Vocalist.org archive


From:  Diane Moore <adinca@i...>
Date:  Wed May 3, 2000  8:15 pm
Subject:  Re: [vocalist-temporary] Met Auditions


Isabelle, thanks very much for your observations. How very interesting for
those of us hoping to teach rather than push good voices.

May I propose another topic: What do the later (30 to 40) maturing voices
do to build a career without the Met?

D. Moore
vocaltech@i...
N. CA

Isabelle Bracamonte wrote:

> Sarah,
>
> Good topic. I haven't competed in them yet, but I
> have gone to the Regional finals in San Francisco a
> couple of times.
>
> Could you share what you've observed about your
> friends who have won? I'm very curious to hear what
> happens to these winners afterward.
>
> I have a friend who won the Finals and became a Met
> apprentice (he was, I believe, 24). He received
> excellent training, mainstage performance
> opportunities (small parts), and is now in the process
> of building a career. It didn't rocket him to
> stardom, but it gave him polishing and a boost, so now
> he is singing large parts in small cities.
>
> The competition I observed this year in SF was
> strange. There were six or seven singers, most of
> whom were sopranos, and they were mostly in their
> mid-twenties, polished although not perfect vocally,
> and boring, boring, boring to listen to. There was
> only one voice there that had an exciting bite to it,
> an edge -- and she was a 22-year-old soprano, singing
> two fachs too big for her, with what sounded like not
> enough technical training or physical stage presence.
> She won. The judges, who took a LONG time to decide,
> included Runnicles (maestro for SFO) and Jonathan
> Friend (stage director for the Met), and someone else.
>
> The singer chooses an aria, and then the panel
> requests one. They almost always asked for a Mozart.
> Every single person was asked to sing something that
> showed agility.
>
> The rumor is that the Met apprenticeships take only
> the youngest, most precocious superstars. Early
> twenties is good; naturally big, early-maturing voices
> are good. Although I think this serves a small,
> promising segment of the singing population well, it
> unfortunately overlooks the dramatic voices, the
> spinto voices, the voices who fully mature in the late
> twenties and early thirties... in other words, the Met
> competition have the reputation of favoring the babies
> in the field. Which is great if you're a 23-year-old
> Violetta, but not very realistic in terms of the
> singing population as a whole.
>
> Just my observations. I look forward to hearing what
> Sarah's friends' experiences with the program were.
>
> Isabelle B.
>
> =====
> Isabelle Bracamonte
> San Francisco, CA
> ibracamonte@y...
>
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