Concert with the Omaha Symphony, and VOTE

So, this is my name on the door of my very own personal dressing room backstage:



This is the first time I've had my name on the door without having to share! It's exciting, people! The occasion for this was our Choral Collaborative Concert with the Omaha Symphony on Sunday night. This is an annual event bringing together the Omaha Symphony and members of the Opera Omaha Chorus with several area high school choirs. The choirs get to work with conductor Ernest Richardson and OO music director J. Gawf during the rehearsal process, and then they get to perform with the Symphony and the Opera Chorus in the Symphony's beautiful new concert hall, the Holland Center. The four Voices in Residence were the soloists for the concert: on the first half, I sang Poulenc's Gloria with four of the choirs, and then on the second half, all four of us sang opera excerpts and solos with the other three choirs.

The concert went extremely well, and the 2000-seat house was full. Chandler, my parents, my aunt, my sister and brother-in-law, Chandler's dad and stepmom, two of their friends, and several of my girlfriends from Des Moines and Pella all came to hear the performance. It was fantastic! And did I mention how well the concert went?

Here I am after the concert with Chandler:


It was an extremely busy weekend, and I didn't get to see any of those friends or much of the family I had visiting, because I had three hours of dress rehearsal on Saturday, then a performance in a Barnes & Noble in the afternoon, and then another four-hour dress rehearsal Sunday afternoon before the performance. Now, this is not ideal, because all that rehearsal can wear out your voice and your body - it's really exhausting before a big performance. But, it was necessary to rehearse all the choirs together with the orchestra, and that was the only time. This is when you have to be really smart about your singing and save as much energy as you can for the performance even while singing enough to check balance with the orchestra in the hall. Poor Sarah had a terrible cold and still had to do everything we had to do - THAT is when your professionalism is really tested, and she rocked it!

Of course, then we went right back into two school programs yesterday - we were a bit tired, but we have today off. I hope you have all voted and realize how blessed we are to have this right! I'm realizing that more strongly than ever today, because I've been disenfranchised: I requested my absentee ballot a month ago, it didn't come, I called about it and the MN Election board said they would send another, but that never came either. I'm lodging a complaint, because THAT is ridiculous. So, yeah, I'm glad I caucused for my candidate and donated to his campaign, but I don't even get to vote today. I think this will really impact the way I feel about the importance of voting for the rest of my life - so, to all of you who CAN, get out the vote today!