Here is, verbatim, and in its entirety, a conversation I had three years ago. I present it here, without context and for no clear reason.
"So Ray."
(long pause)
"Uh... yeah?"
"Julie wants to know if we ever talk to each other by yelling through the bathroom wall."
(another long pause)
'Well, this would be the first time."
(my turn to pause)
"Okay, talk to you later."
"Yeah."
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
Monday, November 9, 2009
In-Class Essays; or rather, an Essay on Classes
As a person who is not currently a student (in any formal sense), but has spent practically his whole life up to this point as a student, I have spent a great deal of time thinking of the nature of "the class" as an entity. Not the people who make up the class, nor the classroom the class is held in. Rather, The Class. English 1304, Communications 1301, etc. In this time spent thinking, I have come to two conclusions.
1) Classes are stupid.
2) The classes that I had the easiest time focusing on, regardless of content, were the classes that were structured like five-paragraph essays.
Everybody knows the basic essay format: you write your first paragraph which includes a thesis, and spend the rest of that paragraph making broad brush strokes illustrating why your thesis needed to be said (these two things do not need to happen in that order, but it is understood that they must both happen in the first paragraph). You then spend three paragraphs illustrating why your thesis is a good and proper thesis, and is in fact far superior to other theses which might disagree with it. Finally, you write a concluding paragraph that sums up your previous four paragraphs. This paragraph may or may not include a lazily-paraphrased restatement of your original thesis, depending on how late at night you finished your essay and how interested you are in your subject matter at this point in the process.
Classes that follow the same structure have a way of making a class bearable for me, probably because it follows the recovering procrastinator's rule of "breaking the big thing into smaller things so it won't seem so big." In my mind, this happens thusly:
Syllabus Day - The Opening Paragraph
This seems self-explanatory and like something one could easily jump past, but in my experience as a student who has been both highly successful and embarrassingly unsuccessful, a class's opening paragraph is vital to how I will perform in a class. The opening day needs to introduce me to the ideas we will cover in class in a way that makes me want to care. The phrasing here is important: nobody can make anybody care about anything in a significant way in a single class period, but they can make somebody want to care about it. Nobody cares about anything until they've sacrificed something for it, and they won't sacrifice anything unless it's something they believe they could care about.
So a thesis statement for an American Literature class's opening paragraph might say something like, "This semester, you're going to learn about the evolution of philosophy in America throughout its history by examining its literature." The professor would then tell us which stories and authors in particular illustrated which philosophies without needing to elaborate on who those authors were or what those philosophies entailed; that is what the rest of the semester is for. Every class in which a professor has done something like this has resulted in me actually doing my homework for at least the first third of the class.
The problems that arose for me were when a professor did not really present an opening paragraph. Rather, they would pass out a syllabus, explain the attendance requirements, and tell us what books we needed and then send us away telling us that we needed to have such and such homework done by the next class meeting. Often, they would simply read verbatim from the syllabus. I believe that these professors really thought they were giving us an opening paragraph. But the essay had no thesis, and it had no hook. In retrospect, if I ever did that first assignment, it always felt like I was working ahead rather than simply keeping up. And now I think I understand why: I had no idea where the assignment was taking me, because I had no clearly defined thesis for the class.
Most of the Rest of the Class: Lectures & Exams - Supporting Paragraphs
The first assignment, given on syllabus day, is the opening sentence of the second paragraph. The first test is a comprehension check on how well you read that paragraph. And so on and so forth for the rest of the semester, until...
The Final: The Concluding Paragraph
If a professor has written their essay well, everything that was briefly touched upon during the first paragraph has now been covered in-depth over the rest of the semester. Now the student must take their last comprehension check: the final. It's never as difficult as the previous tests, but it does sort of lazily graze over the points that were made in those paragraphs. The student should now be able to regurgitate the general ideas behind the first paragraph that the professor gave on the opening day, but now they should actually understand what it all means and why it needed to be said. They know why Benjamin Franklin was a perfect example of Enlightenment thinking and they probably have some sort of opinion on Langston Hughes. Maybe, at the end of it all, they don't actually care about the subject, but the professor has successfully made them attempt to care. In my case, if I was doing well in the class, it was because I had finally started caring sometime after the first test.
So there you have it: five paragraphs. I have no idea if any other students feel this way about their classes; I only know that this is how my mind operated during the many years I spent in school. And it was consistent; I can think back on specific classes in which I did very, very well (Psychology, one of my four music histories, and Intro to Communications in particular) and this is definitely how they were structured. Of course, I did fine in several classes that weren't structured this way simply because I had to, and I did miserably in one class that was structured exactly this way because after attempting to care about the subject I found that I really, really, really did NOT care about it at all. So obviously it's not a hard and fast rule. And I think I like it more that way; if it were one of those things that were always true, it wouldn't be nearly as much fun to think about.
It would be too much like math.
1) Classes are stupid.
2) The classes that I had the easiest time focusing on, regardless of content, were the classes that were structured like five-paragraph essays.
Everybody knows the basic essay format: you write your first paragraph which includes a thesis, and spend the rest of that paragraph making broad brush strokes illustrating why your thesis needed to be said (these two things do not need to happen in that order, but it is understood that they must both happen in the first paragraph). You then spend three paragraphs illustrating why your thesis is a good and proper thesis, and is in fact far superior to other theses which might disagree with it. Finally, you write a concluding paragraph that sums up your previous four paragraphs. This paragraph may or may not include a lazily-paraphrased restatement of your original thesis, depending on how late at night you finished your essay and how interested you are in your subject matter at this point in the process.
Classes that follow the same structure have a way of making a class bearable for me, probably because it follows the recovering procrastinator's rule of "breaking the big thing into smaller things so it won't seem so big." In my mind, this happens thusly:
Syllabus Day - The Opening Paragraph
This seems self-explanatory and like something one could easily jump past, but in my experience as a student who has been both highly successful and embarrassingly unsuccessful, a class's opening paragraph is vital to how I will perform in a class. The opening day needs to introduce me to the ideas we will cover in class in a way that makes me want to care. The phrasing here is important: nobody can make anybody care about anything in a significant way in a single class period, but they can make somebody want to care about it. Nobody cares about anything until they've sacrificed something for it, and they won't sacrifice anything unless it's something they believe they could care about.
So a thesis statement for an American Literature class's opening paragraph might say something like, "This semester, you're going to learn about the evolution of philosophy in America throughout its history by examining its literature." The professor would then tell us which stories and authors in particular illustrated which philosophies without needing to elaborate on who those authors were or what those philosophies entailed; that is what the rest of the semester is for. Every class in which a professor has done something like this has resulted in me actually doing my homework for at least the first third of the class.
The problems that arose for me were when a professor did not really present an opening paragraph. Rather, they would pass out a syllabus, explain the attendance requirements, and tell us what books we needed and then send us away telling us that we needed to have such and such homework done by the next class meeting. Often, they would simply read verbatim from the syllabus. I believe that these professors really thought they were giving us an opening paragraph. But the essay had no thesis, and it had no hook. In retrospect, if I ever did that first assignment, it always felt like I was working ahead rather than simply keeping up. And now I think I understand why: I had no idea where the assignment was taking me, because I had no clearly defined thesis for the class.
Most of the Rest of the Class: Lectures & Exams - Supporting Paragraphs
The first assignment, given on syllabus day, is the opening sentence of the second paragraph. The first test is a comprehension check on how well you read that paragraph. And so on and so forth for the rest of the semester, until...
The Final: The Concluding Paragraph
If a professor has written their essay well, everything that was briefly touched upon during the first paragraph has now been covered in-depth over the rest of the semester. Now the student must take their last comprehension check: the final. It's never as difficult as the previous tests, but it does sort of lazily graze over the points that were made in those paragraphs. The student should now be able to regurgitate the general ideas behind the first paragraph that the professor gave on the opening day, but now they should actually understand what it all means and why it needed to be said. They know why Benjamin Franklin was a perfect example of Enlightenment thinking and they probably have some sort of opinion on Langston Hughes. Maybe, at the end of it all, they don't actually care about the subject, but the professor has successfully made them attempt to care. In my case, if I was doing well in the class, it was because I had finally started caring sometime after the first test.
So there you have it: five paragraphs. I have no idea if any other students feel this way about their classes; I only know that this is how my mind operated during the many years I spent in school. And it was consistent; I can think back on specific classes in which I did very, very well (Psychology, one of my four music histories, and Intro to Communications in particular) and this is definitely how they were structured. Of course, I did fine in several classes that weren't structured this way simply because I had to, and I did miserably in one class that was structured exactly this way because after attempting to care about the subject I found that I really, really, really did NOT care about it at all. So obviously it's not a hard and fast rule. And I think I like it more that way; if it were one of those things that were always true, it wouldn't be nearly as much fun to think about.
It would be too much like math.
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
Hog Fever
I've said this already, but I'll say it again here, for posterity:
I can't believe I got swine flu.
--------
Earlier today, my roommate Clint came into town after spending two weeks in a medical test facility in Austin. He came in, made soup, and gave me a stuffed pig in honor of my malady. We sat and chatted and watched an episode of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. Then he left. Shortly thereafter, I took some NyQuil and went to sleep.
When I awoke about an hour later, I was pretty certain that I had hallucinated the whole encounter. I could not convince myself that Clint had actually been in the house. I sat in my bed for a full ten minutes debating whether I should call him and ask if I had seen him today. I ultimately decided that his answer would be unimportant, because the fact that I needed to ask the question in the first place was evidence enough that something was probably not right. Fortunately, I then headed into the living room and found the stuffed pig. That confirmed for me that I had actually seen my roommate and had not, in fact, been pulling a John Nash (although Clint does bear a superficial resemblance to Paul Bettany, in that he is both tall and blonde-haired).
Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to find me a Jennifer Connelly to feed me some soup while I do math.
I can't believe I got swine flu.
--------
Earlier today, my roommate Clint came into town after spending two weeks in a medical test facility in Austin. He came in, made soup, and gave me a stuffed pig in honor of my malady. We sat and chatted and watched an episode of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. Then he left. Shortly thereafter, I took some NyQuil and went to sleep.
When I awoke about an hour later, I was pretty certain that I had hallucinated the whole encounter. I could not convince myself that Clint had actually been in the house. I sat in my bed for a full ten minutes debating whether I should call him and ask if I had seen him today. I ultimately decided that his answer would be unimportant, because the fact that I needed to ask the question in the first place was evidence enough that something was probably not right. Fortunately, I then headed into the living room and found the stuffed pig. That confirmed for me that I had actually seen my roommate and had not, in fact, been pulling a John Nash (although Clint does bear a superficial resemblance to Paul Bettany, in that he is both tall and blonde-haired).
Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to find me a Jennifer Connelly to feed me some soup while I do math.
Tuesday, August 25, 2009
Montage
When I travel, I find that I need a very specific soundtrack. It’s not a particular artist or genre that’s important, nor am I in search of a precise beat or even a certain type of lyrics. No, what I’m looking for is specific in a way that’s more difficult to define. I’m talking, of course, about montage music.
As the song plays through my headphones, I need to picture a series of images indicating to the viewers (yes, I know there are no “viewers” in reality, but you know full well why I imagine that there are viewers, because you do it too) that I am, in fact on a Very Meaningful Journey. Images like a very distant shot of the train I’m on as it speeds by. Maybe a close-up on my face from outside the window as I look past the camera thoughtfully. A shot that just shows my hand coming out of the window to do that cool wavy thing where you feel the air move over your arm. Definitely a shot where I see an amusing sign and smile to myself at how silly people can be sometimes.
Are you putting together a soundtrack for the montage I’m building? I am, because I can’t help it. When I travel, I need songs that fit these images, otherwise my Very Meaningful Journey (VMJ) becomes simply a journey (j). Can’t have that.
Some songs on my montage playlist:
“Breathe” – Michelle Branch
“Right Now” – Van Halen
“Waiting Game” – Yellowcard (all shots during this song are in slow-mo, of course)
“M79” – Vampire Weekend
"Angels of the Silences” – Counting Crows (this is a “Journey Starter” meaning it must come after a shot of me getting excited and maybe hitting my steering wheel with my palm right as the drums kick in)
“Have a Nice Day” – Bon Jovi
I want to hear other people’s montage mixes. Somehow I bet this could wind up being one of those things nobody agrees on, like pizza toppings or the best route across town. Everybody’s got their own, and I want to steal the bits I like from yours. You can have mine too, it’s okay with me.
As the song plays through my headphones, I need to picture a series of images indicating to the viewers (yes, I know there are no “viewers” in reality, but you know full well why I imagine that there are viewers, because you do it too) that I am, in fact on a Very Meaningful Journey. Images like a very distant shot of the train I’m on as it speeds by. Maybe a close-up on my face from outside the window as I look past the camera thoughtfully. A shot that just shows my hand coming out of the window to do that cool wavy thing where you feel the air move over your arm. Definitely a shot where I see an amusing sign and smile to myself at how silly people can be sometimes.
Are you putting together a soundtrack for the montage I’m building? I am, because I can’t help it. When I travel, I need songs that fit these images, otherwise my Very Meaningful Journey (VMJ) becomes simply a journey (j). Can’t have that.
Some songs on my montage playlist:
“Breathe” – Michelle Branch
“Right Now” – Van Halen
“Waiting Game” – Yellowcard (all shots during this song are in slow-mo, of course)
“M79” – Vampire Weekend
"Angels of the Silences” – Counting Crows (this is a “Journey Starter” meaning it must come after a shot of me getting excited and maybe hitting my steering wheel with my palm right as the drums kick in)
“Have a Nice Day” – Bon Jovi
I want to hear other people’s montage mixes. Somehow I bet this could wind up being one of those things nobody agrees on, like pizza toppings or the best route across town. Everybody’s got their own, and I want to steal the bits I like from yours. You can have mine too, it’s okay with me.
Saturday, August 8, 2009
Generalizing
I had this conversation recently:
Woman: "Men don't notice details. All they see is boobs and butt, and if they like what they see then that's all they need. The details are lost on men."
Me: "Well, at least we don't generalize, the way all women do."
Woman: [pause as she seems to ponder what I have said, then...] "Ugh, that is such a man thing to say."
---
Things are still good in Germany, for all who have been asking after me. If I haven't responded to an email or facebook message that you've sent, please don't take it personally. It probably means I wanted to take the time to write you a "real" response and never got the time and eventually it slipped out of my head.
I'm very much looking forward to heading back to Waco next month, but in the meantime I am having the time of my life here in Weimar. The only things anyone expects me to do here are a) learn my music and b) perform it well. The fact that I'm enjoying so much is very affirming in my decision to make this my career for the rest of my life.
It's ridiculous how much the human mind is capable of memorizing in a very short amount of time, by the way. I remember it used to take me close to two months to really feel like I knew an aria. I remember one aria in particular that Prof Sadlier (my voice teacher) assigned to me that I STILL haven't learned a full year later (Billy Budd's aria, if you're curious). Then, this week, I decided I wanted to learn some new arias, and two days later I had three of them in my voice and I'm anticipating that by Tuesday of next week I'll have them comfortably memorized. In the meantime, I'm still memorizing the role that I'll be performing next month. That's close to two hours of music learned in only a few weeks. And I'm not even close to being a "quick study" compared to some of the people here. My buddy from Mexico, Jesus, has now learned five ROLES this summer, and I don't think he's even broken a sweat to do so (again, for the curious: Don Giovanni, Bartolo and Figaro from Nozze, and Don Alfonso and Guglielmo from Cosi. It's honestly some of the most impressive work I've ever seen, but I think it's really just par for the course for this job. I love watching these people work; it's inspiring.
Okay, time to go. I've got studying to do!
Woman: "Men don't notice details. All they see is boobs and butt, and if they like what they see then that's all they need. The details are lost on men."
Me: "Well, at least we don't generalize, the way all women do."
Woman: [pause as she seems to ponder what I have said, then...] "Ugh, that is such a man thing to say."
---
Things are still good in Germany, for all who have been asking after me. If I haven't responded to an email or facebook message that you've sent, please don't take it personally. It probably means I wanted to take the time to write you a "real" response and never got the time and eventually it slipped out of my head.
I'm very much looking forward to heading back to Waco next month, but in the meantime I am having the time of my life here in Weimar. The only things anyone expects me to do here are a) learn my music and b) perform it well. The fact that I'm enjoying so much is very affirming in my decision to make this my career for the rest of my life.
It's ridiculous how much the human mind is capable of memorizing in a very short amount of time, by the way. I remember it used to take me close to two months to really feel like I knew an aria. I remember one aria in particular that Prof Sadlier (my voice teacher) assigned to me that I STILL haven't learned a full year later (Billy Budd's aria, if you're curious). Then, this week, I decided I wanted to learn some new arias, and two days later I had three of them in my voice and I'm anticipating that by Tuesday of next week I'll have them comfortably memorized. In the meantime, I'm still memorizing the role that I'll be performing next month. That's close to two hours of music learned in only a few weeks. And I'm not even close to being a "quick study" compared to some of the people here. My buddy from Mexico, Jesus, has now learned five ROLES this summer, and I don't think he's even broken a sweat to do so (again, for the curious: Don Giovanni, Bartolo and Figaro from Nozze, and Don Alfonso and Guglielmo from Cosi. It's honestly some of the most impressive work I've ever seen, but I think it's really just par for the course for this job. I love watching these people work; it's inspiring.
Okay, time to go. I've got studying to do!
Sunday, July 26, 2009
Berlin
I visited Berlin yesterday. I had no idea what I was in for. It's one thing to study something in school or remember back to when I was a kid and saw the Wall coming down on the news, but going to the city itself (having done no research of any kind beforehand) seemed like a very abstract idea; I was not actually all that excited. This continued even right up to the point where we got off the train and started walking around. I turned to Joel (one of the guys I'm here with) and said, "Yep... it's pretty much a city." Had it not been for our amazing, mind-blowingly great tour guide, I doubt I would have enjoyed it all that much, simply because I would never have known where to look.
If you're ever in Berlin, you MUST use this company: http://www.insidertour.com/
And you ABSOLUTELY MUST request Brian as your tour guide. The experience would not have possibly been the same without him there to walk us through the story of the city.
We spent the entire day on foot; we walked around from 10:30am to 6:00pm in the cold and rainy weather. I hadn't slept the night before and I hadn't eaten anything all day. But the thought of stopping the tour or leaving for a moment to grab a bite to eat never even occurred to me. That is how wonderful this tour was; even after being awake for 32+ hours, I still wanted to hear more of what he had to say.
The story of Berlin is something that I cannot hope to summarize via the limited medium of text, but I'm going to do my best. Brian managed to spend the entire day building up the sad, hopeless, bitter plight of Berliners during the years of the iron curtain that I could not help but feel deep sympathy for these anonymous people whom I had never met. They were cut off from their loved ones from August 12, 1961 until November 9, 1989. Families torn apart, grandparents separated from newborns they hadn't yet met, newlyweds who lost all contact with the rest of their families, and the list goes on. In the final speech of the day, Brian took all of these oppressive feelings we had been given throughout the day, all of the sad memories we had shared with these anonymous people, and completely blew the lid off of them when he told the most moving story of the night the wall come down you could possibly ever hope to hear. I was deeply moved. It was absolutely beautiful.
I'm about twenty five years old. I can't imagine what it must be like to lose contact with someone for twenty-eight years, because I can't even imagine what twenty-eight years must be like. That's how long these people had to live in isolation from those that they loved. Thanks to Brian for helping make that real to me.
The man loves that city to death, and I understand why now. I would live there in a heartbeat. If I come back here in a few years to get a job, I would love to live in Berlin. Or Weimar. Or anywhere, really. This is a wonderful country.
Now I've just got to learn some German.
If you're ever in Berlin, you MUST use this company: http://www.insidertour.com/
And you ABSOLUTELY MUST request Brian as your tour guide. The experience would not have possibly been the same without him there to walk us through the story of the city.
We spent the entire day on foot; we walked around from 10:30am to 6:00pm in the cold and rainy weather. I hadn't slept the night before and I hadn't eaten anything all day. But the thought of stopping the tour or leaving for a moment to grab a bite to eat never even occurred to me. That is how wonderful this tour was; even after being awake for 32+ hours, I still wanted to hear more of what he had to say.
The story of Berlin is something that I cannot hope to summarize via the limited medium of text, but I'm going to do my best. Brian managed to spend the entire day building up the sad, hopeless, bitter plight of Berliners during the years of the iron curtain that I could not help but feel deep sympathy for these anonymous people whom I had never met. They were cut off from their loved ones from August 12, 1961 until November 9, 1989. Families torn apart, grandparents separated from newborns they hadn't yet met, newlyweds who lost all contact with the rest of their families, and the list goes on. In the final speech of the day, Brian took all of these oppressive feelings we had been given throughout the day, all of the sad memories we had shared with these anonymous people, and completely blew the lid off of them when he told the most moving story of the night the wall come down you could possibly ever hope to hear. I was deeply moved. It was absolutely beautiful.
I'm about twenty five years old. I can't imagine what it must be like to lose contact with someone for twenty-eight years, because I can't even imagine what twenty-eight years must be like. That's how long these people had to live in isolation from those that they loved. Thanks to Brian for helping make that real to me.
The man loves that city to death, and I understand why now. I would live there in a heartbeat. If I come back here in a few years to get a job, I would love to live in Berlin. Or Weimar. Or anywhere, really. This is a wonderful country.
Now I've just got to learn some German.
Sunday, June 21, 2009
Admiral's Club
Buying the one-day pass to the Admiral's Club was an unnecessary indulgence. I'll admit it. But I refuse to regret it.
Here I sit, at LAX, completely isolated with my fresh coffee in a giant, empty room that is softly lit by lamplight as the sun has just begun to rise and peeks its light through the giant windows that overlook the tarmac... in the midst of the second busiest airport in America, I can't imagine there's a single place that's more peaceful. Which is what I need right now. It's been a crazy couple of weeks. It has, however, been the best imaginable type of crazy that there is.
I've just finished a two week program for emerging young opera singers in Los Angeles called OperaWorks (www.operaworks.com). I am about to make a very important statement, and before I do that I must put a few things in context. That context is as follows:
I have spent much of my life traveling. I love to travel, and I have experienced many unique and wonderful things in my life; I hold these memories dearly. From a week in London to eight weeks in Costa Rica to many, many trips to Disney World growing up, I sincerely believe that I have had one of the best lives anyone who is my age could possibly ask for. I am incredibly happy with how my life has been up to this point and I have no regrets worth mentioning or significant turmoil that would cause me to be an unhappy person in general. Taking that into account, I make the following statement:
This was the best two weeks of my life.
If you are involved in opera, you need to be involved with OperaWorks.
At this moment, I am singing better than I ever have in my life, and I didn't take a single voice lesson. I took acting lessons. I did coachings for interpretation and diction. I took yoga. I was coached on my posture by one of the producers of Aladdin. I waved my hands around in the air like an idiot and produced sounds I didn't know I could make while improvising a seven-part ensemble piece about a turkey sandwich. I danced... very, very badly, in front of many, many people. And nowhere in any of that did anyone mention anything about vocal technique or passagio or soft palettes or anything like that. And yet here we are, two weeks later, and I am one thousand percent stronger as a performer.
There's so much more to say, but the fact is it's just going to be more of me gushing. I am so thoroughly exhausted right now, but I'm equally exhilarated by the prospects I have in front of me. I have a direction for my career, I have a plan for my future, and I know what steps I need to take from here to make this life happen for myself. I can't wait.
Thanks for reading everybody. I'm so glad you decided to stop by. Next stop: Germany for Lyric Opera Weimar (www.lyricoperastudioweimar.com)!
-John
PS
The friends I made are what made it so over-the-top special. My colleagues are all beautiful, and I can't wait to see them again. Until then, I will miss them dearly.
Here I sit, at LAX, completely isolated with my fresh coffee in a giant, empty room that is softly lit by lamplight as the sun has just begun to rise and peeks its light through the giant windows that overlook the tarmac... in the midst of the second busiest airport in America, I can't imagine there's a single place that's more peaceful. Which is what I need right now. It's been a crazy couple of weeks. It has, however, been the best imaginable type of crazy that there is.
I've just finished a two week program for emerging young opera singers in Los Angeles called OperaWorks (www.operaworks.com). I am about to make a very important statement, and before I do that I must put a few things in context. That context is as follows:
I have spent much of my life traveling. I love to travel, and I have experienced many unique and wonderful things in my life; I hold these memories dearly. From a week in London to eight weeks in Costa Rica to many, many trips to Disney World growing up, I sincerely believe that I have had one of the best lives anyone who is my age could possibly ask for. I am incredibly happy with how my life has been up to this point and I have no regrets worth mentioning or significant turmoil that would cause me to be an unhappy person in general. Taking that into account, I make the following statement:
This was the best two weeks of my life.
If you are involved in opera, you need to be involved with OperaWorks.
At this moment, I am singing better than I ever have in my life, and I didn't take a single voice lesson. I took acting lessons. I did coachings for interpretation and diction. I took yoga. I was coached on my posture by one of the producers of Aladdin. I waved my hands around in the air like an idiot and produced sounds I didn't know I could make while improvising a seven-part ensemble piece about a turkey sandwich. I danced... very, very badly, in front of many, many people. And nowhere in any of that did anyone mention anything about vocal technique or passagio or soft palettes or anything like that. And yet here we are, two weeks later, and I am one thousand percent stronger as a performer.
There's so much more to say, but the fact is it's just going to be more of me gushing. I am so thoroughly exhausted right now, but I'm equally exhilarated by the prospects I have in front of me. I have a direction for my career, I have a plan for my future, and I know what steps I need to take from here to make this life happen for myself. I can't wait.
Thanks for reading everybody. I'm so glad you decided to stop by. Next stop: Germany for Lyric Opera Weimar (www.lyricoperastudioweimar.com)!
-John
PS
The friends I made are what made it so over-the-top special. My colleagues are all beautiful, and I can't wait to see them again. Until then, I will miss them dearly.
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
Limerick
I'm writing a blog post in limerick
(Though I fear that it might seem a gimmick)
So readers, beware
It might lose its flair
And then you might give me a dropkick.
I'm learning a role for the summer.
It keeps me from having good slumber.
Italian is hard.
And my brain feels like lard
From taking in words like a dumpster.
My future right now is uncertain.
It's obscured by a magical curtain.
There's talk of more school
But it's "grad" so it's cool.
And I guess there are worse ways of hurtin'.
(Though I fear that it might seem a gimmick)
So readers, beware
It might lose its flair
And then you might give me a dropkick.
I'm learning a role for the summer.
It keeps me from having good slumber.
Italian is hard.
And my brain feels like lard
From taking in words like a dumpster.
My future right now is uncertain.
It's obscured by a magical curtain.
There's talk of more school
But it's "grad" so it's cool.
And I guess there are worse ways of hurtin'.
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
History Lessons from Myself
In reading some old entries, I've gotten a little frustrated with how whiny I used to be. I know I found some catharsis in writing those entries, but they no longer really reflect how I deal with problems or how I view unpleasant times in my life. I think I might go back and privatize most of them. I don't really want to delete them, because I know I need to read them sometimes to remind myself who I was and remember how I became who I now am. But anyone who reads them now in attempt to know me better will see only snapshots of a person in increasingly rapid stages of change and development. Often they show me encountering things for my first time and handling them clumsily. Bad breakups, unpleasant illness, and bouts of pompous self-importance all creep into my entries from years past, and I can't easily convince myself to keep those things as matters of public record.
So I imagine it's time to clean up a little around here. This entry hereby officially adds that to my "to do" list.
So I imagine it's time to clean up a little around here. This entry hereby officially adds that to my "to do" list.
Friday, April 24, 2009
At Nathan's Request...
Nathan requested update photos of my growing hair. So here we go.
For reference, this is me on the day of the shaving, while sitting in Geology entertaining myself:
This is me yesterday, about a week after shaving:
This is me moments ago, eight days of growth:
For reference, this is me on the day of the shaving, while sitting in Geology entertaining myself:
This is me yesterday, about a week after shaving:
This is me moments ago, eight days of growth:
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
I'm Low on Shaving Cream
Well... I did it.
Yesterday, before going to class, I took a shower as I always do. When I got out of the shower, I looked at my head in the mirror. My bright orange hair was frizzy from being towel-dried, giving my head the appearance of being on fire. I looked at myself. I mean, really looked at myself. And then, with the kind of sincerity one can only muster when talking to oneself, I narrowed my eyes and said out loud, "You look ridiculous." The face in the mirror seemed to agree.
So I grabbed my clippers. I regarded them for a moment, then set to work. After trimming the hair down to being only a couple of millimeters, I took a second to appreciate that my hair was an even brighter orange as I neared the scalp. Rather than dwell on this for too long, I grabbed my cream and shaving brush and set to work lathering up. The mixture of shaving cream, water, and badger hair was warm against my recently liberated scalp, and as I applied it to the area at the base of my neck it tickled a little bit. The razor was new, and sharp, and it did not bother my skin. It cut cleanly through the fine hair that was left, and for a few hours after I was done, the scalp was very smooth. Forty-five minutes after the begining of this paragraph, I looked like this:
Reaction so far is mixed.
I'm not going to shave it again; this was a one-time thing, I'm not interested in maintaining it as keeping the cue ball clean requires a whole lot of work. I would like to have my old, non chemically-damaged blonde hair back, and according to Wikipedia that will happen at a rate of about .46mm per day. That's about one centimeter per 20-21 days, or one inch every 45-48 days. I may keep a log just for fun. Probably not, but maybe.
Yesterday, before going to class, I took a shower as I always do. When I got out of the shower, I looked at my head in the mirror. My bright orange hair was frizzy from being towel-dried, giving my head the appearance of being on fire. I looked at myself. I mean, really looked at myself. And then, with the kind of sincerity one can only muster when talking to oneself, I narrowed my eyes and said out loud, "You look ridiculous." The face in the mirror seemed to agree.
So I grabbed my clippers. I regarded them for a moment, then set to work. After trimming the hair down to being only a couple of millimeters, I took a second to appreciate that my hair was an even brighter orange as I neared the scalp. Rather than dwell on this for too long, I grabbed my cream and shaving brush and set to work lathering up. The mixture of shaving cream, water, and badger hair was warm against my recently liberated scalp, and as I applied it to the area at the base of my neck it tickled a little bit. The razor was new, and sharp, and it did not bother my skin. It cut cleanly through the fine hair that was left, and for a few hours after I was done, the scalp was very smooth. Forty-five minutes after the begining of this paragraph, I looked like this:
Reaction so far is mixed.
I'm not going to shave it again; this was a one-time thing, I'm not interested in maintaining it as keeping the cue ball clean requires a whole lot of work. I would like to have my old, non chemically-damaged blonde hair back, and according to Wikipedia that will happen at a rate of about .46mm per day. That's about one centimeter per 20-21 days, or one inch every 45-48 days. I may keep a log just for fun. Probably not, but maybe.
Monday, April 13, 2009
Rhapsody in Blonde, Brown, & Orange
A week ago, I looked like this:
On an impulse, I was convinced to see what I would look like as a brunette. It came out very dark. Too dark. I had to shave my goatee because it was a pretty obvious mismatch. After that, I looked like this:
Fact of the matter is this: it doesn't look right. It's not necessarily bad, it just doesn't look right. So I bought some product to strip the hair of color, after which I looked like this:
Yes. My hair is orange.
I then attempted to use the dye I'm holding in the previous picture to re-tint my color to some shade of blonde. The result? Slightly darker orange.
This is what I look like now. I'm leaving it for probably a week, after which I will likely shave it. I'm allowing the week so that I can grow my goatee back and can safely shave my head without looking like a chemo patient.
I felt this was significant enough to merit a blog post.
On an impulse, I was convinced to see what I would look like as a brunette. It came out very dark. Too dark. I had to shave my goatee because it was a pretty obvious mismatch. After that, I looked like this:
Fact of the matter is this: it doesn't look right. It's not necessarily bad, it just doesn't look right. So I bought some product to strip the hair of color, after which I looked like this:
Yes. My hair is orange.
I then attempted to use the dye I'm holding in the previous picture to re-tint my color to some shade of blonde. The result? Slightly darker orange.
This is what I look like now. I'm leaving it for probably a week, after which I will likely shave it. I'm allowing the week so that I can grow my goatee back and can safely shave my head without looking like a chemo patient.
I felt this was significant enough to merit a blog post.
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
It's All About the Benjamins
In a recent patriotic flurry (yes, I was inspired by Obama's speech) I began doing a bit of reading on early American history. I feel like I'm more or less well-versed in the topic already, but it's just so very interesting that I don't know Wikipedia will ever successfully tire me on the subject. This led me to seek out a quiz telling me which founding father I would be. And wouldn't you know it...
A good blend of all great things - Fantastic! You are a very balanced, well-rounded person. You could do anything you set your mind to. Just like Benjamin Franklin, you're known to be a bit strange or even eccentric, but you are also wise and generally very charismatic. You like to stop and think about things, like to surround yourself with intellectual pursuits and lofty dreams, but you are also down-to-earth when it comes to other things. You are a dabbler: that is, you try a lot of new things. Risks don't seem to frighten you, as long as they are well thought-out first. You like to have theories and ideas, but you are never detatched. People generally see you as one to be admired. It is very difficult to get you really, really angry. This is good because, when you do get angry at someone, you tend to stay angry for a very long time. You should probably keep at what you're doing if this is all the case; but just be careful not to let it all go to your head! Be sure to use those abilities!
Click here to take the quiz for yoursef.
-----
Lately I've been noticing my eccentricities and strangeness more and more. While I wasn't exactly self-conscious about it (what would be the point?) I would sometimes leave a particularly unusual conversation and think to myself, "Wow, I have no idea how most of that happened, but I'm pretty sure I was the one leading the way." Having good company by way of Benjamin Franklin makes my recent awareness of my occasional oddness seem less like something I should attempt to rectify.
I do not seek to specialize, I don't think. I sing because it's the thing I can succeed at that will allow me other pursuits. I love being on stage more than anything, sure, but that's such a small portion of the career path I'm on that the stage itself should hardly qualify as the goal of the pursuit. The real questions I've had to ask myself during my recent introspective periods:
Q: Do I enjoy rehearsals more than I enjoy not being in rehearsal?
A: This is important... rehearsal, based on what I've been learning, is the "9-5" of a professional singer if such a thing can be said to exist. Aside from the crappy "just payin' the bills"-type jobs one must take while starting out in the business (ie waiting tables), it seems the bulk of your time is spent in rehearsal rather than performance. I'm sure there are exceptions to this, it has just been my experience thus far that for every hour I spend performing, I spend at least forty preparing (this is an estimate based largely on counting on my fingers and thinking back to the two productions in which I have been cast). And in my experience, rehearsals are fun. My answer is a resounding yes. Singers are, by and large, sociable creatures who get along well so long as everything is going well, and I enjoy being around them and working with them. The exceptions to this have been those with low work ethic or self-important attitudes. I am certain the professional world has very little of the former, but I am equally certain that those people are replaced by twice as many self-important divas (or divos, for that matter). Either way, the negative of these two personality types has not been sufficient reason for me to change my answer; the positive of constantly meeting new friends in casts and always being able to share new jokes and stories will forever be appealing to me.
Q: Do I find my subject matter interesting?
A: Yes. I find opera to be absolutely fascinating. The history of the art form as a whole intrigues me to no end (check my browser history sometime if you're really curious), and even moreso I am enthralled by the individuals within the stories of each opera I see or perform in. The question "why would someone do that" is a never-ending reservoir of introspection and analysis, and each opera I've encountered has been filled characters that need to be understood at their most fundamental level in order to be done justice. On top of that, this interpretation can change based on who is singing the role; a potentially depressing line of thought can be given an air of nostalgia or wistfulness or playfulness, based on what the actor perceives it to be. We are limited to the notes and rhythms on the page, certainly, but our facial expression and vocal tone are rarely notated for us. I have stated elsewhere in this blog that I find small talk to be a waste, that it's reading a person as a pamphlet when there's a whole novel to be discovered; this is the part of my nature to which role research appeals most sincerely. My subject matter will never get old until I have run out of characters to interpret or new ways to interpret them.
Q: Can I handle the stress of having to line up new jobs and auditions all the time for the rest of my life?
A: Absolutely.
Gotta go to class now...
A good blend of all great things - Fantastic! You are a very balanced, well-rounded person. You could do anything you set your mind to. Just like Benjamin Franklin, you're known to be a bit strange or even eccentric, but you are also wise and generally very charismatic. You like to stop and think about things, like to surround yourself with intellectual pursuits and lofty dreams, but you are also down-to-earth when it comes to other things. You are a dabbler: that is, you try a lot of new things. Risks don't seem to frighten you, as long as they are well thought-out first. You like to have theories and ideas, but you are never detatched. People generally see you as one to be admired. It is very difficult to get you really, really angry. This is good because, when you do get angry at someone, you tend to stay angry for a very long time. You should probably keep at what you're doing if this is all the case; but just be careful not to let it all go to your head! Be sure to use those abilities!
Click here to take the quiz for yoursef.
-----
Lately I've been noticing my eccentricities and strangeness more and more. While I wasn't exactly self-conscious about it (what would be the point?) I would sometimes leave a particularly unusual conversation and think to myself, "Wow, I have no idea how most of that happened, but I'm pretty sure I was the one leading the way." Having good company by way of Benjamin Franklin makes my recent awareness of my occasional oddness seem less like something I should attempt to rectify.
I do not seek to specialize, I don't think. I sing because it's the thing I can succeed at that will allow me other pursuits. I love being on stage more than anything, sure, but that's such a small portion of the career path I'm on that the stage itself should hardly qualify as the goal of the pursuit. The real questions I've had to ask myself during my recent introspective periods:
Q: Do I enjoy rehearsals more than I enjoy not being in rehearsal?
A: This is important... rehearsal, based on what I've been learning, is the "9-5" of a professional singer if such a thing can be said to exist. Aside from the crappy "just payin' the bills"-type jobs one must take while starting out in the business (ie waiting tables), it seems the bulk of your time is spent in rehearsal rather than performance. I'm sure there are exceptions to this, it has just been my experience thus far that for every hour I spend performing, I spend at least forty preparing (this is an estimate based largely on counting on my fingers and thinking back to the two productions in which I have been cast). And in my experience, rehearsals are fun. My answer is a resounding yes. Singers are, by and large, sociable creatures who get along well so long as everything is going well, and I enjoy being around them and working with them. The exceptions to this have been those with low work ethic or self-important attitudes. I am certain the professional world has very little of the former, but I am equally certain that those people are replaced by twice as many self-important divas (or divos, for that matter). Either way, the negative of these two personality types has not been sufficient reason for me to change my answer; the positive of constantly meeting new friends in casts and always being able to share new jokes and stories will forever be appealing to me.
Q: Do I find my subject matter interesting?
A: Yes. I find opera to be absolutely fascinating. The history of the art form as a whole intrigues me to no end (check my browser history sometime if you're really curious), and even moreso I am enthralled by the individuals within the stories of each opera I see or perform in. The question "why would someone do that" is a never-ending reservoir of introspection and analysis, and each opera I've encountered has been filled characters that need to be understood at their most fundamental level in order to be done justice. On top of that, this interpretation can change based on who is singing the role; a potentially depressing line of thought can be given an air of nostalgia or wistfulness or playfulness, based on what the actor perceives it to be. We are limited to the notes and rhythms on the page, certainly, but our facial expression and vocal tone are rarely notated for us. I have stated elsewhere in this blog that I find small talk to be a waste, that it's reading a person as a pamphlet when there's a whole novel to be discovered; this is the part of my nature to which role research appeals most sincerely. My subject matter will never get old until I have run out of characters to interpret or new ways to interpret them.
Q: Can I handle the stress of having to line up new jobs and auditions all the time for the rest of my life?
A: Absolutely.
Gotta go to class now...
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)