Things That Scare Me: Singing Edition
I made a goal for myself earlier this year to do more things that scare me— right out of the gate, that led to me chopping off 5 inches of my hair (and anyone who knows me will tell you that that scared the living daylights out of me— like, I’ve had nightmares about it more than once). At the time, I only shared my specific goals (apart from hair choppage) with my husband and my nutrition/life/awesomeness coach, Caroline. But one of those goals was to put myself out there as a classical singer again.
For those of you who don’t know, it is effing HARD to have a career as a classical singer— you go through YEARS of education, practice, and (most likely) mountains of student loan debt to obtain these two+ degrees that you were once promised would lead to a lucrative singing career. And while it’s true that there was a time when the market was less saturated and classical music/opera was much more highly valued in the U.S. than it is now (and possibly even a time when the YAP— Young Artist Program— circuit wasn’t so broken), it’s a LOT harder than it used to be. I don’t know a single professional singer who makes their full income off of just singing. The truth is that, unless you’re Taylor Swift or Renee Fleming, you’re probably going to have to supplement your income with at least one other job. And— as you can imagine— that can make a person reaaaaal bitter.
After several years of running the classical singer hamster wheel, I came to the conclusion that it was stealing my joy in the art form. So, while I continued to take voice lessons, I backed out of the performance world for a while and threw myself fully into teaching— it turned out to be the best thing I could have possibly done for myself.
I always wanted to be a teacher— from the time I could accurately pronounce and define the word “pedagogy” I wanted to be exactly like my piano teacher (with the slight hiccup of ultimately pursuing voice over piano). It runs in my family. My mom’s a teacher, my sister is a teacher, my grandfather, great-grandmother— you get the idea. I never completely forgot about that, but I definitely lost sight of it for a minute while I was pursuing two degrees in performance. It turns out, though, that I LOVE teaching at least as much as I ever loved performing; it also turns out that my experiences with performing (and all that comes with it) made me a better teacher. I know my music teachers had my best interests at heart, and I know that they came from a slightly different generation— but I WISH that someone would have sat me down once and told me how difficult this was going to be. There’s no class on how to deal with rejection. No one pulls you aside and gives you a list of possible alternative career choices. Sometimes I think that teachers in the arts are just so darn thrilled that a kid wants to pursue their instrument/craft/discipline/what-have-you that they kind of gloss over the inevitable hardships. It’s a shield of sorts. But I’ve made it my mission (one of them, anyway) to be 100% honest with my students when it comes to this career. And truly, my experiences with it— good and bad— enable me to celebrate with them when they succeed and to empathize with them when they start to face rejection or favoritism or naysayers or any of that crap. And I think that’s really, really important.
Back to the things that scare me, though— it’s been a couple years since I sang in public or put myself out there in any sort of performance venue. So, in the next several months, I will do both. In October of this year, I will be singing in the first competition I’ve attempted since 2017. It involves a minimum of 14 pieces of music, ranging from opera to song literature to oratorio, representing multiple languages and eras. And to be honest— I couldn’t be more excited about it. I’m scared, yes, but I’m much more prepared than I would have been a few years ago.
I’m also preparing a recital for March of 2020— but more on that later.
For now, here’s to doing things that scare you— whatever that may be and wherever it may lead. Even if it seems to fail for a while, it might turn into something amazing. I wouldn’t trade my studio or the kiddos in it for a floppity jillion dollars or a contract at the Met. And I think that’s pretty rad.
xoxo
Laura