Rehearsals are going well; ice storm; records; new axe

15 april

The rehearsals have been going well, although there are a lot of them.  I haven't done a staged operetta in a few years, not since Fledermaus for Opera York in 2012 or so, and I had forgotten how wordy they can be... The last big stage work with spoken text that I did was Sweeney Todd at La Monnaie in 2015, and I only really had one scene of dialogue to memorise so that was a snap.  This show includes Calchas in nearly every scene, and there's quite a lot of dialogue to memorise, not to mention the dancing.  But my Offenbach experience in La Grande Duchesse is standing me in good stead: some of the sudden changes in the ensembles can really catch you by surprise if you aren't already thinking ahead to the new tempo.  Actually 'think' is probably the wrong word to use; it's more, 'trusting' than 'thinking'.

Last night I went to see Stravinsky's The Nightingale and other fables at the Four Seasons Centre.  I missed Robert Lepage's staging when it first came around and when the conductor of our show announced that a friend of his had a spare ticket I took it.

Really it was a great pleasure; the calibre of singing was very high, especially Jane Archibald, Owen McCausland, and Lauren Eberwein... these actors also had to operate marionettes at the same time that they sang; this was magical to watch, and the orchestra pit was filled with a pool of water, so you can imagine the effect...there was also a troupe of acrobats, and hand shadow puppeteers whose effects reminded me a bit of those in Lotte Reininger's 1920 The Adventures of Prince Achmed.  Lepage is an absolute genius.  Here's a review of the original production in 2009...

The rehearsals today were cancelled, because Toronto is worried about snow and freezing rain... so I had an extra long sleep-in, followed by an longer swim, of 2,1km, which took about 40 minutes.  Then I did some vinyl shopping at the Riverdale Trading Company, near the pool, which was playing Christmas records to celebrate having such weather in April.  After a good chat with the owner about the relative merits of Memphis vs. Las Vegas Elvis, I came home and did some kindling splitting with the new maul, and gave Bruce's snowshoes a little test drive.  Then it was inside to light the fire and listen to a record or two while I made some chicken soup.  Bruce's Jøtul stove here has an even stronger draft than ours; the chimney must be larger or perhaps it is a little taller.  It works wonderfully, and the living room was soon very warm.

While the soup was simmering I took the opportunity to review my staging in the living room, and see where there are any gaps in my memory.  There are places where I am still tentative and need to review the steps or the movements, and the ensembles need regular review if they are going to be crisp.

Tonight I heard from my friend Shannon Mercer that she was singing some new music at Koerner Hall with the Esprit Orchestra.  She had some comp tickets that she was offering, undoubtedly newly made available because of the unusual weather.  I took the TTC and just barely made it on time...

Koerner Hall has been open for a few years already, but I've never had a chance to see the inside of it before.  It's nice; lots of light-amber-coloured wood, as so many recently built opera houses and concert halls seem to be finished with.  It seats around 1135 people, which is very close to the size of Brussels' Theatre Royal de la Monnaie, but it seems a bit smaller.  The acoustic was very good, but despite the stellar rating the hall has received by acousticians, to my ears it is perhaps not quite as clear as the Four Seasons opera house. But in any case it was nice to hear Shannon in performance again.

I left at the half though as I am feeling pretty tired.  I still need to finish reviewing my staging and words tonight and again tomorrow in advance of the rehearsals, and I need a good night's sleep.

16 april

Last night I was awakened by the chainsaws, and went out to talk with the Hydro guys who were cutting up a fallen tree across the street.  As it was a city tree they told me I could take the wood, so in the middle of the freezing rain I got dressed and dragged a bunch of large limbs across the street and up Bruce's driveway.  When the weather dries out a bit I'll chainsaw, split and stack it.

I just got back from a casting audition: Jigsaw Casting was looking for a 30-40 year old opera singer who didn't really look like the caricature image of an opera singer.  I went in with two lines to memorise, and sang music of my choice.  Of course I chose Largo al factotum from the Barber of Seville, and the toreador song from Carmen... no callback, so I guess they found someone else.  Oh well!

18 April

Just on a dinner break now.  We have pretty much run the show a couple of times with a few skipped sections... we lost an entire day because of the ice and snow earlier this week, so we've been playing catch-up... after tonight's rehearsal we are off tomorrow and I for one am going to sleep in!  I'm vocally very tired; the dialogues are always fatiguing for me, so I need some rest.  We have another run in the reheasal space on Friday and then we're in the theatre.

Back to Belgium for the family; more rehearsals for me

It was a bittersweet moment yesterday when I saw the family off on their trip back to Belgium.  Fortunately my rehearsal schedule included a Thursday without any rehearsals, and Bruce left his car in our care while he is singing opera in Victoria, so it was a simple thing to drive up to Pearson International Airport.

We did a lot of visiting with extended family over the course of the trip, but it is also true that I spent many hours a day either in the studio preparing my music and dialogue, or in the rehearsal hall staging the operetta, so I wasn't as available as I would have liked.  Yet Maggie and the kids had more free time, and we all still managed to spend time with Maggie's parents.

We also enjoyed a big extended family gathering at my aunt and uncle's home in Mississauga.  Happily my parents and both sisters and my nephew Henry also were there, which makes the first time that my parents' extended family has been altogether in quite some time.  Many of my cousins and aunts and uncles were also able to make it to Lorraine and David's.  Growing up in a large family with many relatives that live within 100 km radius of each other means that you are lucky to spend a lot of time together as children, and you all become very close.  These days, my extended family is much more dispersed geographically than when I was a child, so it makes these infrequent reunions all the more pleasurable.

It was really nice to have a day off yesterday, my first in what feels like many weeks.  Prior to going to the airport we sorted through the last few large plastic boxes that we have been keeping in storage since 2007, and made some decisions about what we will ship, what we will sell, and what we will donate.  We have already taken many bins full of old clothes and stuff animals and old linens to Value Village, and depending on what sells on eBay or any yard sale, there may be more donations.  I am going to try to purchase space in a shipping container, and send over things like our wedding china and special small items, as well as my vintage tube amplifiers, and probably also my Fender Telecaster guitar.  The Fender Stratocaster that I have here is a newer one that I don't have a big emotional connection with; I didn't gig with it very much, and it wasn't used on the Moses Gillespie record so there's no no real reason for me to keep it.

One thing we found was tons and tons of photographs. I was quite a prolific film photographer back in the days before high-quality digital cameras, and so it's great to find these prints, negatives and contact sheets waiting for us.  Here's one interesting photograph taken in the Kingston guitar shop in the first few years of the 21st-century... I think that Malcolm was maybe four or five years old at the time… By the look on his face it would seem that he was interested in string instruments and amplifiers even at a young age.

After I got back from the airport yesterday and noticed that the air temperature was 12° C, I decided to take advantage of  the nice weather and go for a run... it turned out that there were many #12s that resulted from this decision: apart from it being 12° C, it was also the 12th of April.  My last 10km run had an average pace of 5:15 seconds per kilometre, but this time I shaved 12 seconds off my pace (5:03) and ran 12km.  So I'm feeling quite good and was only 35 seconds away from running 12 km in less than 60 minutes.  It still was my fastest-ever 10K, though, so I'm feeling happy.

This morning I took advantage of the free lane swims at Jimmy Simpson pool, and did a kilometre in about 19 minutes.  I've been doing that about three times a week since I got here, and it's nice to balance out the exercise so that my upper body get some work as well as my legs.  Surprisingly there is no pool in Wavre, and if I go to the pool in Brussels it costs several euro each time, so I'm making use of the free admission here as much as I can.

The rehearsals are going well; we still have two weeks and before the play opens, so we should be fine.  Don Tarnawski, my long-time Toronto coach helped me prepare the music, and Malcolm was generous enough to run lines with me many times, so I don't think it's an exaggeration to say that I was one of the best prepared people.  I have to be well prepared because while I don't have all that much solo singing to do, "Calchas" has a part in nearly every ensemble, and he is in almost every scene of the play... my most extended dialogue scene is the very first one, and it introduces everything, so it has to be super clear for the audience.

Maggie and the boys sent me some photographs from Brussels.  It would seem that the weather there is very nice and the tulips and daffodils that Malcolm and I planted in the fall have come up!

One curious coincidence: the license plate for the scooter has arrived, and despite the fact that it is registered in my name, the gods who assigned random letters and numbers to licenses seem to think that the scooter belongs to Maggie...

Now it's time to warm up and review my music and lines prior to staging rehearsals this afternoon and evening...

End of the Passion season

Well that's done and dusted... quite a burst of activity I must say.  I took yesterday off and we all went to the Edwards household for our Easter dinner of slow cooked lamb shoulder and outdoor bonfire.  It was really nice!

I have to pack now so it's going to be a short blog, mostly pictures.  But the short story is:

• the Matthäuspassion Christus went very well, and the conductor passed on lots of great feedback from the audience and also from other musicians in the orchestra; he immediately hired me to sing it again next year
• the third Johannespassion with deChorale also went well despite the fact that I was pretty tired... it was a long drive of about 3.5 hours from Zieuwent to Bruges, but we did a good job and received a big standing ovation, and many good words from the conductor afterwards

Now I've made my packing list and we've got our stuff organised, but now I have to go put things into suitcases and get to bed early, as we have to leave tomorrow morning...

the poster for the Matthäuspassion; these were everywhere,
which might explain why the church of 600 seats was at 90% capacity... 

these concerts are a very big deal in the region.

I had some help from the cat in reviewing my score

I think the cat believes that her camouflage lets her blend in with the carpet

There is a big Easter music festival in Zieuwent and Lichtenvoorde,

in the east of the Netherlands, and on Easter weekend they light a humongous bonfire.

  Very "Burning Man" but hopefully not "Wicker Man"... 

here they are building the bonfire out of brush.

Here is a video of a moment late in the concert, with me singing the last words of Christ, sung in Hebrew.  If I had known that I was going to be on the Jumbo-Tron I would have picked a point to focus on, I didn't know my eyes wiggled around like that so much... here's the youtube link.

at the Bruges performance of the Johannespassion:
Pilate says to the angry crowd: "Crucify him yourself; I find him not guilty..."

recreational axe-throwing

Laila with her fire (we had a little coaching session on fire-making)
 

Not quite sure what story was being told here...

the flowering trees are out in Wavre

and there are lots of wild primroses blooming in the back lawn