Today is Richard Wagner’s 200th birthday!
To celebrate, I just uploaded my rendition of his song Traüme (“Dreams,” Op. 91, no. V) along with a slideshow of original photographs of Cape Point, South Africa. I hope you enjoy it.
And please stay tuned for more posts about Southern Africa… coming soon!
Santuzza is a bit of a drama queen, but she’s so much fun to sing!
That’s why I’m thrilled that I get to sing the role of Santuzza in Pietro Mascagni’s dramatic one-act opera, Cavalleria Rusticana.
For those of you who don’t know Cav, the music is glorious. It’s sixty minutes of sheer Sicilian heartbreak, but at least we serve free brownies afterwards! Seriously, it’s a great show.
For its grand opening, San Pedro Opera has launched this production as a fundraiser for the upcoming No. 1 Ladies’ Opera Festival in Botswana. Going to this local performance in Los Angeles supports young musicians in Southern Africa!
Here’s our video trailer:
The show opened in San Pedro last weekend to great success, but you can still catch in in Claremont on Saturday! You can buy your tickets right here. I feel very privileged to work with a wonderful ensemble of singers:
See you at the opera. 🙂
Exciting news! I am competing in the SymphoNet Competition, a YouTube contest for young professional singers ages 18-35. Four Grand Prize winners, one from each voice type (soprano, mezzo-soprano, tenor, baritone), will each receive a soloist contract to perform Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony with the New West Symphony as part of its 2012-2013 Masterpiece Series season.
To vote for my submission:
JUST CLICK HERE, enjoy the show, and press your “like” button on YouTube. The singer in each voice type with the most “likes” by January 4, 2013 will automatically move on to the final round of judging!
If you read this blog, you know that German Romantic music is very close to my heart. One of my goals in life is to sing a glorious, heart-pumping rendition of Beethoven’s 9th Symphony with a brilliant orchestra! This could be my chance… Will you help me?
Do you have a favorite room? A favorite place? A favorite opera house? (Come on, you’ve gotta have a favorite opera house. ) If so, I have just the aria for you.
Photo of Paris Opera found at chameleon-interiors.blogspot.com
A couple of weeks ago, I made a brand new recording of “Dich teure Halle” from Tannhäuser by Richard Wagner.
This is the moment in the opera where Elisabeth bursts into the Hall of Song, overjoyed by the fact that her beloved Tannhäuser is returning to her. She knows he’ll come to the Hall of Song, so she runs in and cries out “Hello, dear room!”
So it’s a love song… to a room. Pretty cool, right? I think so, too. And he music is very exciting:
Here is my translation of the German text:
You, dear hall, I greet you once again,
joyfully I greet you, beloved room!
In you his songs came alive
and wake me now from troubled dreams.
When he departed from here,
how bleak you seemed to me!
All the peace abandoned me,
all the joy went out of you.
How my heart now beats in my chest,
you look so proud and sublime.
He who brings life both to you and to me,
he will not stay away for long.
I greet you, I greet you
You precious hall,
I hail you!
So, the next time you walk into your favorite room, try singing this song. And if you desperately need some more music right now, you can find more of my videos and audio recordings HERE! Have a great day, everyone.
I’m currently singing the role of Leonora in Verdi’s Il Trovatore. It’s an opera about gypsies, nuns, knights, ladies, passion, revenge & arson. Watch my own 2-minute synopsis of Il Trovatore:
(Don’t you just love how YouTube freezes your face in the strangest expressions? Oh, well.)
Come and join us for Verdi’s Il Trovatore with the Repertory Opera Company on Saturday, October 15 at 2 PM at First Christian Church in Pomona: 1751 N. Park Ave, Pomona, CA, 91768
Tickets available HERE
the Globetrotting Soprano 