Mouth Shapes

Life has been a bit crazy lately.  Last week, I sang with Washburn University Choir and Topeka Symphony as a soloist in Haydn's Lord Nelson Mass.  It went very well, but the most disturbing event was that my tuxedo pants came unhemmed at some point.  Thankfully, I don't believe I looked too much like Charlie Chaplin with my slightly too long tux pants.  By the way, this isn't the first time that I've had a fashion emergency.  In the first voice competition that I have ever won, I was without my glasses or contacts and wore two right foot shoes (I had a friend hastily buy shoes for me from a tux shop hours before a concert on a day that I was busy, and sure enough, he bought two right foot shoes).  I also had an unzipped zipper moment in 2010 during my Master's conducting recital and in 1999 when I played a crow in The Wizard of Oz, wearing full body tights in a dress rehearsal, I didn't understand that when you wear tights, they stretch and people could see my tighty whities underneath my featherless legs - it could have been worse; at least I wore underwear.  Nevertheless, I had a great time in Topeka with a wonderful conductor and I enjoyed learning about the careers of the Washburn Professors whom I shared the stage with.  Oh, and the choir sounded veraciously exciting!

Guess what vowels we are singing...I hope we aren't all singing the same word! My wife pointed out the by making an "oo" sound with these mouth shapes it sounds like a seal's mating call.  Photo courtesy of the Topeka Capital Journal

Of course I made my rounds with the Spring Commencement exercises this weekend singing the National Anthem.  It went very well of course, but my excitement at the moment is with the Kansas City Symphony.

Today, I had a very long dress rehearsal with the Symphony who is performing several sold-out concerts for their Education Series.  It is an amazing event, where the students, who have been learning about music all year in a curriculum funded by Carnegie Hall and the KC Symphony, have come to join the Symphony to learn and participate in a concert in the world renown Helzberg Hall.

I showed up early, and while I was sitting in the performers entrance in the "cleavage" of the two theaters at the Kauffman Center, in walked a group of folks with ACDA (American Choral Directors Association).  They were touring the center as they were selecting a venue to host their National Conference, which is pretty much the Super Bowl of choral music.  Of course, I was really excited when I overheard their conversation, so I jumped in - rudely - but hey, I really think that Helzberg is the greatest venue for choral or symphonic music; greater than any other place that I've experienced on earth.

Well, the ACDA folks (Dr. Tim Sharp among others) picked a great day to visit.  They first heard Aretha Franklin do her bit and they somehow got through the army of secure fences and border police.  Literally, the workers cleared out the entire area and put up a restraining fence to keep anyone in the building from bothering or listening to Her Highness practice.  I love Aretha, but it would have been fun if they were a little more lax on the secret service side of things; she even had guys dressed in black suits with glasses and ear pieces and all!  There were very few people in the place, so it seemed like they went a little overboard with the security - and unfortunately, I was unable to meet the Queen herself, but maybe I'll get another opportunity.  

The Symphony played portions of Beethoven 5, Le nozze di Figaro Overture, and I sang with the Symphony as well...however, some of the songs, are a little less than classical in nature.  I sang a catchy Brazilian dance song in Portuguese (no, I have never studied Portuguese, but I had some coaching) and other pop tunes created for the event and even moments from Carmen, with my friend Chris Carr as the awesome toreador Escamillo, and for all the music nerds out there, we are even performing an Arvo Pärt piece for the elementary kids - how crazy is that!?  I'll let you know if it effective or not, but I think it will be shockingly cool.

In the end, I am really excited for our concerts with the kids - they get to "accompany" with their recorders on one song...literally, 1200 kids playing recorders to Blue Danube - who can't smile (or laugh) thinking about that!

Also, I got an awesome private dressing room!  I even enjoyed a catered meal in my room - it was a sandwich lunch of turkey on rye with wine-soaked onions, spinach, and a raspberry cream dressing with Swiss cheese, a salad of mushrooms (which I loved!), and a pear!

Lastly, I must mention the passing of Maurice Sendak.  He had an impact in the world of opera in a rather interesting way, by making the opera Brundibar into a picture book in 2003.  I will make a special post about it later this week, but the opera was written at the concentration camp that I visited three years ago in Terezin, Czech Republic - I think it is a very important story to tell.  If you do not know about it, here is a short wikipedia article http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brundib%C3%A1r

May Days

Oh beautiful May!  For two decades you have ushered in the highest levels of anxiety, looming ever so devilishly amid a procrastinated school work-load; But this year, I will relax!

School ended for me on April 30!  This is the first time in my life that I have not had school into May, and not just any school - May is a time that teachers and students alike procrastinate the biggest assignments and tests, making one last push to cram-memorize/cram-teach all that one physically can with as minimal sleep as possible.


Amazingly, my schedule in May consists of teaching voice lessons and a few awesome gigs.  First, I will be a tenor soloist with Haydn's Lord Nelson Mass at Washburn University in Topeka.  If you are in the area, you should definitely come - large choir, orchestra, awesome soloists!  Downbeat is 7:30 on Friday at White Hall on the campus of Washburn University in Topeka.

Also, I will be singing the National Anthem and Alma Mater for a graduation on Saturday, but my Sporting KC gig has been moved to June 16 - right before I leave for Pennsylvania.  If you don't know, I will be singing the Canadian National Anthem at that televised soccer match.

Next week, I will be singing with the Kansas City Symphony at Helzberg Hall in their Education Series concerts.  I am a very lucky person in that my first day (May 8), Aretha Franklin and I, share the same practice time at the Kauffman Center, so I am very excited to see if I can get an autograph, hug, photo, anything...

Then, I will be singing with the Simon Carrington Chamber Singers at the end of May.  We will be recording an album and we are hoping to submit it for some awards (possibly a Grammy!).  I've never been a part of a process like that, so I am very curious to see the workings of a professional choir and a professional recording.


Last weekend, I was able to sing a recital in Salina, KS at the grand opening of the new sanctuary at the church I used to work at.  I was met with great memories and the smiles from many friends.  I miss those folks very much, and I was honored and excited to sing for them all in their incredible new sanctuary.  In fact, if you are in Salina, KS and you are a musician, you must find a time to make some music in the sanctuary of University United Methodist Church.  It is certainly the best music venue in town - I truly mean that.  It is live but doesn't dampen the resonance, and even with a domed ceiling, performs very clean.

Also, last week, the 2012 Kansas City Vocal Institute Celebrity Auction ended.  It was very successful, and I want to publicly thank my mother for all of her help, and thank all of the bidders as well.  We are now able to provide over 100 more free lessons this year for underprivileged children and families in the Kansas City metro area!

Next time, I will be posting some pictures of the various events of this week as well as give you more info on the KC Symphony gig!

CLICK HERE TO SEE MY PERFORMANCE SCHEDULE

March Madness

What an exciting time.  Don Giovanni is opening next week at the Conservatory and I should be hearing back about my audition with the Lyric Opera of Kansas City soon - it seems like I am constantly looking forward to something. Even if there is bad news, there seems to always be something to get excited about.

The Conservatory opera, Don Giovanni, will open next Thursday and I am very excited for it.  Our preparation has been stellar - I am still trying to get used to the level of proficiency that is expected.  I am very excited that there is always someone trying to push me further.  On the other hand, it can get mentally draining at times.  I have learned so much about dealing with these situations, and if anything, it has made me take time to appreciate when I can relax, because they mean business here.  Hopefully, I haven't had too many "tenor" moments to make anyone frustrated.  I feel bad for my wife who will one day have to deal with both my "tenor" moments and "senior" moments (she probably already does deal with that).

The opera is double cast, which means that there are two complete casts.  I will be performing on Friday, March 18 and Sunday, March 20.  As part of the role of Don Ottavio, I am singing two arias (in addition to many recitatives and ensembles) that will hopefully be amazing - one of them is legitimately one of the most difficult things that I have ever had to sing.  I will give lots of information next week on that.

Also, I had my costume fitting.  We have been having a difficult time with costuming and other aspects of the production for various reasons and I won't go in to those details, but it was the location of the costume fittings that was a surprise.  The costume department is in the Kansas City Underground.  Literally right underneath downtown Kansas City there is a giant abandoned salt mine with hundreds of businesses.  You can drive right down into it from 31st street and it is HUGE.  It is a very daunting drive though - definitely not for the claustrophobic

.

Last Saturday, I was the tenor soloist for a production of Haydn's Lord Nelson Mass, with a 200 person choir and orchestra.  But what really blew me away was the venue.  It is one of the largest churches that I have been to in this part of the country.  It was in Independence, MO at the world denominational headquarters for the Community of Christ.  There are two venues there, the auditorium - which on the outside looks like a mix between New York's Grand Central Station and Basketball Arena (enormous to say the least).  And the temple, which I posted a picture of last week.  It was probably one of the very best performing venues I know of or have ever performed in.  It was spectacular with a giant spiral-cone roof (I later found out that you can walk an enormous spiral staircase to the top!).  To put it another way, it was like there were two capital buildings across the street from each other.

I have a secret passion for architecture, but I will spare you the nerdy-ness of that for now.  As far as the concert was concerned, it went very very well.  The orchestra was incredible and the choir was so vibrant and energetic.  It really is an exciting piece with war marches and large choral blocks of sound that can't help but send goose bumps down your body.  I had a brief "freak-out" moment however.  In a small quartet section, I breathed in and the back of my throat dried up very fast.  I needed to cough really loud, but forced myself to fake a couple of words until it subsided.  I have never had something like that happen before.  Luckily it wasn't a solo line and it happened at a point that other voices and the orchestra were doubling what I was singing.  Nevertheless, it was scary - and it kept my blood pumping at a nice rate for the rest of the piece.

Also, this week I received the recording of the Monteverdi Vesper's Concert from last December with a chamber group made up of members from several ensembles including the St. Louis and Kansas City Symphonies.  I practically had solos in every moment (except the two all female movements).  I have put together some highlights of my solos from the piece (these are just some of the things that I did, there are many more awesome choral movements that aren't featured here - if that's what you're in to).  If you are interested in getting a complete recording, please shoot me an email at bryanpinkall@gmail.com.  Remember this is REALLY old music - 400 years old - and the style and ornaments are weird at times, with weird instruments.  Hopefully you will find it interesting.  We spent a lot of time trying to figure out some of these performance techniques.  Another interesting part was that the singers move during the piece to different parts of the church and sing from different areas giving echo effects and other exciting elements.  You should be able to tell in the recording what a difference it makes.  I find it really interesting and exciting!  Enjoy!

Another schedule addition (sort of).  I will have a short solo in the Poulenc Gloria concert in April.  This is one of my favorite pieces of all time.  And I have just learned that the Royals wanted me to perform the US and Canadian National Anthem for the Toronto series.  Unfortunately, it already conflicts with SCI in June.  Hopefully, I will be able to sing another time.

UPCOMING SCHEDULE

• Don Giovanni (Don Ottavio)- Conservatory Opera - 3/18 & 20
• Wichita Symphony Orchestra Naftzger Young Artist Auditions - 4/2-3
• Conservatory Finale  - Poulenc Gloria (probably on my top 10 favorite pieces ever) featuring the Conservatory Choirs and Orchestra - 4/23
• National Anthem - DOE Small Business Conference & Expo - Kansas City Convention Center - 5/10
• Administrative Director of the 33rd Annual Summer Choral Institute - 6/5-11
• Sugar Creek Opera Festival (Chicago) - role: tba, opera: Daughter of the Regiment, maybe Little Women as well - 7/20-8/7
• Kansas City Symphony Chorus Auditions - tba

Lyric Opera of Kansas City Auditions

I had my audition for the Lyric Opera of Kansas City on Saturday.  I auditioned for the chorus, comprimario roles (non-starring roles), and for the tenor apprenticeship.  I have been looking forward to this audition for a long time for several reasons:  the new Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts will open later this year and will be the new home for the Lyric, next year's opera season will feature some great operas, this could be my first opportunity to sing with a professional company outside of a summer program, and I am excited to be auditioning for the tenor apprenticeship.

Anyway, the week leading up to the audition was very odd.  In the past, I have lost my voice twice during this time in February.  I don't know if it is because of allergies or perhaps it is just a fluke, but I was worried earlier in the week that my voice would not hold up until Saturday.  I took all the opportunities that I could to rest and drink water.  By Friday, I still was pretty tired and had a rough voice, but I prepared throughout the day on Friday as best as I could.  I got plenty of rest, sang just a little, and drank tons of water.  By Saturday, I felt very well.  After my morning pot of coffee (yes, that's right - a whole pot) and allergy medicine, I had several hours of opera rehearsal before my audition.

I was in opera rehearsal for several hours, singing sotto voce (meaning "under voice") - we call it marking as well, but it is just light singing compared to full voice operatic singing.  Then I headed downtown for my audition.  The audition was at the opera center which doesn't look very impressive on the outside, but is actually a large building designed for all the rehearsing and set building (I'm assuming) etc.  The room I sang in was very large, kind of like a basketball arena, or an indoor football practice facility.  It was VERY live (to put it another way, my voice echoed profoundly).  As the singers left the "arena", many were complaining about their tendency to oversing, and saying that it sounded like they were all in a giant shower.  I don't think that this changed the way I approached singing one bit, since I rely a lot on how my voice feels instead of how it sounds.

I was one of the last singers of the day, and one of only a few tenors.  After the singer before me finished (and she was SPECTACULAR) I took the long walk to the piano at "mid field".  They were still debating about the previous singer, so I just stood until they welcomed me.  I said, "Hello", and then waited awkwardly long for a response that never came, so I then said, "I would like to begin with Lenski's Aria", and we immediately began.

This is one of my favorite and most successful arias. I thought it went really well. Perhaps it was hard to tell in such a live space (many small details can be lost or muddled in an echo-y room...this is also why karaoke machines have lots of reverb - it can cover a myriad of singing sins, which you can blame for why your Aunts feel like their tipsy rendition of INSERT COUNTRY SONG TITLE HERE is the best thing since sliced bread), but many of the technical issues I have been working on went so well during this aria.  The notes past the passaggio rang true with ease (these are the highest notes that I sing).  I was very proud about the lower resonance as well, which is one of the great attributes of my voice (it is a more mature sound than many other light tenor voices).  This aria brought out many of the things that I do best and I thought it was one of the best times that I have performed it.

After that aria was over, they asked what other arias I brought with me.  All the arias that I bring to auditions are generally in different styles and languages.  The one I began with is in Russian.  So the other four I brought were Dies Bildnis (German), Il mio tesoro (Italian), En fermant les yeux (French), and Here I Stand (English). They chose to listen to Here I Stand from The Rake's Progress.  I am always surprised when they pick it, because it is kind of weird.  It premiered in 1951, so it isn't that old, but it just requires a good mind to stay on track and it lies in an interesting part of a tenor's range.  It also is full of speech-like patterns and sounds, a far cry from any classic romantic aria. Some people love it, and some hate it.  Actually, the company that gave me the gig in Chicago this summer also chose to hear this aria.  Take a listen and make your own conclusions (the aria begins at 5:25 - if you are already annoyed and want to fast forward)



How interesting, isn't it?  Actually, this staging really is distracting...the music is really ingenious and this opera is considered one of the most important pieces of Neoclassical music ever.  Neoclassicism developed in the early 20th century and was a new approach towards the old classical era structures of music.  In other words, they wanted new sounds, but they kept it simple and uniform.

I don't speak/yell as much as this performer did, but I will tell you that my performance was certainly not my best.  Fortunately, the large and reverberant room was probably somewhat kind to me - but I laid some big fat eggs.  In my personal critique, I was too choppy, I wasn't precise enough on my entrances, I rushed the aria - and for that I offer my most sincere apologies to my accompanist, I am SO sorry I put you through that - and the last note was poorly placed.  I manage the tone and vibrancy of my voice by feeling the resonance (or the vibrating air) crashing through all the sinuses and cavities in my face, mouth, and the rest of the skull.  I am very technical about this, but this resonance can be moved around to vibrate in any of these spaces.  So when I say that the last note was poorly placed, it means that I didn't use the right resonating space in my face and mouth so it sounded closer to Bette Midler than an opera singer.  On the bright side (pun intended), I had a good high A right before it.  But, I could have looked like I was passing a kidney stone - I'm not sure.

After the aria, the artistic directors called me to their table on the "side line" to talk.  They asked me a very interesting question.  Why do I have a Master's with two emphases?  I explained to them the situation and my studies at K-State and what I am doing now with my Doctorate, which is just in Voice Performance.  They thanked me for singing, and now I am just sitting back and waiting to hear from them.  Hopefully, it will be an opportunity to perform.  Afterward, I went right back to opera rehearsal without dinner and we practiced until 9:30 or 10.  It was a very long day for sure!

I also had a concert last week with the Conservatory Singers, which went well.  This Saturday, I have another one where I will be the tenor soloist for Haydn's Lord Nelson Mass.  It should be amazing!  There will be a 200 person choir, with orchestra, and it will be held at the Community of Christ Temple - one of the most amazing churches you'll ever see.

Also, last week I had a private coaching with the great American opera singer Diana Soviero.  It went great and she was so kind and encouraging as we worked with many of my release issues with my highest notes.  There are other technical things that we tried to do, that do not seem to fit right with my voice and technique, but it is always great to learn from the best and to hear their stories.  She talked about singing with many of the greatest tenors of the past generation like Alfredo Kraus and Franco Corelli.  I am so thankful for UMKC for providing us with these opportunities at the Conservatory.

State Senators in Kansas are getting close to voting on rescinding the Governor's executive order to end public arts funding, however it may be a close vote.  I have tried very diligently to not make political statements here.  I am just standing up for my profession and passion in life.  I do hope that this era of political antagonizing ends soon.  The "American Dream" for many artists and educators are on the line in many states now.  I hope there is an understandable way to resolve a fight we shouldn't even be fighting.

One more addition to my schedule - I will be singing the National Anthem (the correct way) at the US Department of Energy's 12th Annual Small Business Conference & Expo, which will be here in Kansas City this year.  And in case you are wondering (and "I honestly don't know" is my answer) but the agenda for the opening address includes "Startup America" - the White House's Small Business Initiative to Promote Entrepreneurship.  I am hoping for a very special guest speaker.

UPCOMING SCHEDULE

• Tenor Soloist - Lord Nelson Mass by Haydn - Operation Breakthrough Benefit Concert at the Community of Christ Temple in Independence (where Jan Kraybill is the Principal Musician - she's one of my favorite people in the whole world) - 3/5 7:30pm
• Don Giovanni - Conservatory Opera - 3/17-20
• Wichita Symphony Orchestra Naftzger Young Artist Auditions - 4/2-3
• Conservatory Finale  - Poulenc Gloria (probably on my top 10 favorite pieces ever) featuring the Conservatory Choirs and Orchestra - 4/23
• National Anthem - DOE Small Business Conference & Expo - Kansas City Convention Center - 5/10
• Administrative Director of the 33rd Annual Summer Choral Institute - 6/5-11
• Sugar Creek Opera Festival (Chicago) - role: tba, opera: Daughter of the Regiment, maybe Little Women as well - 7/20-8/7
• Kansas City Symphony Chorus Auditions - tba