Untitled #27

This week I have been working on Non so piu cosa son, O del mio dolce, Widmung, and Reward.  Mostly I have been working on perfecting my memorization of Widmung.  It frustrates me to know that I don't have it perfectly memorized when I've been working on it since school started.  I have been trying your suggestions.  You really hit the nail on the head when you said I've been taking my music away too soon.  I guess my thoughts were that I'd need to just toughen up, get smart and memorize it (like weening myself off my bottle...the bottle being my music) or suffer the consequences.  Definitely not the right sort of mentality or technique because obviously it didn't work.  I've been trying your suggestions.  I will sing it with my music in front of me.  Also I've been working on singing in a mirror.  When I went to ACDA last week I witnessed many talented singers perform and all of them had the biggest mouths.  I want to have the same.  It would help resolve the struggle between me and my voice.  I just cleaned my room and got rid of some stuff.  I found I had more wall space, so I put up a mirror to practice in.  O del mio dolce has definitely been a lot of working with technical things.  There are more trills and things in that song than any other song I've ever sang.  I've been doing more conducting myself through that one and non so piu cosa son.  There are so many rhythmic and technical things to work on.  As for Reward, I've basically just been trying to familiarize myself with the song.  I've been working a lot on listening to it and playing out the parts on the piano.  That song has some rhythms I've never encountered in a solo before.  Those will be probably the biggest challenge, but I'm not worried about them at all.  I just need to be ready for them and make sure to anticipate them when they come along.

Untitled #26

This week has been a great! I feel a hundred times better and I'm back!!!! I've actually been able to really sing my music and focus on my technique.  I started my practices this week by working on my open vowels.  My difficult spot is keeping my jaw dropped and my mouth wide open.  So that was the focus of this weeks work.  As I went up my scales I tried to keep an eye on my mirror and make sure I was opening my mouth as wide as I could.  The vowels I worked on were AH and OH because they are particularly difficult for me in my higher register.  I try so hard to control the sound because its almost loose and crazy feeling.  I tried really hard not to control and to just let it go and see what happened.  Sometimes very successful...sometimes not.  I feel like if I were to keep practicing like this I could really make a break through.  I like to think about the movie "The Coneheads".  There is a part in the movie where Connie Conehead eats a huge foot long sub sandwich in one bite...I like to pretend I'm trying to eat a huge foot long sandwich in one bite...it usually makes me open up quite a bit more.  As far as the songs I've been working on, they're coming along quite nicely.  I've got Widmung memorized.  I want to save O Del Mio Dolce Ardor for the Studio Recital because I just have something special with this song.  I feel a connection to it and I want to save it for that special night.  This week I've also been listening to and working on Aus meinen grossen Schmerzen.  It very easily could be the second song memorized before spring break.  I'm not going to stop just there though.  I plan to at least have three songs memorized before then.  They should consist of all those I've mentioned working on recently.  If my plans go accordingly or better than anticipated, then my next plan of action is to work like heck on Non So Piu Cosa Son.  All in all, it's been a fantastic week and I plan to have more of them.

What I am listening to and who is singing it

 While drinking peppermint tea, sneezing, and watching Spongebob... I compiled this list...

All purchased on iTunes:

Widmung-  Eileen Mager from Songs of Life
 O Del Mio Dolce Ardor- Anne Sofie Von Otter from Opera Arias: Gluck Hayden, & Mozart
Nobody Knows This Little Rose-  Carole Bogard from A Collection of American Songs
Aus meinen grossen Schmerzen- Mitsuko Shirai & Hartmut Holl from Franz, R.: Lieder
Reward-  Suzi More with Angela Manso from Suzi More sings Songs of John Jacob Niles
 Le Nozze Di Figaro (The Marriage Of Figaro) - Act 1: Non So Piu Cosa Son- Erich Kleiber, Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, Cesare Siepi & Lisa Della Casa from Mozart's Best Operas
 

Untitled #25

This is great! I can hear the music in my head!!! haha!! more often than not, this would seem to be a statement of insanity...but in this case, it is a good sign:)  I know that my listening and score study has paid off and I am learning this music well.  I only hope that I can sing/perform it just as successfully.  It feels good.  I feel pretty confident.  Ive been listening to this songs on iTunes, playing them on the piano, and speaking them in time with the accompaniment.  I think I almost have Widmung to a near memorization.  I'm pretty sure its the whole song I'm hearing in my head.

Untitled #24

These past two weeks I've been learning the words and pronunciations to O Del Mio Dolce Ardor and Widmung.  Most of my time has been spent listening to the songs on iTunes and reading along with the text.  Despite the fact that my singing is not entirely possible right now, I'll have my words possibly memorized to both songs hopefully by Monday...or at least one of them.  Most likely O Del Mio Dolce Ardor.  That one is the one I am most familiar with.

Heinrich Heine (poet/librettist)

Heinrich Heine was born in 1797 and lived at a time of major social and political changes. The French Revolution and the Napoleonic wars deeply influenced society and Heine's poetry.  Heine was also of Jewish background but later converted to Protestantism.  As a young man, he encouraged to pursue a commercial career.  When it was met with failure, Heine studied law at the universities of Bonn, Berlin and Göttingen, but was more interested in literature.  He eventually took a degree in 1825.  Heine's early works show the influence of folk poetry, but his contrariness separated him from the Romantic mainstream. His writing was always easy-going, and his observations were meticulously composed.

Robert Franz (Composer)

Robert Franz was born June 28, 1815 in Halle, Germany.  He was one of the most gifted of German song writers.  As a child, his parents blatantly disproved of his desire to pursue a musical career.  A the age of twenty, he began his formal music studies of the Organ.  Later in life, he filled various public offices, including those of organist to the city, conductor of the Sing-Akademie and of the Symphony concerts, and he was also a royal music-director and master of the music at the university.  In 1841, he became deaf and developed a nervous disorder, which forced him to resign from his duties to the community.