Difficulties... and goodbyes...

Well, I felt like I got my ass kicked by Turnage today, even though I've never met the man.

I spent a great deal of time learning the Greek score, but I focused primarily on my arias and duets and much of the ensembles fell to the wayside. I will do much more work on those horrid trouble areas tomorrow. I'm about to make excuses, which would include the reasons why I wasn't good today, not well prepared. But I won't... because, in the end, it doesn't matter. Get it done. I'm good enough to get by, but I can't rely on myself just absorbing music anymore. My professionalism as a musician must begin to match my professionalism as a performer. Gosh darn it.

Contrarily, I sang with my friend Charlie Williams's band Mira Mira, which combines classical piano and cello with bass and drums and some singing and beautiful poetry. I like rock music, because you can stop thinking so much about technique. It's not so demanding vocally, so the poetry and JUST MAKING MUSIC is all that matters. I needed that after today... and perhaps I need it more often, even once in awhile. The "Sara Salon" with Mark Bilyue and Dr. Brown was like that... just making music because it was fun. Art for the sake of art.

I feel weird, as my class is wrapping itself up with a bow and everyone feels nostalgic... I feel distant and not a part of it. I have missed many recitals because I've been in rehearsals or am just unable to make it from the suburbs. I miss the closeness I had felt with my friends in my class before, and so writing a letter to them was difficult in class yesterday... but I'd like to give it another go.

Dear friends and colleagues,

When I came to Roosevelt nearly 2 years ago, I was very lonely and scared. I had been away from music, from study, for a number of years and had lost myself as a singer. I also felt a void of friendship in Chicago, a place that I had always considered home. I was jetlagged from visiting a boyfriend in Paris who had made me cry non-stop the day before I left to come home. And I came here, scared of being bad, of being judged, of failing. And in this class I found some of the most amazing friends, and even those who I didn't get to know as well I learned from as both human beings and performers. We are all human... And I'm grateful for that, because the imperfections are what make art and music real and expressive and magical. I have experienced magic in so many performances, in words and gestures of kindness, in the support and friendships through breakups and other difficult times. And somewhere, in the midst of all this shit, we've all begun to learn how to be opera singers...

I will miss you all. And I wish I'd gotten to know many of you better than I did. Perhaps there's still time...

Much love,
Caitlin