Updates from the road; the story of a traveling singer.
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New woodworking photos here.
 

February 28, 2010  I'm back!
It has been a while.  I just realized, in this update, that I didn't even upload the last of the posts that I had written nearly 2 years ago.  To recap, Mexico was awesome and my tenure with Cantus ended. 

Done.

In September of 2008, I moved back "home" to NY.  It's been a pleasure to be back on the east coast, close to family and friends; the time had come.  In December of 2008, following a brief reunion tour with Cantus while Tim had a break for the birth of his first son, I moved into Manhattan and chose to become a real estate broker with Citi Habitats as a manner of supporting my singing endeavors in NYC.  Well, here we are 14 months later and I've won awards, built a small company and done more than just "get a job."  I am very grateful for the attention my work has been given and thank all those involved.

Still, I've been needing to use my voice!

On Monday, the 15th of February, after nearly 2 years of auditioning for operas under Robert Lombardo and Assoc, the calls finally came.  In 10 days I opened (this past weekend) as "Inquisitor Felletti" in a new opera, Il Caso Mortara, the true story of Edgar Mortara. 

As of yesterday I committed to another new production, "Death and the Powers" by composer/engineer/scientist/professor Tod Machover of MIT's Creative Media Lab (the folks behind "Guitar Hero" and others) which will take me to Monaco later this summer and, if all goes well, to a number of opera houses domestically in 2011.

Still pending, the role of "The king of Scotland" in Ariodante with the Princeton Festival this summer! 

When it rains, it pours and after nearly two years, it has been pouring!

Check the links, ask questions about the productions and look for more updates:

I'm a singer again!  Next challenge?  Voiceover.  Who's out there to help? Don't be shy!

June 24, 2008  Do I have to?
Having been in Playa Maroma, about 45 km south of Cancun for the last week, I am currently sitting on a flight back to the twin cities only to turn around on another tomorrow morning to NY for my last Cantus performance.  Do I really have to go?  The beach was so nice!  It was my first experience with an all inclusive resort (not like a Sandals, rather a small independent one) and I highly recommend it for a nice, relaxing, and inexpensive way to sit on the beach for a week.  Congratulations to Lalo and Adriana on their beautiful, thoughtful and extremely personalized wedding.

May 30, 2008  Kennedy Center Debut
This weekend, Cantus gave our Kennedy Center debut!  How exciting it was to be in that hall.  It is truly an amazing facility with spaces for every type of performance to excel the way it is intended.  The hall we were in, designed predominantly for chamber music and instrumental/vocal recitals sounded every bit as nice as we would have hoped.  We were there with Trio Mideavel, a trio of Norwegian sopranos with whom we worked to rave reviews last season.  This is the second concert we have with them, the last being at the Cleveland Museum of Art where the audience couldn't get enough. 
Met some really nice folks after the show and was able to catch up with some old friends so I would say this was a fantastic stop.  The end is near...one more show in Connecticut towards the end of June and then voila, my time in Cantus ends as fast as it began.



May, 2008  Cantus does pop
Anyone who has ever been to a Cantus concert knows the shows end with a little pop music be it new or old.  We hear from many fans that they would love more.  You asked, we provided.  This weekend Cantus gave its first ever (and probably not last, I imagine this will become a yearly endeavor) run of pop concerts to rave reviews, great fan feedback and soon will have a recording out of the weekend.  That's right, the show was being recorded to be produced into a full length album.  I imagine it may be up to two years before this gets out the door since we have been recording tons lately and only so much can go through folks wallets each year, but when it does make it to pressing it will be fantastic!  In true Cantus fashion the programming ranged widely from Pink Flamingo, The White Stripes and also The Beach Boys and Billy Joel, with many members of Cantus doing double duty as instrumentalists.  Yours truly wowed Cantus and the audience with my unknown skills at playing the spoons!  A huge thanks to John Atkinson, editor-in-chief of Stereophile Magazine, Cantus groupie and therefore engineer for this disk, his 9th with Cantus.  These shows officially marked the last performances of mine in the twin cities.  I have to admit, singing "Time has told me," (Nick Drake) on that final performance was not as easy as times previous.  To read a review of the show, click here.

May 2008  Sign on the line please
Well, I left the very end of Cantus' last tour to go to NY and do some auditions for agents whom I have been contacting to help with the coming years of my career and low and behold, it was fruitful.  After two full days of auditions, a little bit of rehearsing and coming down with a killer cold, I have signed on to be represented exclusively by Robert Lombardo and Assoc.  Having helped the early career of one of my teachers, tenor John David DeHaan, I have high hopes for this relationship and hope it can turn into some nice gigs this coming season or two.  Back in Minneapolis now after that quick trip during which I was lucky to get some more playtime with my year and a half old nephew who, though shy at first, is quickly learning the ways of getting what he wants!  I look forward to more visiting this summer.

April 2008   Not going to miss this...
Will I miss Cantus?  Of course.  Will I miss tours like the one we are on?  Heck no.  Now into its
third week and still not done we have made a loop, driving, from the Midwest to the east coast, down to the deep south, back to the east coast, back to the deep south and soon we will start the two day drive back to Minneapolis (luckily, I will be flying out to NY while the rest of the guys start that drive).  In total, this is going to be about a 6300 mile tour, the longest this year, and definitely rivaling others as the longest of my tenure.  I guess we got spoiled when touring with the Boston Pops...no pictures this time...I figured a collage of street signs and interstate markings was too much work.  I wish I had kept track of all the miles we had done throughout the last four years; then again, having kept all the hotel keycards from 4 years of touring has proven uneventful.

April 2, 2008  YouTube channel
You can find me on YouTube on my own channel.  Check it out, things are being added as I can come up with them.  Also check out Cantus' work, you can find it on my page under favorites.

March 8, 2008   Recording All is Calm

All is Calm was a huge success this season.  (See blog archive here.)  Having been broadcast on MPR to rave reviews, Cantus, Theater Latte Da and MPR have teamed up to get a recording down faster than any of us could have on our own!  The actors have recorded their portions, Cantus has finished recording our portions, and now it is time to make the disk.  The show has so much dialogue over underscoring from Cantus or pasts that rapidly move among the actors and the singers both spoken and sung as well as having to pay people to sit around as other parts are being recorded (Cantus does many takes before we are happy!) made this a particularly difficult session.  I think the final product will be very nice; the show is fantastic and both the actors and Cantus performed very well for the mics.  Check out the short video above put together from takes of the title track All is Calm (an arrangement of Silent Night in 3 of the languages you would have heard in the trenches by Cantus Artistic Director Erick Lichte)...keep your ears open for the awesome low note at the end!

 March 5, 2008 Recording for Documentary
Today was really a fun new experience!  Public Television is doing a documentary on the choral scene in the twin cities and naturally Cantus was involved.  After a short interview about our trip to Africa and other recent endeavors, we got to the singing.  Standard Cantus rep, but this time with a few cameras on us and a person riding around on their cool little camera cart.  I have done other on camera work, but this was the first time I saw the process from set up to break down.  It was quite exciting!

February 26, 2008  Time to go
Many know already, but it is official, after four years, this will be my last.  There is still plenty of work ahead before I am done this summer but following this spectacular season, it is time for something new.  Like all good things, they come to an end, and for me that time is this season.  There is plenty in the works for next season that makes it tempting to stay (besides the salary and benefits!) but to paraphrase Al, a former Cantus tenor, "There is always going to be exciting stuff, if you need to go, you need to just go."  (Side note, congratulations to him, he is a new daddy!)  Time to get back to enjoying the rest of this season and get some plans in place for what's next.

February 18, 2008 The Semi's
To get right to the point, I didn't make the finals.  Am I upset?  No.  For my first attempt at ANY competition these results have been great.  Besides, I got to sing on stage a the Met and let me be the first to say...acoustics can be a man's best friend.  I have sung in many great halls around this country but none compare to the Met.  For a place of such size (nearly 4000 seats) it had the sound of a mid size concert hall (around 1000 seats), particularly those of a box design such as Sauder Hall at Goshen College and Stude Hall at Rice University.  There was plenty of feedback on stage and I didn't feel the need to over sing (which was my main concern going in).  The weekend was really fun, the hotel was nice, the meetings/coachings  were informative and frank yet very encouraging and friendly.  A large congratulations to the finalists! In the photo below are my three mentors over the years, from left to right, John David DeHaan, me, JoEllen Miano, and Norman Bailey.

February 12, 2008 Beautiful venue on a beautiful campus
Well, late afternoon on Saturday the Idaho Dept. of Transportation website showed that one of the two routes to the airport had been opened so off I ran...I tossed my sheets in the laundry, packed (no folding this time!) and ran out the door to ensure the mountain pass didn't close again before I could cross.  I made it without a problem thanks in part to the huge snow removal machines that were cutting swaths in the drifts that looked the same as when rock is cut through to keep a road flat!  It definitely made for an exciting drive.  After one night at a truly nasty hotel (hotels.com didn't make it seem that way) and a  few hour delay waiting for flight crew I made it to Houston for an exciting show at Rice University. The very well established chamber series Houston Friends of Music is a wonderful organization who consistently hosts the world's top chamber musicians in Stude Concert hall on the beautiful campus of Rice University.

February 7, 2008 No better place to be snowed in.
Being completely snowed in is never fun, but there are few places that I could imagine would not drive me crazy.  Luckily, this week I have been at one of those places.  Back in Idaho again to do some coaching for the upcoming semi-finals of the Met Competition, and I am stuck.  Seriously.  All three highways to leave this valley have been closed since I got here Saturday night (it started snowing as I got in around midnight).  It is now Thursday and only once have I left the house.  We needed groceries and had to leave soon after the driveway was plowed and return before it drifted over again.  I am estimating that time to be around 3 hours.  The roads/driveway (which is the real problem since it is 300 yds long and as 1.5 miles back on a dirt road) are getting cleared and it is ok when they are, but the strong wind has been drifting the snow like mad.  You can see some of the cool designs that have been created around the house in these photos.  I walked to the end of the driveway earlier today and some parts where nearly clear, other parts 3-4' deep.  I have to be at the airport on Saturday to join Cantus in Texas for tour so I hope this storm finished up soon!  I wouldn't think that 56 more hours wouldn't be enough time, but we are now on day 4 of the "snow in" and it hasn't changed a bit so my faith is waning at the moment.

January 19, 2008 I won again!
I can't believe it.  I won again.  I was one of three first place winners at this year's Upper Midwest Regional Finals of the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions.  Along with a cash prize, the three of us won spots in the semi-final competition February 17, on stage at the Metropolitan Opera House in NYC.  What an honor this is.  The competition was top notch this year, exemplified by three of us moving on (most often only two move on and sometimes only one is deemed appropriate by the judges).  It was a low voice day, the other winners being (pictured below at a recording session, left to right, myself last) Kyle Albertson, bass-baritone and Cory Renbarger, baritone.  Luckily, we are all competing against the judges, not necessarily against each other, so the competition stays friendly.  On February 14th, we will travel to NY along with the other 23 semifinalists from around the country and begin prep for another round of competition on February 17th.
I was really excited to go to the after party (although I had to leave before dinner and the concert in order to attend a reunion for those of us who went to Africa this fall) which was held at the James J. Hill house in St. Paul.  Located on the historical Summit Ave. this house was built by the railroad tycoon James G. Hill and was amazing to tour...more so because of my interest in woodworking.  This home is FILLED, floor to ceiling in many rooms with beautiful work from craftsmen generations ago.

January 4, 2008, Merry Christmas, Happy New Year
The holidays are over, but I am still on break.  After a nice quick trip back to NY to visit family I headed down to Mexico to spend some time relaxing and visiting with new friends and family.  I spent new years at a ranch in Madera, Mexico which was somewhat remote, not at all quiet but a ton of fun!  Dinner was the head of a bull.  That's right.  The whole head.  I had some taquitos from the cheek which were fantastic but passed on the more gooey parts of the meal.  The food on the trip was really fantastic (keep in mind I wasn't in Cabo or Cancun, this was true Mexico) and some of the drinks I had were to die for especially, michelada (a medium colored maybe an amber or lager with salt and three limes) and cubana (same amber beer but this time with a spicy tomato mix, pepper and Tabasco).  Plenty of play time during the week but now I am in Idaho gearing up for the regional finals of the Metropolitan National Council Auditions later in the month.  It is wonderful to be in this beautiful valley again and especially to see Kristine Ciesinski and Norman Bailey with whom I have studied for years but haven't seen for nearly 18 months.