Some quotes from this week's SVC rehearsals. The first two you kind of had to be there to hear the inflection of the voice and see the accompanying facial expression in order to fully appreciate their humor and quotability.
Rehearsing the "Witches Chorus" from Verdi's Macbeth:
Conductor Bill - "Altos, you're singing too pretty. Make it sound more witchy! Ok, let's run it again."
(After our first entrance, significantly witchified) "Oh dear. . ."
After the first run-through of "Il se fait tard" from Gounod's Faust:
Soloist Jill (pointing at Bill's score) - "Don't slow down, I'm not breathing there!"
No matter what we're singing, Bill has a habit of yelling "Opera chorus!" when he wants a really full, rich, core kind of sound and we're not producing it. This concert it's just kind of funny when he says it, because everything we're singing is an opera chorus!
Tonight we must have started too weak and wimpy on the "Voyagers Chorus" from from Mozart's Idomeneo, because pretty soon Bill was calling out "opera chorus!" After we finished:
Soloist Zak - "Your sound suddenly became so beautiful after he said 'opera chorus!' I don't know what that means, but keep doing it!"
While listening to soloist Jill rehearse "Quando m'en vo" from Puccini's La Boheme:
Fellow alto - "You know, TB was a very useful plot device."
Catrina - "It's making a comeback. In a few years opera can use it again."
As soon as we finish rehearsing our finale, the "Easter Hymn" from Mascagni's Cavalleria rusticana:
Soloist Jill - "That was it."
Conductor Bill - nods
Jill - "No. That was it. (fanning herself) I'm getting all emotional here. . .friggin' Italians."
The title of this post also comes from Jill, it was her parting thought at the end of rehearsal, and came in response to Bill telling us what a treat it is to get to conduct this kind of music for the first time in his life. And she's totally right - how often do you get to hear live opera in central Pennsylvania? If you live around here, you should come to the concert!
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