What will it be like to own my evenings and days again? Yesterday (my husband’s birthday) I tried, in vain, to adapt my mind to a “relaxing afternoon.” Once I no longer have the pressing demands of my upcoming duo show, *Recognition*, will I pine for Gershwin songbooks and crave the obscure lyric that nails the sentiment required in some imagined 11 o’clock reverie? Will I awaken with the sun and dream of solo shows for one? Will I again descend the slippery slope from YouTube to online sheet music downloads?
I now have 16 Google Docs running with solo show themes and 2 Docs for shows set in a cabaret format of intimacy and humor that combine art songs and poetry. Yet, at the rate I’m building my book, I’ll be as old as (and much less accomplished than) Julie Wilson before I get them all done. Nonetheless, I’m hopeful my ability to learn and interpret songs will progress as quickly as it has in the 4 weeks we’ve had to pull together *Recognition*.
It has been a blessing to have come to this business as a gregarious conversationalist and conveyor of amusing anecdotes…that’s what patter is all about, and that’s been the easy part.
Similarly, as one of my warm-up exercises announces, “Oh I can sing!” It’s not always pretty; it’s not always perfect, but it’s pretty darned good enough of the time that I don’t worry about that piece of the puzzle either. [Thank you, arum triphyllum.]
The hard part is leaving the bathroom in the morning, fully aware of the flaws in the 10x hand mirror and, yet, wanting to deliver what is necessary, “Make them either want to be you or to fall in love with you.”
My duo partner is calm and confident in his personae. Our music director is adept at drawing out of us the nuance of the lyric and finding the perfect arrangement to convey both our talent and the song’s place in the show. What could possibly go wrong?
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