> Talk about commitment to your craft !!!
I wonder a lot about how a singer with career
ambitions deals with the desire to have a family.
Renee Fleming's 60 Minutes interview was very
enlightening on this subject... except that she seemed
to be constantly regretful that she didn't have any
time to spend with her little daughters. Beverly
Sills made a similar comment during that interview
(she remembered a moment when her six-year-old waved
goodbye as BS was leaving for a production, with the
words, "Bye-bye Mommy... no more Mommy...").
For someone who wants the type of career that involves
contracts signed years in advance, all over the globe,
is it practical to have children? I realize that this
question is more pressing for women than for men. Can
you afford to take the time out of a career to have
children and recover from the physical stress of
childbearing and breastfeeding, especially if you
have, say, La Scala and Met contracts that you signed
before becoming pregnant?
On the other hand, are you a lesser performer if
you've never had children? Can you really understand
the anguish of an Amelia, the dementia of a Medea, the
passion of a Butterfly, if you've never experienced
that life-changing, soul-altering thing that (they
say) motherhood is?
And do the gods get jealous, after all? Is it better
to devote your entire life to your art? I can't
believe it's better to have children somebody else
raises. And the trade-off of choosing a lesser career
isn't attractive, either, although I know there are
many fine singers who settle for that.
Isabelle B.
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Isabelle Bracamonte
San Francisco, CA
ibracamonte@y...
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