup ...

... this is a shoutout to WSTW! Especially Mark Rogers and Hometown Heros. Thanks for all the IVA time and for coming to visit.
<3

the teacher and the student

Over the past few weeks I've been continuing my work in the studio .. the voice studio, that is. Yes, all singers need to continue to take lessons. And opera singers? Definitely! Since coming back to the States I've started up with a fantastic teacher named Don Marrazzo. He went to Curtis and teaches full-on opera technique, but also studied with William Riley (Celine Dion's and my dear friend Keith Porteous's teacher) and teaches pop voice. We have opened up some incredible things in my voice so I thought I'd explain to you a bit .. and hopefully enlighten you on how to open up your own voice if you so desire.

One of the things we've been working on in the pop voice is having a proper "mix". This is sometimes known as a "belt" and it's mixing head and chest voice into one register that the body knows how to instantly call up when you sing a note. Don gave me a number of exercises that we worked on for weeks, as well as pointing me to some videos online.

This is Hayley Williams from Paramore doing her vocal warmup.

We also worked on stripping out all the vibrato on the pop voice. Vibrato is the natural shake in the voice. With both my opera and pop voice I was imposing vibrato on my sustained notes, and we worked so that I only used my natural vibrato, which is a lot slower and produces a much more free sound. And with pop music, too much vibrato clouds the words. When we cleaned up the vibrato and took most of it out, the words of the song and the emotion began to jump out! I used this new voice on my show at the Queen Theater, and you can hear the difference. (listen to "Future Love" on http://www.reverbnation.com/iva)

As for the opera voice, since I'd been singing mostly pop for a while, we had some work to do. The voice had grown since the clips on my opera website and I hadn't been using my full voice. Plus, once I started using my natural vibrato, things just got crazy big!  So we're working on new sound clips for the end of the summer/early fall so you can hear the difference. The opera voice is kind of a wild animal, so for the past months I've been on the 1-2 hour a day practice schedule while doing classical concerts to test it out. Phew .. I am tired after one of the sessions, but things become more and more natural. And progress is made. So really, there's no complaining allowed. I mean, what else would I be doing with my time?? Silly me, did I forget that this is what I love to do??

So, what else; we are working on dynamics. Now that I've got this bigger voice, I have to learn how to control it. Especially pianissimo (very quiet) in the high registers. It takes incredible presence to make it happen, and the body is working, working, working for air production and the right amount of pressure in the voice. Take a listen to Renée Fleming if you'd like to know. Especially at about 5:00 of this clip - you'll hear her come off the note with a little release of pressure from the voice and a breath in. She is in top-gear, thought it's the most quiet full sound she can sustain.

Am feeling a bit embarrassed to share clips from my voice lessons, but now I'm seriously temped to upload some audio and even make some video clips to show you so you can hear what's happening.

In the meantime, I'll leave you with some wisdom from Brett Manning:

p.s. someone tell him to get some rest!!

guest blogging for Dilwyne Designs!

Svenskt Tenn

This week my longtime friend Bree Wellons asked me to do a guest spot on her blog for Dilwyne Designs. She asked for all things Swedish, so I got to revisit my favorite things in Stockholm.

Check out my guest blog as well as Bree's other posts. They're fun, beautiful, and give you great ideas on what to do at home. Bree will help you make the space you've always dreamed of, using new pieces and re-inventing what you already have!

http://dilwynedesigns.com/blog/

Enjoy .'.

www.dilwynedesigns.com

To cover, or not to cover ...

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=180210005361859

A week from now, five of us are going to step on stage at the new World Café Live at the Queen Theatre and do the first IVA show I've ever given in my hometown, Wilmington, Delaware. My band and I (Shaun Dougherty, guitar, Joe Trainor, keys, AJ Malme drums and Ray Gagliardino, bass) have been rehearsing for a couple of weeks and I had thought that perhaps we should cover a song at the gig. It had been suggested to me by a friend as a way to help the audience fell more familiar with me at my gigs, since all my songs are original. This past week at rehearsal, as my band got to know my songs better, AJ said "why should we do a cover? I want people to hear you rock on your own music." And Joe said "when people ask me and my trio to play a cover so they can hear something more familiar, I tell them to come to more of my shows and then they'll be more familiar with my music." This Sunday we have our final rehearsal and we'll be really familiar with my older and new songs by then, and I'll be wondering .. to cover or not to cover?

On my first album I wanted to do a cover, which my producer was against. But then he made a beautiful arrangement of U2's "Where the Streets Have No Name," (click to listen on Myspace) and we were off. And earlier this year my lawyer/agent asked if I wanted to be a contestant on "The Voice" on NBC, where you have to sing covers with no rehearsal. Since I'm an opera singer by training and had basically only sung pop songs that I'd written myself, I didn't know how I was going to be able to handle singing covers on the spot, and we decided that it was not the right context for me to "break" in the States. But since then, I've found an awesome opera and pop teacher and we've been able to step up my pop vocals with real technical work in a way that goes naturally with my operatic voice. So ... a cover is entirely possible technically. But aesthetically? That's the real question. 

Matt Cardle singing "When We Collide"

This month I've been following a very successful cover since I heard it on the radio. Last year's X-Factor winner Matt Cardle sang a Biffy Clyro song they called "Many of Horror" which he (or Simon Cowell's team) called "When We Collide". I absolutely love this song, and since I'd heard it on 104.5 FM I was searching for it on YouTube. I found the Matt Cardle version first, and loved his singing, but thought it didn't sound like what I'd heard on the radio.

Biffy Clyro singing the same song, called "Many of Horror"

So I dug further and found both versions, and found out that Matt Cardle had the #1 Xmas single with the song, while fans of the band Biffy Clyro made an outcry which brought their original version of the song up to #8 on the charts. Now they are coming to play in Philly. The songwriter Simon Neil is loving the controversy, I imagine, as well as the exposure his song and the band are getting.

So .. to cover or not to cover. What do you think?

PIFA wrapup .. and beyond

The 6,000 bulb Eiffel Tower in the lobby of the Kimmel Center

Now that PIFA 2011 has wrapped, I thought I'd go through some of the highlights (and low-lights) of what I saw at the festival.

The puppeteers revealed after Basil Twist's Petrushka

The most exciting performances gave new conceptions of the Ballet Russes - Basil Twist's "Petrushka" and Center City Opera's "Danse Russe." Both shows took art forms with a legacy - opera and even more ancient, puppetry - and injected them into modern world with a current-cy that made them perfectly suited for PIFA. It helped us understand what took place in Paris a hundred years ago while holding its own as modern entertainment.

There were two low-lights of my PIFA experience. The first was the University of the Arts' "A Lyrical Opera for Two". This was a case of false advertising, for the piece was musical theater, not opera, and for an opera artist and audience member like me, it is not fun to show up for an opera and have it not be one. The two art forms use completely different vocal techniques as well as aesthetics, as fans of each well know. They should have listed somewhere in the notes on the show that it was to be musical theater.

The other disappointment was of course the Philadelphia Orchestra's announcement that it was declaring bankruptcy. No one wants to see an arts institution of the Orchestra's caliber go under. One of my friends expressed his fear that it marked the end of world-class classical music in Philadelphia. Let's not let that be so, and hope that while we as an audience support the organization, they also put their house in order and make history again.

Librettist Terry Teachout's backstage shot of "Danse Russe"

PIFA included a lot of events and even I had a hard time whittling down all the choices. WHYY's Jo Ann Allen said on her blog that she felt there was "too much" at PIFA.
http://www.newsworks.org/index.php/allens-lane/item/16801-too-much-pifa
This was the first year for the festival and it came in with quite a bang. I hope that in the upcoming years it will evolve further into a festival to put Philly on the cultural map of the world. 

Of course the spectacular grand finale over broad street was a spectacle for anyone and everyone to enjoy and was a more-than-fitting ending to the festival. For those of you that missed it, I'm truly sorry. It was as mind-expanding as it was purely entertaining.

Coming up from me now that PIFA is over? I'll be preparing for my IVA show at the World Café Live at the Queen in Wilmington, Delaware as well as preparing for a special Swedish performance. Stay tuned...

IVA writes to you with and in support of PIFA (Philadelphia International Festival of the Arts) <http://www.pifa.org/> . Please Like their Facebook <http://www.facebook.com/PIFA.Philly>  Page and Follow them on Twitter <http://www.twitter.com/PIFAPhilly> ! 

La Compagnie Transe Express dazzles Broad Street!

Last night I got the chance to see something I've never seen before.

Broad Street was packed! It took about a half-hour to move just three block to get to the Kimmel Center.

The crowd on Broad Street awaits

 At the corner of Broad and Spruce was a large metal ball suspended from a crane. The crowd waited expectantly as dark set in. People were standing in windows and on top of buildings to see the show. And as the night approached, the acrobats slowly climbed into the ball. One began ringing a large bell. It was like wind chimes preparing us for something from another world.

The structure rises...

Slowly the ball began to rise from the street, percussion musicians suspended above from its edges. They hung like Christmas tree ornaments, lit up in the dusk while they took on their crazy characters. The acrobats were perched up above them, and the musicians played different chimes and bell sounds along with drums to keep the wonderfully strange pace. As the performance went on, the ball opened from the bottom like a flower, a musician on the end of each petal. Then it spun like a merry go round, or a Christmas decoration that spins under an open flame.

...and the corners lift

 The musicians continued to play until the acrobats began their incredible show, gracefully showing their balletic strength. Later they moved mechanically like dolls, dancing on top of the music box. They were lit with spotlights from the bottom, casting their shadows on the high rises on Broad Street. As they moved, we moved, to another time.

The whole performance was gorgeously magical, stylish and wild. I heard a woman next to me say that it made Philadelphia proud, and I believe she was right. PIFA ended their festival with the perfect modern influence of old world French artistry. Bravi.

A link to video:
http://www.philly.com/philly/video/BC926218531001.html

La Compagnie Transe Express 

IVA writes to you with and in support of PIFA (Philadelphia International Festival of the Arts) <http://www.pifa.org/> . Please Like their Facebook <http://www.facebook.com/PIFA.Philly>  Page and Follow them on Twitter <http://www.twitter.com/PIFAPhilly> !    

 

A Hallelujah Moment for Center City Opera and "Danse Russe"

Last night I was lucky to witness somewhat of a miracle - an excellent, engaging, accessible new opera: "Danse Russe". The Center City Opera Theatre put on a triple bill called "Rites, Rhythm … Riot!" at the Kimmel Center's Perelman Theater. The first half of the show was comprised of two chamber pieces by Stravinsky, "Ragtime" choreographed for two dancers, and "Renard", a chamber opera sung by the same cast of singers and performed with five dancers. Each piece was given smooth, quirky, stylish choreograph by Kun-Yang Lin that reflected the jazz influence of the music as well as the  surrealism of much of the art of the time, and was danced with excellent skill and acting by the players. (They trumped the performance of Pulcinella with the Pennsylvania Ballet that opened the festival) Both stagings suited the music to the "t", and from where we sat in the audience, at tables on the floor of the Perelman Theatre, we were thrown right into the informal café influence of Paris in the early 20th century.

After intermission, we got a real treat: A new opera called "Danse Russe" with music by Paul Moravec and a libretto by Terry Teachout. It told the story of the four men that created the famous "Rite of Spring," the Ballet Russe that famously caused a riot in Paris in 1913 : composer Igor Stravinsky, impresario Sergei Diaghilev, dancer Vaslav Nijinsky and conductor Pierre Monteaux. The opera was in English and I understood every word. And good thing, too, because the libretto was clever, funny, and at times, quite touching. The text, in combination with the music and stage direction, created an enthralling inside view of the creative process behind one of Stravinsky's, and the Ballet Russe's, most famous pieces.

The stage direction, created by Leland Kimball of Opera Delaware, was composed of vaudeville "numbers" which moved from stylishly funny in "There's Something about Serghoia" danced with straw hats and canes by the the composer, played by Christopher Lorge, and the conductor, played by Paul Corujo, to even more profound moments when the characters' influence and personality came to vivid life. For example, when Stravinsky began to compose the Rite of Spring, Christopher Lorge played the music on the piano as the orchestra played its most memorable theme. Later there was a touching and beautiful trio about springtime in Russia shared by Lorge, Matt Maness as Nijinsky and Jason Switzer as Diaghilev. And there was a captivatingly-intimate moment with Diaghalev as he sat at the front of the stage and described how he was able to unite the artists in breakthrough performances, but that he himself could offer nothing without them.

The historical references were accessible to the novice as well as those more aware of the Ballet Russes. Kimball chose to place the pictures of the original creators on chairs behind the players, which reminded us that these characters once lived and breathed. There was also a famous choreographic quote when Matt Maness as Nijinsky's performed a pantomime version of the dancer's trademark straight hands. It made us all laugh, whether we knew the original choreography or not.

Matt Maness at  Nijinsky working with choreographer Kun-Yang Lin

Orchestra 2001 gave a solid performance of the music under the direction of Maestro Andrew Kurtz. After the performance, I heard Kurtz explain that many of the singers were young artists who had stepped in due to illness and far surpassed his expectations. They and the dancers (Scott McPhetters, Elrey C. Belmonti, Jessica Warchal-King, Jennifer Rose, Olive Prince and Wen-Chen Liu) did a fine job indeed, as did the cue-card carrying Corinn Kopczynski, who gave us a number of good laughs during the opera.

Most importantly, "Dance Russe" was a brilliant crossover, funny and accessible while stylish and lofty. It had something for everyone. Center City Opera chose to present it in a cabaret format, with chairs and tables spread out over the floor of the Perelman Theatre. We sipped cocktails and enjoyed the show while this seminal moment in musical history was cleverly slipped under our skin. It brought a landmark moment in Western Culture alive again, and gave PIFA an important moment of living history. And it did justice to the legacy of "The Rite of Spring", which still shocks and amazes audiences. I was reminded of a moment where I, my housemate soprano saxophonist Anders Paulsson and rock producer Martin Karlegård listened to a recording of the piece to celebrate the early Swedish Spring. Even Martin, the rock producer, was taken aback.

The Center City Opera has two more performances of this not-to-be-missed piece, so go see them this afternoon at 2pm, or tomorrow, April 30th at 8pm. Tickets start at $10.
http://www.operatheater.org/wp2/

*Hallelujah Moment appears courtesy of Swedish music guru Kishti Tomita

IVA writes to you with and in support of PIFA (Philadelphia International Festival of the Arts) <http://www.pifa.org/> . Please Like their Facebook <http://www.facebook.com/PIFA.Philly>  Page and Follow them on Twitter <http://www.twitter.com/PIFAPhilly> !