I don't want to work much on my voice. This is hardly a new thought. I have materially walked away from vocal work 3 times- 1979-83, 1989-91, and 2003-2013. Many, many people, singers, vocal coaches and teachers, friends and family, do not understand why. I have been told repeatedly "you have such a gift", or "your voice is almost unique". Why do I walk away?
This is about why.
Understanding why requires understanding, briefly, how I got here. I went to a boys private school. I was not 'the right kind' of boy, had too many consonants in my name. I was, and am, awkward in society, never managing to have the grace so many other have. I had my share of teasing. Where I grew up there were formal dances for teens 'from the right schools'. I went to those dances, where girls walked away from me when I asked them to dance (I don't really blame them now that I'm older).
I learned about music from my father, listening to Rempetika and Herb Alpert. I sang boy soprano and alto in middle school, despite the fact that by the time I was 12 my father and I could the tenor and baritone duet from The Barber of Seville. He intended me to sing in the Greek Orthodox church choir beginning in 8th grade but died right before that year started. I had absolutely no idea what to do with my life. I joined our school chapel choir, and I sang in the Greek church choir. It was something to do.
My personal exploration of music began in April of my 7th grade year. I bought American Woman by The Guess Who. My father hated it. HATED it. I played it only at the risk of sharp criticism. The week he died I discovered Abbey Road. Through 8th and 9th grade I listened to Beatles, Chicago, and various radio hits, and then I discovered Led Zeppelin. I heard their song D'yer Mak'er. I recall exactly where I was, in Ardmore, by the train station. That song found the combination of anger and sadness inside me and expressed it without the limitations of words. Robert Plant's drawn-out, howling last line "Ooooooooooo yeah, baby, please, please, please" summarized every longing and loss I had ever had.
During this time I became the youngest person and first 9th grader admitted to my school's Glee Club. I was put in our special singing group without audition. In 10th grade, I replaced a professional bass for the solos in a fall program that included a small Bach cantata and Holst's Christmas Day. And the next day, as I approached the door to my biology class I heard "here he comes", and my entire class stood up and applauded. It was the first time I had been popular for anything in my life. The girls who walked away from me at dances were suddenly running up, crying, asking for the flower in my lapel or a kiss. Crying! It was amazing. Within a few months I had my first paying job as a section leader in a choir. I couldn't drive yet. I got a voice teacher. The next year I was the top male vocalist under 18 in Philadelphia. I was in the paper. I was soloist for every Glee Club program.
The odd part was none of the music touched me very much. I sang it because I could, and because I got a level of positive attention I got from nothing else. I dove deeper into what in the 70s was very heavy and dark music- Zeppelin, Black Sabbath. In our gym locker room I played Iron Man, and no one could figure out who played 'that song'. Finally someone said, "did you put that on, Tsaltas?" I nodded my head. "Do you like that stuff?". "Yeah", I said, "I do."
Through college I had many singing jobs, and by the time senior year rolled around I had a class A contract with the Philadelphia Singers and jobs worth 12,000.00, when an Ivy League yearly tuition was less than 5,000.00. Still, none of the music really touched me.
My mother got me a little set of drums for Christmas of my 8th grade year. She, a child psychoanalyst, felt (rightly) that I needed some outlet for aggression. I didn't even know how to assemble them. I didn't know how to tune them, or what the bass drum was for. At the dances where no one danced with me I watched the drummer intently. How did he play with his hands crossed? What was a hi-hat? I used summer job money to buy pieces for my drum set, and simply played, 1-2 hours daily, every day. And I learned. I could pound out the songs I loved, hearing them in my head, singing and shouting myself hoarse while I played.
Med school and residency enforced a 'no singing, no drumming' life, until I got to Atlanta in 1991. Again, for something to do in a city where I knew no one, I auditioned for the Atlanta Symphony Chorus.I had absolutely no idea who Robert Shaw was, but I thought I might have some fun, do something I knew how to do. Within 6 months I was in the Symphony Chamber Chorus, getting solo gigs out of town, and working as soloist for Shaw's church, Trinity Pres. In 6 years in Atlanta I got a first-rate voice teacher, got full operatic roles, did operatic recitals, made seven Carnegie Hall appearances with Shaw, one as a soloist, sang small solos for him elsewhere, sang in various churches.
I revered Shaw as a father surrogate. He was one of only two men for whom I would have done anything, gone anywhere. I was admitted to the Chamber Chorus, which was re-auditioned annually, without audition. If you missed one rehearsal, you were fired. One soprano sang at Carnegie with appendicitis rather than not do her job. We were reviewed in New York and elsewhere as the greatest chorus in the world.
At my last Carnegie concert with Shaw, he found out I was moving to Knoxville. He called me to him during the break. I recall the conversation exactly.
"What's this I hear? You're leaving?"
"Yes sir, I'm moving to Knoxville."
"That's not so far, not so far. I'm going to miss you. I'm going to miss your voice, I'm going to miss your musicianship. If you can make even one rehearsal, I'll let you sing with the group."
I was so moved I couldn't sing or speak for about 20 minutes. I simply stood on stage and let Brahms' Requiem wash over me.
In Knoxville I sang some with a couple of groups. The opera offered me roles twice, which I turned down. In 2003, I simply stopped. No group had the discipline and precision of Shaw, but there was much more to it. I found I had gotten what I wanted from singing. I had received approval. I received it from a conductor renowned for his work, with a chorus reviewed as the best in the world more than once. I received it from a surrogate father. There was nothing more for me to gain in singing.
Instead, I began playing drums in bands. This for me was intensely expressive, personal, my soul speaking. I used to tell people that if you wanted to meet my mind you come to my office. If you wanted to meet my soul come to where my band is playing. As drummer I set the tempo, controlled the flow of the song, was a soloist without being center stage, played my way, with an entirely self-taught technique. I loved it. I wasn't nervous, I didn't feel I had to sound 'a certain way', I wasn't constantly being judged for exactly how I hit my snare and besides, I had full confidence I was hitting it the way I wanted to hit it.The performance was mine, body and soul.
Classical music has never been this for me. It has always been for approval, first from a dead father, then from girls, then from society at large, mainly as payment. It has never been about me, about expressing anything about me. I have only occasionally found joy in it, as opposed to power.
I was coaxed back into singing by Harv Wileman, a singer, conductor and musical coordinator who has acutely fine taste in creating emotionally cohesive and moving programs. I have found pleasure in singing for him, and I have been greatly honored to serve as his soloist a couple of times. Doing some solo work for the Rachmaninoff Vespers, a piece I love, was a highlight of my musical life. I had not received applause like that in years, and I loved it, and loved singing a piece I love. It's enough.
I'm flattered to be told I sound better than half the professional Zarastro performance out there, that I'm a special voice, etc, etc, etc. I have greatly enjoyed singing for Harv Wileman, Josh Golden and David Long. I hope they will keep using me. But I don't want to 'work' at it. I'm not trying to 'have a career' at 62, even if I could. I'm having a great deal of fun singing with people I know and like, social fun, a rarity for me, and I feel little pressure to 'be something'.
So, despite the disappointment I have caused people, I am not going to seriously pursue singing. I am not gunning to be a featured soloist. I will sing a little. Shaw's blessings were enough for a lifetime. I got everything I needed that day. Anything else is just for a little amusement. You can hate me for it, but I feel free.
Ted
This is about why.
Understanding why requires understanding, briefly, how I got here. I went to a boys private school. I was not 'the right kind' of boy, had too many consonants in my name. I was, and am, awkward in society, never managing to have the grace so many other have. I had my share of teasing. Where I grew up there were formal dances for teens 'from the right schools'. I went to those dances, where girls walked away from me when I asked them to dance (I don't really blame them now that I'm older).
I learned about music from my father, listening to Rempetika and Herb Alpert. I sang boy soprano and alto in middle school, despite the fact that by the time I was 12 my father and I could the tenor and baritone duet from The Barber of Seville. He intended me to sing in the Greek Orthodox church choir beginning in 8th grade but died right before that year started. I had absolutely no idea what to do with my life. I joined our school chapel choir, and I sang in the Greek church choir. It was something to do.
My personal exploration of music began in April of my 7th grade year. I bought American Woman by The Guess Who. My father hated it. HATED it. I played it only at the risk of sharp criticism. The week he died I discovered Abbey Road. Through 8th and 9th grade I listened to Beatles, Chicago, and various radio hits, and then I discovered Led Zeppelin. I heard their song D'yer Mak'er. I recall exactly where I was, in Ardmore, by the train station. That song found the combination of anger and sadness inside me and expressed it without the limitations of words. Robert Plant's drawn-out, howling last line "Ooooooooooo yeah, baby, please, please, please" summarized every longing and loss I had ever had.
During this time I became the youngest person and first 9th grader admitted to my school's Glee Club. I was put in our special singing group without audition. In 10th grade, I replaced a professional bass for the solos in a fall program that included a small Bach cantata and Holst's Christmas Day. And the next day, as I approached the door to my biology class I heard "here he comes", and my entire class stood up and applauded. It was the first time I had been popular for anything in my life. The girls who walked away from me at dances were suddenly running up, crying, asking for the flower in my lapel or a kiss. Crying! It was amazing. Within a few months I had my first paying job as a section leader in a choir. I couldn't drive yet. I got a voice teacher. The next year I was the top male vocalist under 18 in Philadelphia. I was in the paper. I was soloist for every Glee Club program.
The odd part was none of the music touched me very much. I sang it because I could, and because I got a level of positive attention I got from nothing else. I dove deeper into what in the 70s was very heavy and dark music- Zeppelin, Black Sabbath. In our gym locker room I played Iron Man, and no one could figure out who played 'that song'. Finally someone said, "did you put that on, Tsaltas?" I nodded my head. "Do you like that stuff?". "Yeah", I said, "I do."
Through college I had many singing jobs, and by the time senior year rolled around I had a class A contract with the Philadelphia Singers and jobs worth 12,000.00, when an Ivy League yearly tuition was less than 5,000.00. Still, none of the music really touched me.
My mother got me a little set of drums for Christmas of my 8th grade year. She, a child psychoanalyst, felt (rightly) that I needed some outlet for aggression. I didn't even know how to assemble them. I didn't know how to tune them, or what the bass drum was for. At the dances where no one danced with me I watched the drummer intently. How did he play with his hands crossed? What was a hi-hat? I used summer job money to buy pieces for my drum set, and simply played, 1-2 hours daily, every day. And I learned. I could pound out the songs I loved, hearing them in my head, singing and shouting myself hoarse while I played.
Med school and residency enforced a 'no singing, no drumming' life, until I got to Atlanta in 1991. Again, for something to do in a city where I knew no one, I auditioned for the Atlanta Symphony Chorus.I had absolutely no idea who Robert Shaw was, but I thought I might have some fun, do something I knew how to do. Within 6 months I was in the Symphony Chamber Chorus, getting solo gigs out of town, and working as soloist for Shaw's church, Trinity Pres. In 6 years in Atlanta I got a first-rate voice teacher, got full operatic roles, did operatic recitals, made seven Carnegie Hall appearances with Shaw, one as a soloist, sang small solos for him elsewhere, sang in various churches.
I revered Shaw as a father surrogate. He was one of only two men for whom I would have done anything, gone anywhere. I was admitted to the Chamber Chorus, which was re-auditioned annually, without audition. If you missed one rehearsal, you were fired. One soprano sang at Carnegie with appendicitis rather than not do her job. We were reviewed in New York and elsewhere as the greatest chorus in the world.
At my last Carnegie concert with Shaw, he found out I was moving to Knoxville. He called me to him during the break. I recall the conversation exactly.
"What's this I hear? You're leaving?"
"Yes sir, I'm moving to Knoxville."
"That's not so far, not so far. I'm going to miss you. I'm going to miss your voice, I'm going to miss your musicianship. If you can make even one rehearsal, I'll let you sing with the group."
I was so moved I couldn't sing or speak for about 20 minutes. I simply stood on stage and let Brahms' Requiem wash over me.
In Knoxville I sang some with a couple of groups. The opera offered me roles twice, which I turned down. In 2003, I simply stopped. No group had the discipline and precision of Shaw, but there was much more to it. I found I had gotten what I wanted from singing. I had received approval. I received it from a conductor renowned for his work, with a chorus reviewed as the best in the world more than once. I received it from a surrogate father. There was nothing more for me to gain in singing.
Instead, I began playing drums in bands. This for me was intensely expressive, personal, my soul speaking. I used to tell people that if you wanted to meet my mind you come to my office. If you wanted to meet my soul come to where my band is playing. As drummer I set the tempo, controlled the flow of the song, was a soloist without being center stage, played my way, with an entirely self-taught technique. I loved it. I wasn't nervous, I didn't feel I had to sound 'a certain way', I wasn't constantly being judged for exactly how I hit my snare and besides, I had full confidence I was hitting it the way I wanted to hit it.The performance was mine, body and soul.
Classical music has never been this for me. It has always been for approval, first from a dead father, then from girls, then from society at large, mainly as payment. It has never been about me, about expressing anything about me. I have only occasionally found joy in it, as opposed to power.
I was coaxed back into singing by Harv Wileman, a singer, conductor and musical coordinator who has acutely fine taste in creating emotionally cohesive and moving programs. I have found pleasure in singing for him, and I have been greatly honored to serve as his soloist a couple of times. Doing some solo work for the Rachmaninoff Vespers, a piece I love, was a highlight of my musical life. I had not received applause like that in years, and I loved it, and loved singing a piece I love. It's enough.
I'm flattered to be told I sound better than half the professional Zarastro performance out there, that I'm a special voice, etc, etc, etc. I have greatly enjoyed singing for Harv Wileman, Josh Golden and David Long. I hope they will keep using me. But I don't want to 'work' at it. I'm not trying to 'have a career' at 62, even if I could. I'm having a great deal of fun singing with people I know and like, social fun, a rarity for me, and I feel little pressure to 'be something'.
So, despite the disappointment I have caused people, I am not going to seriously pursue singing. I am not gunning to be a featured soloist. I will sing a little. Shaw's blessings were enough for a lifetime. I got everything I needed that day. Anything else is just for a little amusement. You can hate me for it, but I feel free.
Ted
As we have discussed these things at length many times, there is nothing really new to me here (other than your public kudos to my work which are humbling from one as experienced as you), but I am glad you consolidated into one place. One thing that jumps out to me in more relief seeing it expressed in writing rather than just verbally is that fact that none of the music "touched you very much". This is so hard for me to understand. I have worked as deeply as you as a singer, and I cannot imagine not having been touched by it; I feel like I have been significantly touched by the performances (and even rehearsals) I've been part of probably 80% of the time or more - even with mediocre music. It would seem to be a real drudge or boredom to be doing something like that for such long periods when you were not connecting with it in that way. It's not bad or derisible or anything, but it's a state-of-being that I can't relate to, and I wonder if our perceptions of how much or in what way "it means much" is more different than the actual feelings we have respectively felt about doing it,
ReplyDeleteFor your next blog, perhaps you could expound on why you chose medicine over music as a career. You could have done quite well financially in the world of music (both drumming and singing), so what was it that so drew you to medicine (and draws you still)?
ReplyDelete-D-