La Monnaie Parsifal | Introspection

I learned today I'm getting my butt kicked in the blogosphere.

I was told one of the bondage peeps, Frances D'Ath, is keeping a blog of the Parsifal. Curiously, I went over and started to peruse things. I quickly realized my own efforts to introspect and intelligently speak about this Parsifal are pretty lame. Actually mine are really pathetic. So, all I can do is offer an apology and try to find some renewed determination to not tip toe around the making of this production. I'm now fully focused on it without the natural distraction of winter flights and other performances and holidays. Wouldn't trade them, but real life sometimes shortchanges artistic endeavor.

My problems lie in trying to have it both ways: Maintain some mystery about the production; and, give the readers here an 'insider's look.' I'm not succeeding on either front, I realize.

My other problem is the taboos that are being incorporated. Bondage being the most pronounced. I confess to being very intrigued by what I'm seeing. I don't understand it, though there are aspects that I can uniquely understand as a singer. Performing onstage is a type of slavery, a photograph of time, energy and sound, a bondage. The joy you experience doing it is only equalled by the release when you achieve what you intend on a given evening or even phrase. Ecstasy takes many forms.

It's been a heckuva week. Every day longer then the next. I'm still not sleeping from jet lag and feel 'prickly.' Not moody per se. But like an itch in my brain that I just can't get rid of. Feeling strange. This request to deliver my lines "like Buddha, passive and peacefully" even on very declamatory, dramatic musical writing bugs the CRAP out of me. I feel naked. And completely alone onstage in a room full of people.

And it CAPTIVATES me at the same time. I have always had a strange desire to find the moment when there is no effort, physically or mentally onstage. I have never noticed any correlation between the nights when I felt I was "really the role" and an effective performance. Always on the night when I feel low in energy and can't quite find the same dramatic flair, those are the nites when people often say "Your best yet.")

I know I've attempted to mention it here, but out of political expediency (not wanting to piss off administrators or directors) temper my frustration. Which is basically why I'm being so boring lately.

Making still our bodies as we sing leaves the mind open, and openness for me is never very comfortable. I protect, cover up. Not my better side. Peacefulness that allows for deeper feeling, deeper meaning, fuller impact feels nearly out of my reach. I like to become and often know inside I'm just wanking about as an actor.

Roméo doesn't charm you into doing it his way either. He just simply gives you a mental picture, allows the singer to grapple a bit with it and then allows you to experiment with his way of framing the scene. All I know it, I don't like saying "I can't do that!" to him. It literally hurts when I have had to. The gentleness in the rehearsal process (for the singers) is always disrupted when a singer has said this to the director here. That's the best word for his style: Gentle. (I told him today we were all taking bets on when he would lose his cool, raise his voice, be impatient or get angry. He said it was known to happen, but rarely.)

My new motto for the blog of this production is: If ya don't wanna know about it, stop reading. If ya wanna criticize a production by my lame-ass writing, I can't stop ya. But if you are interested in artistic process, I hope you'll continue reading. Sorry it took me so long to get around to it.