G

Any singer has a range. The singer has a low note that is at the bottom of his or her range and then there is a note that is at the upper limit.  Just like an adrenaline-infused athlete, in certain circumstances this range can be stretched slightly.  In my vocal performance prime, as a bass-baritone I could sing a low Eb to a high F. And in some songs on certain vowels, I could comfortably push the upper note to an F#.   This  note is not high for a tenor or a soprano, but for a baritone it's fairly impressive. Over my lifetime I have experienced very many sensations that feel good, but to nail an F# at the end of an aria was right up there with the top five good feelings.

In any conversation about music school, like the one I had this week, I am asked quite often, "What was your instrument?"  In many ways I wish I could say piano, or trumpet, or saxophone or oboe or any number of instruments, but I say "Voice." And all things considered, I'm very proud of that.  The fact that my instrument was a physical part of my body is an awesome thing. For me to be "in good voice" I had to be in good everything.

Until I transferred into Samford University as a junior, I had never even heard an opera, much less sung in one. I had used as my taped music school audition  the song O Give Me A Soapbox from a  youth choir book.  At school I learned that my classmates had submitted famous arias from world-renowned operas. Music degree. Should have known.

During that year I  not only listened to recordings of operas, but had  attended a few and had come to love the medium.  The music was a far cry from youth musicals. And the  next year I found myself in the lead  role of Gianni Schicci in the Puccini opera by the same name.  The fifth from the last note in my most important aria was a high G. In rehearsal, since I didn't have a G, I defaulted to an E.   The E was in the chord, but had none of the power or prestige of the G.  I practiced for hours trying to get my voice to stretch one half step higher, but it just didn't work.  On a piano keyboard, a half step would be from a black key to the white one beside it. But my vocal cords knew their own limits. Both of the tenors more or less insisted that I figure out a way to sing the G.  Tenors are like that, especially since a G wasn't a challenge for either of them.  During the final rehearsals, I went for broke and nailed the G a couple of times. It was a tenuous G, but it was a G. I thought I'd crossed into the promised land.

The night of the performance, and there was only one, it came my turn to sing this aria, my moment to shine. I think I can speak for all singers when I say that the "high note" is all that matters.  If you nail the high note your night is complete and your life is worth living.  If you flub the high note, then all those other notes you sang well really don't matter.  The G was not only foremost in my mind as I started singing the aria,  it had been foremost in my mind for days.  It's real time now.  I'm  singing and every note I sing gets me closer to that fateful moment.  I'm now singing the last line of the aria; it's do or die. It's a solo.  It's me. I'm the one singing and no one else.

I knew I didn't have it. I think basketball players feel that on the would-be game winning three. But they shoot anyway . I could embarrass myself, everyone on stage, and everyone in the audience or I could fink out to an E. I sang the E.

I couldn't tell you what I ate for breakfast yesterday, but I remember what that felt like.  And I remember the scorn of my cast as if I'd ruined the whole performance. The interval from an E  to a G is a third, a simple step of a triad. But there was a world between those two notes that night in Birmingham, Alabama.  What if Neil Armstrong had stopped on that bottom step and said, "Just to be this close to the surface of the moon is such an honor for me and for my country."

Singing solos can be exciting, exhilarating, challenging and fulfilling, but it is also cruel.  Only a singer knows what I mean. It keeps you up at night, it stays with you for days.  Days? Did I say days?  That was forty-two years ago.

Nobody there died that night.  Nobody went to bed hungry. Nobody lost any sleep.  Except me.

After graduation my sweetheart and I got married and moved to Louisville, Kentucky to graduate school.  Besides my academic studies, there I was the featured soloist in several ensembles. My voice professor even invited me to sing the baritone solos in one of his original works. I also performed with the Louisville Symphony and Opera Association. I was good. My pivotal decision in the heat of the moment had not ruined me for life.

A few years ago, although there was no one there to hear it, I got my redemption.  I dreamed that I was a tenor.  Yes, a tenor! I was singing Nessum Dorma from Giacommo Pucchini's opera Turando. In this opera the high note is not a G or an A, but a B. A high B!  Another third above that G I couldn't sing. It is said that tenors like to turn slightly purple on the high note just to make it look like they're working hard. In my dream I don't know if I turned purple or not, but in the moment of glory, I nailed it. Pavarotti had nothing on me. I woke up feeling like I had been born again. I had taken one small step onto the moon.

Looking back, I made the right decision. Only the cast noted my decision to sing the E.. Everyone there would have known if I had decided to sing the G. Damage control. For physical reasons I don't understand, my singing voice left me.  I have not sung a solo for several years. But I am getting pretty good on my synthesizer. And the range is 88 keys. From A to shining C. Do I get as much satisfaction from playing that C as I did from singing that F# several octaves lower? Not even close. That F# was from my own body. That C is from a machine. But it's music and how I love making music. But I'll get off my soapbox now and help my wife make breakfast. The kitchen is only a few steps up from here.