Un scandolo, un disordine....

After our orchestra dress last night, I tuned into Facebook to learn some depressing news.  The Artistic Director of Skylight, the stage director of two of my Year-of-Figaro productions, and my friend, Bill Theisen was suddenly ousted from the Skylight Opera.  Details are sketchy right now, but this is a potentially self-destructive  and definitely short-sighted move by the Skylight board and managing director.  I am deeply concerned for the future of this beloved company.  You can read more about it here .  I look forward to learning more about the circumstances surrounding this decision.  If you are a friend of Skylight, please make your opinion known.  

In these rough economic times, it is hard to keep a toehold as an employed artist.  Personally, I think sticking to your guns as an artist is the only way to get through this mess.  That goes for organizations as well as individuals, and I think chucking your artistic vision, and your artistic visionary, are not reasonable compromises.  I hope that as we learn more about the situation at Skylight, we find that their decision making process was grounded by the artistic vision that has defined that company for so long, and not by temporary financial setbacks.  

As for current Figaro activities, our first dress was, well, a first dress.  There were a lot of new things thrown into the mix; costumes, new acoustic, orchestra.  It takes awhile to find your sea legs.  I was concerned mainly about getting through the piece vocally, using the Lafayette dress rehearsals and run as a measuring stick.  I am happy to say that generally speaking I am singing this role with more ease and finesse than last time, but there are still some lingering issues.  I sort of peter out in Act IV, right where I need to have the most gas.  I'm going to try some different things tonight.  The good news is that, all troubles aside, I don't feel fatigued at the end of the opera.  This tells me that I can fix it.  Here's hoping.  

The show held together pretty well with all the new elements in place.  This music never gets old for me.  Orch dress # 2 tonight.  I'll be back with more (and less politically charged) rantings later.  

AW