Joan
Dorneman, now the premier Italian repetiteur, at the
Metropolitan Opera, kept telling me, during a coaching
prior to an Escamillo of mine with the Met on tour in
Atlanta, “There is just something wrong, but I can’t
tell you exactly what it is!” She granted that I was
singing very well, the French excellent, phrasing, etc.,
but something was bothering, nay, nagging her. After
about forty minutes she suddenly exclaimed, “That’s it!
You keep getting tall!” I asked, “That’s it, that’s
what’ bothering you? Uh huh, but ... how did it sound?”
“Great, but it bothers me when you get taller.” (During
all of the years we had been working together, she
hadn’t realized that I get tall–from the waist up–on
every high note.)
“First off,” I suggested, “The audience, if they can see
it at all, doesn’t see what I do as being wrong, because
it is part of my animation, in character of Escamillo
... and the first row of the audience ... is fifty feet
away. No one sees what you are seeing, sitting just
seven feet away.” I continued, “Now think about this;
has it occurred to you that, maybe I sing the high
voice, as well as I do ... because I get tall?” I
explained that, every time I get tall, my belly button
goes in ... which gives the high notes an extra shot of
breath pressure. Also, the getting tall ... allows me to
add full vertical room above the note ... soft palate
all the way up! I gave that same suggestion to the
lovely Carole Vaness, one night stage left, at the N Y
City Opera, when she asked, “Richard, what am I doing
wrong with the high C {in the aria she was about to
sing.}” I told her, “You need to focus a really tighter,
brighter vowel, farther forward, more narrow mouth ...
get tall ... and lift the phrase down the back side of
the phrase!” As she came off, she graciously gave me the
high sign and I acknowledged with a smile and a wave ...
the beautiful high C with which she had just buttoned
the aria.
Thimpk about it!!!
