Spontaneity...

Here's a blogpost from a long car ride yesterday, that I was too tired to post when arriving after midnight.  :)

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So, after an incredibly long week under the audition spotlights, I decided to do something a little crazy...hop on a rideshare to visit Noah in New Haven for the long Labor Day weekend.  I know he was just in Montreal, and I know there are first-week studies to be attending to, but this will literally be my last Sunday sans church, and the prospect of Monday off too was too good to pass up.  I found a share on the facebook group "People who travel between NY and Montreal" and got confirmation from Abbie, rushed around, and managed to get to the Lionel-Groulx metro to meet her at 4:15pm today.

We chatted a little bit before her boyfriend Phil arrived, and she said they're heading down to New Jersey for a wedding; she's a social worker who went to McGill for undergrad and has been in Quebec for a while.  Phil arrived and said immediately in French something about "passport"...at which point Abbie goes, "Ohmigod.  I don't have mine."  ......So!  She did have a copy of the passport, albeit with an expired date, and here we wait at the border, in a line of people waiting to cross, wondering if we'll have to head the hour back into Montreal to get her passport.  Sigh!  Curve ball!

In the meanwhile, I listen to them exchange Quebecois and muse about the past week.  Quick update:  We got through the border!!  What a relief.  We went to the smaller border check, which was probably an excellent idea.  At any rate, despite this entry being disjunct, I'm still full of thoughts from the past week, and have a nice 6-hour chunk during which to write, do my seminar readings, and experience life without constant performance pressure.  Ahhh!

Tuesday was my first audition, and would have been my first class - that class being full, however, I just got to spend the day cleaning, relaxing, preparing.  Well, it wasn't necessarily the most relaxing of days, since audition pressure was already starting to weigh in, but it was far less a marathon than some of the days that followed.  I spent the greater part of the morning very flustered that I couldn't find my headshots folder, and indeed still haven't found it...but, sometimes that's just what happens when you move, no matter how organized you think you are.  I met Conrad, Noah's and my organist friend, to rehearse for my early music audition which was the next day (he played harpsichord for me - very well, too!), and then we happened to meet Clayton (another Oberlin organist friend) outside the practice rooms; although I had a 5:15 practice session scheduled with Cheryl, my pianist, I called her to see if she was on-time and, when she wasn't, we postponed to later that night and I got to have a nice dinner with Conrad and Clayton.  We ate sandwiches and talked a lot about Canadian vs. US accents, and then they were nice enough to walk me the 10 or 15 min to my audition at St. John the Evangelist, the "red roof church," on St. Urbain.

Conrad knew the music director so it felt good to have a personal connection going into the audition, not to mention I had already been referred by a friend who sings there and goes to McGill undergrad for recorder, Laura.  We sang a little bit with piano, and then some more with organ; I sightread some Byrd and maybe Ockeghem, can't quite remember that far back, and then some medieval square notation.  Overall, the audition was about an hour of singing...much longer and more intensive than I expected.  I don't think he was extending the audition for any other reason than that he had time, and wanted to see what I could do; but I couldn't well say "I have to go and rehearse, and conserve for three more auditions tomorrow!!" *at* an audition, so I played along.  At the end of it all though, he offered me the soprano scholar position, and I said that before I'd commit I should ask about the American payment issue.  Unfortunately, he didn't know much about that, and said there might be some issues with my work permit only functioning six months from now, but he was willing to work something out if I was.  I left the audition and headed back one more time to the music school, now completely exhausted and a little frustrated, but lucky me - after calling Cheryl to say I was on my way, she had noted how tired I was and brought me peppermint tea to rehearsal!  Seriously the best thing ever.  So we sat around and chatted a little bit with another singer, David the countertenor, before going in to practice all the songs and arias, and I felt a bit better than before.  Voice-wise, I knew the next few days would be exhausting, though, so I cut myself off from singing and talking after we'd finished the rehearsal, and went to bed very early.

Wednesday I had my first seminar, and first class at McGill...at 8:35am.  This was a challenge less to my mental and more to my physical capacity; I remembered what Liubin always said about needing to get up early for a while before the actual event of it.  At any rate, I won a few free hours that day to warm up and relax, since the seminar was a brief introduction and assignment (Research Methods in Music Education, starting off with preschooler case studies, woo!) and got out at about 9:30 rather than 11:35.  I also noted how especially lucky I was to be early to the practice rooms for warmup, because they'd already started filling up with auditionees...SO many auditionees.  After the warmup I went home for a little while to have lunch and stop singing, then headed back again to school for my 1:35p Italian diction class.  I was happy to find that there were many levels in the class, not only age- and experience-wise but in terms of technical variation:  a pianist who always used glottals, a singer whose mouth shape appeared tense, but wasn't actually.  I think I'll be learning a lot in there about singing, and not just Italian diction, and the prof is fun to boot.

After class I trotted over to my 2:50p jazz ensemble audition.  This audition was definitely a longshot schedule-wise, but I'm really glad I did it; Madeleine Theriault, the conductor/teacher, was incredibly sweet and affable and stopped me after only a few bars of my song, letting me know I was invited to join if I had time.  What with all ensembles counting for course credit here, though, I had to tell her I'd let her know only later; I still had early music ensemble credits to fill to complete my degree, and the possibility of an opera or two.  She also very kindly let me off the hook for sightreading, just saying "I bet you've done a lot" which was much appreciated, as I still had so much more to go that day.  I left that audition and headed to a 4pm early music audition, which was for Valerie the voice chair and Betsy the chamber coach/gambist.  Conrad played well, I thought I sang well, and they seemed at ease, which is always a huge plus in auditions (nothing worse the auditioners seeming either more stressed than you or completely disinterested and judgmental).  Sightreading was some Schütz, went fine, and they said they'd let me know soon.

I then hurried over to my opera audition, at 4:50p, met Cheryl, talked with a few other singers as we waited, etc.  It was then that I got a bit more stressed than I had been before; listening to other singers and hearing their wonderful varied rep, seeing everyone's headshots and glamor-outfits, listening to the blah-blah who knows whom bragging, etc., wasn't great for morale.  A friend came out of his audition and complained that the director was rather dry and professional with him, which luckily didn't happen with me but wasn't an exciting prospect, so I headed in feeling less than 100%.  It was a large studio with recently redone floors, an overpowering smell of varnish, and just one person, the director, at a table many miles away from the piano; he greeted and welcomed us, and we started with the Handel aria from Agrippina, the aria (I like to think) that got me into school here.

Well, I had already been a little off-kilter, but then what we started with was not what I expected - Cheryl didn't play the recit before the aria (there was some miscommunication there, and she thought we were skipping it) and we just up and went.  I definitely did not feel great about the coloratura in the first A section, and could only imagine my colleagues shrugging outside as they heard me for the first time through the audition room doors; but whatEVer.  I managed to kick down those demons for the B section and especially for the da capo, or ornamented first section, so I felt at least somewhat redeemed.  Still, it was a frustrating audition for me, especially when after the Handel he asked for Purcell then Poulenc, rather than the Britten I'd wanted to do.  Take it as it comes, he seemed to be telling me, so I did my best on those other two excerpts, and was dismissed.

Outside the room there was plenty of "oh great jobbbb!" cooing, but I was pretty fed up with the whole singerly process.  Cheryl and I went to the graduate orientation at Thomson House, the graduate society, which reminded me a lot of Yale; but, I couldn't partake of the free beer or wine due to auditions, as much as I wanted to relax and celebrate.  So we went back to a 6pm "voice area" meeting, with all the voice students present, and got a bit more introduction to the programs and some student advice.  I took notes dutifully, but was already planning my evening...the main brunt of auditioning being done, I called Conrad and Clayton right afterwards on my walk home to ask if they'd like to come to my neighborhood and get gelato at the fancy place around the corner.  They both agreed, so we met at 8:30; well, Clayton and I did, and then Conrad ended up being so late that Clayton and I decided to get dinner while we waited.  So we went to Pizzedelic on St. Laurent, my first time going anywhere twice (!), and I had a nice salad and he got a fancy goat cheese chicken pizza.  Conrad finally arrived and hung out while we ate, then we all headed back to gelato only to find...that idiot girl working there had said it closed at 11p, but here it was 10:15 and completely shut down!  Upset, we wondered aloud "where could we even get ice cream??" to which a homeless man right next to us said, "right down there you can get ice cream."  ...And there it was, a huge double-scoop cone standup sign just down Prince Arthur.  We thanked him and got some sorbet and ice cream, and went to enjoy it in the park a couple streets down, talking about college things and what our parents do for a living.  I had managed to clean up the apt a bit before I'd left to meet them, so I invited them over just to see the place, and was happy when they were very enthusiastic; so, feeling energized from the freedom from auditions, I invited them over to have breakfast popovers the next day (my next audition was, after all, only at 4:15...even if my first meeting was at 11:30).  So we hung out a little more and read Calvin und Hobbes auf Deutsch and also Calvin y Hobbes en español, and they headed home.  But wait!  What time was that?  Oh, 1am.  Right.  I then went about the business of getting to bed right then, only to wake up at 8:15am to cook.  Probably the worst idea I had all week, but at least during the beginning of the day, it seemed totally worth it.

So Thursday was likely the longest day of all, from accumulated stress and lack of sleep, and my attempts to do and be everything all at once.  We had popovers with various jams and some good genmaicha brown rice tea, and Conrad tried out his new stovetop espresso machine; but then I had to shoo them off so I could get to McGill by 11:30 for the opera meeting.  I was very glad I was there, because Mr. Hansen the director provided some really key information as to what the program was about; my only worry was (and is) that I know as an early music master's student I don't have room in my schedule to take the actual class, such that if I end up doing opera I'll have to be volunteering for the many hours I'd devote to it.  Not an unreasonable thing to ask of me, but I'll admit to having gotten used to doing singing things for pay or for credit, and especially when I know how slim my time will be anyway with classes and reading and transcriptions, it's a little daunting.  At any rate, I decided to skip a scholarship meeting I'd planned to attend, and instead warmed up in the practice room, went to the library to read and take notes on some reserved material, and then went home to do dishes and clean up, have some lunch, and prepare.  It was at this time that I found the rideshare offer for Montreal-NY...so I sent her an email and facebook message, but had yet to hear back and was slightly reeling with the idea of going back for the long weekend.  I walked back to McGill for my Song Interpretation class audition, but they were incredibly backed up with auditionees, so I used that time to get to the library, pick up the music education binderfull of articles on reserve, and copy them *just* in case the rideshare went through and I'd want to read them in New Haven over the weekend.  The Song Interp audition went pretty well, nothing I'd call spectacular, but nothing terrible either, and I was amused the whole time that it was in the same hall as my original audition had been.  I went home one last time to refresh and refuel, and then trekked to St. Andrew and St. Paul (A&P) downtown for one more audition. 

After a pretty hurried 30min walk over, I was greeted by many other McGill students also auditioning and waiting in the waiting room.  It was good to talk with them a little bit before the audition and hear about their past experiences, and I walked into that audition more calm than I'd been for a few others; Jordan de Souza, the conductor, is also a McGill student and also happens to be in my Italian diction class, and the organist Jonathan Oldengarm was all smiles.  I especially enjoyed that Jordan spent most of my first piece just listening while reading my CV, which made me feel like it was the voice and not just "hmm, what *are* you wearing" that he cared about; we went on to an excerpt from Bach b minor mass, which went fine, and then a couple sightreading excerpts, Lizst and a Bleib bei uns by unmarked composer.  They seemed happy and especially enthusiastic about my previous choral experience, and told me they'd let me know by today, and I left the room feeling fantastic and relieved.

I waited for the next person after me to finish his audition, so we walked back to campus together to get to the music building *one more time* to see the callback sheet for opera.  I wasn't feeling hopeful, and was actually rather glum to be checking about what I thought was a bad audition after the exhilaration of a good one, but there it was - Estelí, callback 11:10am, Agrippina excerpt again.  So I called Cheryl, we set up one more meeting time for 10:30a this morning, and there it was, the *really* last thing.  I called Clayton and demanded he come out to gelato but not for a long night-out experience, so we had a scoop (tried the kiwi - VERY good) and talked about the auditions from the day (he had had continuo audition).  I tried to head to bed as early as possible, but was really unable to sleep even though I was exhausted; it was after midnight by the time my brain finally let me rest.

I woke up this morning to a very wonderful, very adorable IM message from my old college suitemate Liubin:  "Hi Estelí!  Please take care of yourself!  I miss you!"  I couldn't help but think how many times she'd told me this through college, when I was running myself down way too often, and it was so good to know that, even from her faraway Texas medical school, she knew the exact right thing to say.  I rallied and went to warmup at 9:15, met with Cheryl at 10:30, and headed to the main hall, Pollack, for the 11:10 callback.  It was a Zen moment as any; I was so tired it was hard to worry too much.  Directly before the audition a man came out of the room and said "Are any of you here from Yale?" and then addressed me "Nice to meet you!  Alan Murchie just sent me an email about you, I'm Julian Wachner.  I'm looking forward to hearing you."  So I went in thinking of lovely Alan and how supportive he's always been for me.  We played/sang, this time with the recit, which definitely made me feel more grounded, and were thanked; walked out, wished others toi toi toi, and headed to Paleography class.  Clayton was there, as was Laura O, and a couple others I knew, so apart from the end of what felt like an era of auditions, I had a few friends to celebrate with - granted the celebration involved neume and square note reading/singing, but it was good.  Clayton joined me very nicely for a sandwich at Java U, and I walked back for a superquick packing and cleaning session, went to the bank for money, went to the metro to get where I needed to meet the rideshare.  If I can't say I'm proud of my sleep habits this week, I can be proud of my efficiency!!

Soon comes Albany, NY at which point I call Noah for him to head out and drive 1.5 hrs to meet me in Hillburn NY, just off Abbie and Phil's path to New Jersey.  I've been looking up at intervals to experience the full moon; listen to the radio with Abbie/Phil; watch little clips of The Office on Phil's computer (!!!); and have a few reality check moments.  I'll never have first-time auditions for McGill again, nor will I have to worry about the church thing like I have these past weeks...I didn't mention that also upon my return home from school and lunch, I found an email from A&P saying I have the job there if I want it.  I grin even now thinking about my tentative "I've got to go this weekend since I'll neverrrr have a Sunday off again!" because now, with two church offers, it's really definite.  So although I won't get to see the Opera McGill cast sheets posted tomorrow, or receive any audition results phonecalls on my Montreal cell phone, or party hardy with Clayton or go to David's voice majors party or do homework actually at home, it feels good to be getting to see Noah for the long weekend, lay low and get done what I need to get done, relax and have more time together than other weekends will allow.  I'm not sure how much time I'll have to see people or go out and be sociable, especially with with having moved only less than a month ago - I can only imagine the "whaaat why are you back already??" comments - but the opportunity was too good to pass up.

Hope everyone is well out there!  Sending much love.
Estelí