Fire and Ice

This week I was reminded of a particularly tough call in front of one of the finest orchestras in the world and its distinguished Direktor, my employer for several years.

We were in final orchestral rehearsal for Elektra, nerves particularly concentrated since we were in the company of the legendary Birgit Nilson, and this, as it turned out, was to be her final stage performance.

After sleeping and dreaming my very tricky interjections with which the piece opens, amid a tremendous orchestral cacophony, I was really ready for the baton. It came, along with the "Obey me or else..." glare that I grown to expect...but the baton came down a bar earlier than written.

It was a traumatic moment for a very young singer. Either you disobey the Maestro and get it wrong, or you refuse and get it right, possibly exposing him either way. 

I had about one tenth of a second in which to decide and went for my good training...the composer first, but I think the icy eyes behind the specs didn't forgive me.

 I sang the performances flat on the floor on a steep rake, with face painted blue and enormous, rubber feet like a Platypus which made getting about tricky, but the music always went right.

Much later, I smiled at Herr Direktor across a beautiful dining room in Madrid where I was having lunch before a Carmen I was to sing that night, and watched as he slid, looking at me, with his back along the wall... and out.....