Samuel Ramey Live and In Person!!!

Ever since I first started taking voice (21 years ago), I have listened to the bass/bass-baritone Samuel Ramey.  He has been a staple in recordings and videos of opera or song.  I remember when I was working on the preacher in Susannah by Floyd, his recording was the only one that I would listen to.  He is from Kansas and I think this brought a sense of brotherhood to me because of my southern roots.  Any time a bass student asks me who to listen to, I say Samuel Ramey.  

Last night, the Bass (pronounced like the fish) concert hall opened it's doors for the first time after a multi million dollar renovation.  The renovation is quite wonderful and well worth the money.  They invited several people to help with this opening.  Samuel Ramey was among them.  He and Frederica Von Stada, who I find to be an excellent soprano that I have also listened to for years, sang back to back songs and a couple of duets.  He is definitely older and his hair is grayer but he still has enormous vocal strength and stage presence.  Frederica was just as entertaining but I have not formed a close fan connection that I have with Sam.  Maybe after last night I will do so.  

The whole evening was nice and they wanted to have elements of all types of music so they asked "Ghostland Observatory" to sing.  I have never heard of them but apparently they are rather famous.  It was interesting that all of the sudden I was sitting in a rock concert.  I don't mind rock concerts but I can't take the loudness of them so I just moved to the beat in my seat and held my fingers over my ears.  I heard the singer much clearer that way.  He was yelling something like "the band played on" and the marching band came out and started playing.  It was totally appropriate because that hall actually has had rock concerts in the past.

I was so star struck last night.  I really could not stop smiling the whole time that Sam and Frederica were on stage.  What a wonderful night and a wonderful memory to last me a life time.   

Majority and ethics do not mix

Democracy is a wonderful thing but to say that it is infallible is incorrect.  No government is perfect.  "Majority rules" is the best that we have.  No person is left out of the count.  What if the majority of the people were wrong?

This really is not a political post but a social post about America's ethics.  I watched the Golden Globes the other night with a friend of mine.  I probably would not have watched them alone yet I found them to be very interesting.  I thought that Woody Allen had fallen out of the lime light.  There is no doubt in my mind that Woody Allen can be equated with Mary K Latourno.  Latourno is married to the child with whom she had sex and Allen is married to the child with whom he had sex.  Allen did not have to serve time as Latourno.  This is not because Allen is a man, but because he is famous.   

One of my mentors and I sang some German songs last year because he was teaching a German class.  I must say that I was a bit apprehensive about singing these songs because I found out that the composer, Wolf, was on the side of the Nazis.  He explained to me that music is a form of art that takes us to places and transcends our understanding.  Giving credit to the composer is merely putting the songs in an historical frame.  It is important to understand that Wolf wrote some beautiful music regardless of his life choices.  

Woody Allen does not need to be honored.  History gives us information on Allen and Wolf and we should keep that at the forefront of our minds.  Art is a reflection of the times.  The more accurate the reflection, the better the art.  That is why something ugly can be so artistically worthwhile.  Society at times is just as ugly.  I have not seen Woody Allen's movie but I did see Penelope Cruz talking about the movie and showing great excitement over working with Allen.  That night Allen was moved to a god like position.  People talked about him with a gleam in their eye.  Would you speak of Latourno in the same way?  

I do understand that people need to be forgiven and we shouldn't judge because we don't know everything but laws in this country are put in place to protect the innocent.  Someone that is 18 is still a child because their brain has not fully developed.  These children were well under 18.  

It just reminds me of O.J. Simpson with that stupid televised trial and Hitler on the cover of Time magazine.  In my own profession (and I could not find the sources on the internet) there is a famous conductor who molested young boys and is still being praised because of his fame.  

This actually made things feel a bit more normal in my own life.  There are times when someone who makes bad choices on a constant basis will be uplifted by society.  The opposite is true for those who speak out about it.  They will be shunned.  If someone is praising Woody Allen after knowing his actions (and shunning Mia Farrow), the only logical conclusion is that society sees what it wants to see.  

I know I have chased a few rabbits in this posting but the main thing is that art would be better judged on the basis of its relevance to society and not on the ability or talent of the individual who created it.  Secondarily, society's majority is much like a teenager with a new fad.  It doesn't have to be ethical nor does it have to make sense.  It merely is. 

Race in Mississippi

My Great Aunt, who is a retired journalist, wrote a beautiful blog posting today that everyone should read. It inspired me to ponder on my own feelings of the race relations in Mississippi. Unfortunately, people make judgements about those relations based on what they see on television. When it comes to TV, sex is not the only thing that sells. Another selling point is controversy. Many of the elements of race relations are blown way out of proportion because of Mississippi's history. I see that people in Texas like to label Mississippians as racist before a word has been uttered. I have had many friends from the north who moved to Mississippi thinking that they would be the fair person that was missing from our state. One must live in Mississippi before judging its racial tensions. In the cities of Mississippi, it seems as if there are two kinds of people; those who want equality no matter what and those who want privileges for their race no matter what race it may be. I have also been to several northern areas of the country where the race relations were worse than those in Mississippi.  

When the L.A. riots were happening, Hattiesburg was putting on the production of Big River. The house was filled for every performance and it was certainly great to see that we racially embraced each other each and every night. It was a beautiful sight that brought me to tears of elation.  

Living in Austin and dwelling in my circles, I hardly see an African-American. I had no idea how influenced I was by that culture to the point of people thinking that I was acting like a black person. I had to correct them and say that I am acting like a Mississippian. I had no idea that they were so culturally segregated. I had a couple of friends here that were African-American from Louisiana and Alabama. One turned out to be a horrible friend and I am glad he moved. The other was a great guy who moved away and we lost contact. I was drawn to them because they are a part of my culture in Mississippi. It is like seeing another American when visiting Mexico. It is nice to just dwell in your own culture.  

Austin is not the only place that I have experienced this. I have not lived there but visiting Boston and New York City had a similar effect. It is a matter of the circles that you dwell in and living there for a longer period of time would give me more insight but one cannot deny that the whole country is truly segregated on many racial ideas and ideals.  

Getting back to Mississippi, do not judge unless you have been there to judge it for yourself. It is very complex and racial killings would be happening all the time if there were no tolerance for race. I do not know of a death that has happened that way in a very long long time. Anything from a diet to cultural changes is best when it moves at a slow steady pace. Rather than being impatient about race relations, one needs to understand and become an example of what is the best choice.  

I relinquish my soap box now. LOL.

TA meeting today

Now that I think about it, that title might be a bit confusing.  LOL.  TA stands for Teaching Assistant and not body parts.  

This is my last semester as a TA.  I am finishing my course work and hopefully my comps.  Many people in music fail at least one part of the comps making them add an extra two semesters onto their school career.  I am hoping that I will pass everything but If I don't, I can always get a job and take the test by flying back for them.  Looks like I will be ABD (all but dissertation) by the end of the summer.  This means that I can get a job and do my final recital by flying back to UT.  I really do see hope for the future.  I have many opportunities.  Some will pan out and others will not.  I know that my skills as a performer and a vocal pedagogue are above many of my fellow candidates so if you hear of a job... LET ME KNOW!!!  LOL... especially if it is in a liberal city.  I could probably go back to Jackson but that is not my first choice.  I really like Austin but no one ever gets hired here.  I guess I want a semi big city that has a large Oratorio and Concert following that allows me to do one or two operas a year and teach 9 months out of the year.  I tend to have 1 to 3 gigs here in Austin a week.  I really like that ratio.  Probably teaching somewhere would cause me to want a ratio of 2 to 4 per month and then anything goes in the summer.  I am now applying to several places and hoping that they accept my ABD status.  I also supplement my income with my private voice studio so I would want a college that allows me to teach privately in my studio.  

Well, I have to get this day started and go to this meeting.  I am so looking forward to this semester.  I really feel like I am nearing the bottom of the checklist.

Debit Card Alert!!!

My friend Wendy and I went out to eat the other night.  We had a very nice meal and when the check came we decided to split it down the middle using our respective Wells Fargo debit cards.  The waitress came back and gave us separate credit card trays and pens to sign our receipt.  We signed, took our cards, and left the restaurant. 

The next day I went to a hole in the wall type chinese restaurant for lunch and used my card then went to get gas.  While at the pumps my debit card was not reading properly.  I reentered my PIN several times and then used it as a credit card which prompts you to type in your zip code.  I typed it in and it said invalid.  I thought well maybe the bank has changed my address without me knowing it because I had recently moved to a new zip code.  I finally went inside and said that it wasn't working.  The clerk said that he could only put a portion on the card so I said 20 dollars.  He said okay and I pumped away.  The car only took 18.15 dollars and I had to go inside for a refund.  he then put the refund on my card and I left.

I received a call from Wendy shortly afterwards and she immediately said that she was using her card at Fiesta and no matter how many times she put in her PIN, it still would not work.  She finally ran it as a credit card and was able to charge her groceries.  I thought to myself something is wrong with Wells Fargo because this isn't the first time that our debit cards have been denied even knowing that we had plenty of money in the bank.  Wendy said, "No, you don't understand.  I have your card and you have mine!"  Of course, we inquired to each others purchases and it came that I owed her 10 dollars so I paid for her bowling that was 10 dollars that evening.  By the way, I won.  I was the only one to break 100 with a score of 108.  It was tragic that I would roll a strike and then a gutter ball.  Technique... not a constant on bowling for me.  

That night, we discussed how easy it was to use another persons card.  I was never told by the two merchants that I was using Wendy's card and she was never told that she was using Phillip's card.  It gave us a bit of a scare because we sometimes will have a large sum of money in the accounts.  Lesson:  Make sure you read that you have received your card after dinner especially when the cards look exactly alike AND if you do realize you have your friends card the next day, make DAMN sure you buy a new flat screen television and then give them back their card.  LOL.  

Funny story

Okay, I told you I would tell you about my reading for the blind story in the last post so here it goes.  

Reading for the Blind in Mississippi goes over a closed circuit radio that is specifically designed for blind persons in Mississippi.  I read once a week for one hour with a partner.  We would cut out articles in the local paper as well as USA Today and the New York Times and others.  We were always teamed as male and female so that the voices could go back and forth between articles and keep from being monotonous.  I can't remember my partners name but she was a tiny young woman who was very subdued.  I never saw an emotion or anything.  I had to read a sports column about basketball.  I started reading and a reference to the NCAA came up.  I read as big as day, "NAACP."  My partner grabs her mouth and runs out of the radio booth leaving me to swallow my own laughter.  I breathed in very deeply, paused for a bit, apologized for the mistake, changed it to NCAA and kept going all while wanting to laugh.  Mike Duke was the head of this organization and always listened to the program.  I can't remember what he said about this particular mistake but we all had a good laugh and now I have a great story to tell.

Hope you enjoyed!

Reading for the Blind and Dyslexic

I was just oriented in volunteer service for the Reading for the Blind and Dyslexic.  What a wonderful organization.  They read text books for all ages from Kindergarten to Post Graduate.  I have driven by their organization several times saying that I was going to volunteer.  I used to read for the blind on the closed circuit radio station in Mississippi.  We clipped interesting articles out of several newspapers and read them over the radio for the blind.  I got my grandmother one of these radios but I am not sure if she ever really listened to it.  She did hear me a couple of times but I wish that she would have taken advantage of all that it could do for her.  They had certain magazines on the show as well as books.  She would have loved to have heard articles from Southern Living Magazine.  

Anyway, I was surprised to find out that the RB & D have these services but no one knows about them.  They have one person that goes to schools in this region but she can not go to everyone.  This is a nationwide program and I encourage anyone and everyone to make this service known to any educator (especially Special Education teachers).  One thing I have is a voice and while I still have my eyes, I find this to be a very special service for me to be a part of.  

The url to their site is here:

http://www.rfbd.org/Units/Texas_Unit.htm

Take a moment to look at this site and see what it can do for you or for others that you may know.  

Maybe next time I will tell you a funny story that happened while reading on the air in MS.  LOL.

Thank you!

Moving is always a bitch!

Well, my apartment is packed in neat little (some big) boxes.  I have to call the movers today.  I was going to do it all myself but I just don't have the energy or the manpower.  I am so glad that Lacey will be legal this time.  This is the first time that she has not been legal and let me tell you it has been a hard row to hoe.  Many non-dog people do not understand that she is a responsibility like a child.  She is not a couch that I don't have room for.  I can't just get rid of her.  True enough, I was looking for someone to take her while I finished this lease but no one came to hers or my rescue so I had to take matters into my own hands and move to a place that accepted dogs.  I will be paying the same amount of rent as I do here and will get my own bedroom and my own bath.  

Unfortunately, My roommate here wants to move as well.  This really has been a shitty apartment.  This means instead of me finding him a roommate and paying rent until that person is found, (which is very easy to do in Austin at this location) I have to pay penalties that will probably cost more than staying in this apartment.  Staying is not an option because they have said too many times that I have to get rid of the dog because they no longer accept pets.  I refuse to come home and find that they have taken my dog or to find an eviction letter on my door.  I don't think that some people realize that this is reality.  

I don't mind paying whatever I have to pay but I do not want to suffer over it.  As soon as I say okay that sounds good.  Something changes and I end up having to pay something different.  My roommate here has been one of the best roommates I have ever had.  There is no way that I could share this apartment with any other person.  He is a descent and fair man.  Unfortunately his girl friend, who I like, is a young child and clouds his rational thinking and keeps him indecisive on so many issues.  She is not who I have a contract with and I do not want to hear her opinion on the matter.  He is an adult and can speak for himself.  She said that this was a great opportunity to see how things will work when they are married and I could not agree more.  Inevitably, I have to pay what I have to pay and I am okay with that.  

The TAA is the worst company and if I am ever rich, I will do my best to try and put them out of business.  People need protection much more than a building.  I think if we all burned up in their shitty apartments, their first thought would be how much money are we going to get from the insurance, when can we rebuild and how fast can we put new tenants in.  There would be no shed tear for the person.  Transient apartment dwellers do not have a voice because of their temporary status.  I plead for the government to start looking at this a little more realistically and ethically.  These apartments are always full.  If I leave and pay a penalty and they find someone else or I find someone else to fill the apartment, I shouldn't have to remain responsible for this apartment until the end of the lease.  The contract should be broken because two contracts on the same apartment should be illegal.  I am ranting now on my blog because I go and see them in 30 minutes.  Hopefully, I can approach everything with a calm and rational spirit.  At least I am not having to deal with Barbara, the old manager, she would say one thing one day and it would be totally different the next.  The other thing is I signed a roommate addendum saying that I was living here which also constitutes as a binding contract of which I was totally unaware.

I am going to think positively about this.  I will be out of this shit hole with a legal dog, my own bedroom, my own bathroom, a nice community and a nice roommate.  I am leaving this place in a nice way by succumbing to all of their demands and I am hoping to make my schedule more compact by living further from the college.  So many wonderful and positive changes are happening because of this.  Yea!

Moving

Well, I am moving yet again.  For some reason, Austin sells its apartments like rental cars.  The new management does not allow for dogs so I have to move.  If you ever have to move to Texas, BUY A HOUSE, no matter the costs.  In the long run you will come out ahead.  I wish I had done that when I first moved here.  The Texas Apartment Association (TAA) is a one sided business that is only for the side of the owner.  I understand that it is important to protect your investment but I also understand that you are dealing with humans and not robots.  We have certain needs and as apartment dwellers, we are more transient than others.  This is the 4th state capital that I have lived in and this is the worst apartment dwelling place by far.  

I feel good about the move because many positive things are coming from it.  My dog will be legal, I will get my own bedroom and bathroom and my old roommate will move and get his own bedroom and bathroom.  We will no longer be in walking distance of the school but that might be a good thing.  I will schedule things more compactly rather than having a spaced out schedule.  

The TAA are crooks.  They know that you have no legal rights (and if you do, you won't act on them) to change the laws and make it fair to both parties.  They have expensive lobbyists that are constantly lining the pocket books of senators and congressmen.  I have written to my apartment complexes, to the TAA and to the government to no avail.  In fact, I have never received a response from any of them.  They know they have us and they know it is unfair.  If they respond, they will have to acknowledge this unfair treatment.  

Cathartic

Part of the process of letting go is to not only let go of things in your psyche but to let go of old letters and such.  It is a good process to burn old letters so that a cleansing process can take place.  Ritual helps you to move into a new area of growth.  You may notice that my past posts have been deleted.  I have kept several of them that I thought were of importance on my computer and deleted the ones about the pain and grief over various life situations.  In a way I hate to do this because I truly got a lot from looking at others posts on the internet.  I truly felt like I wasn't alone in my sadness.  SO... I am going to help in other ways.  Deleting these posts have been truly cathartic and I do feel like growth can occur.  I used to read for the blind and one of my new years resolutions is to volunteer for that again.  I am going to try very hard to be there for other people and to offer support for those that have been unfairly treated.  We cannot do it alone.  I have received a great deal of help from friends and family.  I have rekindled connections that were once lost.  Things are really going in the right direction.  What a perfect day to let go of the past and embrace the present that will lead to a desired future.