“When I began blogging back in May of 2006, the online landscape was a drastically different and perhaps simpler place. My life was in a simpler place, too. I was still relatively fresh out of a young artist program at the Houston Grand Opera, on the cusp of making my European operatic debut with Oper Frankfurt in a production of Mozart’s La finta semplice. At the beginnings of a professional career without the training wheels of an apprenticeship…”
Read MoreIn any other year, the moment Thanksgiving arrives I’m staring down a five week tunnel of constant travel and performance, hopping from city to city singing Handel’s Messiah. There have been many years where I’ve missed Thanksgiving with my family in order to begin a run of Messiah performances on Black Friday….
Read MoreI was first drawn to Britten’s music partly because of the lifelong romantic partnership that inspired him to write all of this incredible music for the tenor voice...The idea that love between two men could produce such incredible beauty still inspires me to this day, and I feel so privileged to be able to sing Britten’s music as much as I do. It’s a testament to me about how much representation matters, and how art combined with living openly can change lives for the better...save lives, even…
Read MoreThis post is the program note I wrote for the first concert of CAIC’s 2020 Collaborative Works Festival, Modern Women, which will be broadcast October 23-25, 2020.
“Women composers continued to persevere as the 20th century ambled along, but misogyny and racist ideas about music stubbornly stuck. The classical music world increasingly worshipped the hallowed canon of repertoire composed by white men it had placed on pedestals that grew higher and higher with each passing decade…”
Read MoreThis post is the program note I wrote for the first concert of CAIC’s 2020 Collaborative Works Festival, Les Parisiennes, which will be broadcast October 16-18, 2020.
“There is no sex in art. Genius is an independent quality...I do not believe that the few women who have achieved greatness in creative work are the exception. But I think that life has been hard on women. It has not given them opportunity. It has not made them convincing. She is handicapped and only the few through force of circumstances or inherent strength have been able to get the better of that handicap...” — CÉCILE CHAMINADE
Read MoreThis post is the program note I wrote for the first concert of CAIC’s 2020 Collaborative Works Festival, Women of the Baroque, which will be broadcast October 9-11, 2020.
…Despite this false narrative, women have been composing music for centuries, relentlessly pushing against the oppressiveness of the musical patriarchy. As we commemorate the centenary of women’s suffrage in the United States through song for this year’s festival, it’s important to acknowledge that this milestone achievement was just one victory in the worldwide centuries’ long struggle for equal rights for women that continues today..
Read More…If we really want to effect lasting anti-racist change in the operatic industry and art form, we need to focus on systems – not people. Because of its reliance on external, industry-wide consultation, the situation at the Richard Tucker Music Foundation presents a unique opportunity to examine the systems that maintain the operatic White status quo….
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