{"id":2466,"date":"2013-02-11T18:06:45","date_gmt":"2013-02-11T22:06:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rockwellblake.com\/blog\/?p=2466"},"modified":"2014-11-27T18:43:15","modified_gmt":"2014-11-27T22:43:15","slug":"so-why-should-anyone-belt-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rockwellblake.com\/blog\/2013\/02\/11\/so-why-should-anyone-belt-3\/","title":{"rendered":"So Why Should Anyone Belt?"},"content":{"rendered":"

I\u2019m back from Barcelona and now that I\u2019ve washed that trip right out of my system, I can get back to the subject that was tickling my interest before I heard about a diva falling victim to sickness in the singing ranks.\u00a0 I hope that you enjoyed reading the articles I suggested to you in my last <\/span>\u201cBelt\u201d<\/span><\/a> blog before I flew the coop.\u00a0 If you missed them, <\/span>click them<\/span><\/a>, they are:<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe opera-izing of the American musical\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cZambello brings personal touch to retooled Glimmerglass Festival\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

If you have enough time to dawdle, you might consider meandering about the internet by clicking on the links in those articles and get an even bigger picture of the cultural state of affairs in the United States.\u00a0 You will also acquire an overview of the vocabulary and attitudes of some who are employed to dispense opinion on this small sliver of the \u201cArts and Entertainment\u201d industry.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

I know I may appear to be picking on <\/span>Ms. Anne Midgette<\/span><\/a>.\u00a0 I guess it\u2019s unavoidable since, once upon a time, she called me on my cellphone to talk about the cultural industry in the environs of Washington, DC.\u00a0 I can be a real pain when asked to opine.\u00a0 If I have anything to say at all, I\u2019m likely to run on at the mouth wandering way beyond the original subject which I will have forgotten before running out of air.\u00a0 This should be expected from a tenor who tends to <\/span>forget librettists\u2019 words<\/span><\/a>.\u00a0 In this particular instance, with Ms. Midgette, my memory served at least for the short term, but what about the long term?\u00a0 Given what I remember now, she could have asked me how I made my morning coffee.\u00a0 Anyway, I have taken a shine to reading what she writes now and again, and when I discovered her discussion of Old Broadway Show revivals I couldn\u2019t pass up the opportunity to mix some of my thoughts with her reporting. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Ms. Midgette did not write about “Belting<\/a>” specifically, but her articles are about the natural habitat of that style of singing. \u00a0\u00a0Ms. Midgette seems to center her \u201cOpera-izing\u201d thoughts on the lynch pin word: \u201cauthenticity\u201d.\u00a0 She doesn\u2019t seem to believe Glimmerglass was wise to seek \u201cauthenticity\u201d in \u201cAnnie Get Your Gun<\/i>\u201d.\u00a0 I don\u2019t suggest she is wrong to complain, however, I do want to expand on her conclusions.\u00a0 When I asked her, she told me that she was at least aware of “Belting<\/a>“<\/span>, but I\u2019m not certain she would agree with what I am about to write.\u00a0 I believe that the \u201cauthentic\u201d component missing in \u201cAnnie Get Your Gun\u201d <\/i>at Glimmerglass in Cooperstown, NY and in \u201cOklahoma\u201d<\/i> at Arena Stage on Sixth Street in Washington, DC was \u201c<\/span>Belting<\/span><\/a>\u201d.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Now that \u201c<\/span>Highbrows<\/span><\/a>\u201d want to compromise and play with \u201c<\/span>Lowbrow<\/span><\/a>\u201d music, they have a big problem.\u00a0 They can\u2019t find those \u201cLowbrow\u201d \u201cBelters\u201d who can deliver those \u201cLowbrow\u201d melodies the way <\/span>Irving Berlin<\/span><\/a> and other \u201cLowbrow\u201d composers expected their melodies to be \u201cBelted\u201d into the theatre.\u00a0 The Opera Singer can\u2019t be faulted for not having the authentic vocal style that a lot of \u201cLowbrow\u201d music demands.\u00a0 The Opera Singer has always been taught to avoid \u201c<\/span>Belting<\/span><\/a>\u201d.\u00a0\u00a0 I am not surprised that in her article Ms. Midgette wrote that two unamplified<\/span><\/b> Opera Singers:<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

gave the impression of being less invested in, or less serious about, this musical than about opera, as if carelessness were a hallmark of the \u201clightness\u201d of this particular style.<\/span><\/span><\/i><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Excuse me, but, if you don\u2019t \u201cBelt\u201d you \u201c<\/span>ain’t<\/span><\/a>\u201d serious about old \u201cLowbrow\u201d music generally, and even less serious about those old Broadway Shows.\u00a0 Let\u2019s get serious and say:\u00a0 All they really had to do is \u201cBelt\u201d. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Ms. Midgette asks a very valid question of Ms. Deborah Voigt after citing some of her impressive high notes:<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cwhy does the rest of your singing seem so pale?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/i><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The honest answer would be\u2026\u2026\u2026 \u201cI don\u2019t Belt!\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Ms. Midgette suggests that <\/span>\u201cfetishizing authenticity is of questionable value\u201d <\/i>and I heartily agree.\u00a0 It is REAL<\/b> authenticity that gets my juices flowing and my hand reaching for my wallet to pay for tickets.\u00a0 Whether the tickets are for the theater or for a museum, I want to have at least a fighting chance to hear or see authentic talent employed authentically.\u00a0 That\u2019s why my preference these days is for botanical gardens.\u00a0 I haven\u2019t found one of those places putting a single silk or plastic plant or flower on display, yet.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

I was happy to read Ms. Midgette\u2019s mention of Ethel Merman, but I really wish she hadn\u2019t suggested that Ethel had formal vocal training.\u00a0 It would seem to contradict Ethel\u2019s <\/span>biography<\/span><\/a>.\u00a0 There is no real barrier to Deborah Voigt undertaking the study of \u201cBelting\u201d so that she might sound more \u201cMerman\u201d like.\u00a0 Why didn\u2019t she?\u00a0 Ms. Midgette seems to give us a good answer, albeit unintentionally, on page 2 of <\/span>the other article<\/span><\/a> she wrote about Glimmerglass and its new director Francesca Zambello: <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Zambello also has great connections. \u201cA lot of it is asking your friends,\u201d she said. This summer, she\u2019s lured singer friends into accepting Glimmerglass\u2019s relatively modest fees\u2026\u2026..<\/span><\/span><\/i><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Asking an Opera Singer to make herself a viable reviver of Ethel Merman style is like asking a brain surgeon to go back to <\/span>school<\/span><\/a> to learn how to use his\/her scalpel skills to prepare the raw material for \u201cSteak au Poivre or Tartar\u201d.\u00a0 Well,\u2026.. it\u2019s not really like that, but you get the idea.\u00a0 When it comes to money the parallel does hold.\u00a0 At Glimmerglass Ms. Voigt was certainly paid less than her normal surgeon like salary to put her vocal talents at the service of \u201cLowbrow\u201d music.\u00a0 If you put her in Br\u00fcnnhilde\u2019s costume, even I might actually come to listen, but Annie\u2019s vocal demands just don\u2019t fit the voice. If you ponder my assumption that the fee for Br\u00fcnnhilde in NYC, Chicago, Dallas or San Francisco is likely to equal or exceed the cost to Glimmerglass for all singers on the stage in \u201cAnnie Get Your Gun\u201d, you can get a glimpse into a singer\u2019s material calculations and priority system. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

A little further on Ms. Midgette tells us about her preferences. After the very short preamble: \u201cIt may be heretical\u201d, she explains that the amplified performance of \u201cOklahoma\u201d<\/i> at the Arena Stage was a better artistic experience than the unamplified performance of \u201cAnnie Get Your Gun\u201d<\/i> at Glimmerglass.\u00a0 It is an aggressive paraphrase, I admit, but Ms. Midgette can always defend herself, if I\u2019ve misrepresented her meaning.\u00a0 Neither cast at Glimmerglass nor Arena Stage can be expected to have any \u201cBelting\u201d instruction or experience in todays\u2019 world.\u00a0 And to emphasize one last time: If you don\u2019t \u201cBelt\u201d you ain\u2019t authentic Old Broadway or even authentically old \u201cLowbrow\u201d. So what\u2019s the difference between those productions besides differing dancing abilities?\u00a0 Microphones!<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The critics praise the youthful \u201cOklahoma\u201d<\/i> cast for good looks, high energy and great legs. I think this is a good, and likely complete, list of assets those up and coming stars of modern musical comedy bring to their production.\u00a0 No one seems to say much about them vocally. Perhaps it\u2019s because none of them \u201cBelt\u201d or sing \u201cAu Natural\u201d. (\u201cwithout a mike\u201d.)\u00a0 Now that we have critics opining that building a \u201c<\/span>Field of Dreams<\/span><\/a>\u201d with lights and sophisticated amplification is a wonderful thing for \u201cLowbrow\u201d Broadway revivals, could the Opera World be next to face some big changes?<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Because many tools of the singing trade like Chest Voice, which is the foundation of Belting, are being ignored and even vilified, perhaps in the future we may find Ms. Midgette or her descendants writing similar articles about Opera.\u00a0 Amplifying the singing of \u201cLowbrow\u201d music seems to be STANDARD practice, and now critically preferred.\u00a0 \u00a0With practice on the \u201cLowbrow\u201d stuff, the technical problems with amplification in the theatre will eventually get worked out. \u00a0The opera singer hopefuls I heard just last month at <\/span>Vi\u00f1as<\/span><\/a> only reinforced my conviction that the big opera houses are in trouble.\u00a0 All those young people are singing with a lot less volume than previous generations of opera singers.\u00a0\u00a0 It seems to be an inevitable compromise.\u00a0\u00a0 Opera Theatres will have to imitate the Arena Stage if this trend continues.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

In the meantime, I will stand on my soap box and yell many things, one of which will be: Better to \u201cBelt\u201d and be rid of the mike.\u00a0 If the amp blows a fuse, one might be reminded of the fate of <\/span>Millie Vanilli<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

As for the photo of <\/span>Rocky\u2019s Pizza Place<\/b><\/em><\/span> at the top of this blog. I snapped that photo just a few days ago while I was in Burlington, VT<\/a> running errands with my two favorite ladies, Debbie, my wife, and Dot, Debbie\u2019s Mom.\u00a0 Debbie spied the pizza emporium and asked me to take a photo while she and Dot did their thing.\u00a0 At first I was happy for the opportunity to add a ha-ha photo to our collection, but as I was snapping away it dawned on me that my blog was almost finished and the title asks a question.\u00a0 \u00a0I realized I was taking a picture of the best answer ever.\u00a0 Those Millie Vanilli guys might now be kicking themselves and wondering why they didn\u2019t do pizza and pasta instead of lip syncing.\u00a0 But as for anyone <\/span><\/ins>who quests for stardom and has Broadway as his\/her target, even if you only want to know how to sing, take the risk and learn to \u201cBelt\u201d.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I\u2019m back from Barcelona and now that I\u2019ve washed that trip right out of my system, I can get back to the subject that was tickling my interest before I heard about a diva falling victim to sickness in the singing ranks.\u00a0 I hope that you enjoyed reading the articles I suggested to you in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2454,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3,4,53,85,51,50],"tags":[206,169,203,99,167,147,204,150,214,166,131,97,98,218,227,177,187,192,158,195,234,220,198,229,168,170,226,209,148,151,199,153,181,207,224,144,103,185,221,191,223,146,211,213,237,212,182,175,174,105,240,156,176,163,201,178,154,208,233,215,184,86,162,171,197,172,180,230,102,239,238,236,188,210,202,241,157,161,160,200,155,159,189,219,173,231,217,225,242,193,194,186,72,183,179,126,228,205,149,222,134,196,190,235,152,145,216,164,165,232],"class_list":["post-2466","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog","category-featured","category-garcia","category-opera","category-singing","category-teaching","tag-aggressive-paraphrase","tag-agree","tag-amplified-performance","tag-anne-midgette","tag-annie-get-your-gun","tag-arena-stage","tag-artistic-experience","tag-arts-and-entertainment","tag-assets","tag-authenticity","tag-barcelona","tag-belt","tag-belting","tag-big-changes","tag-big-opera-houses","tag-big-problem","tag-botanical-garden","tag-brain-surgeon","tag-broadway","tag-brunnhilde","tag-burlington","tag-chest-voice","tag-chicago","tag-compromise","tag-conclusions","tag-cooperstown","tag-critically-preferred","tag-critics","tag-cultural-affairs","tag-cultural-industry","tag-dallas","tag-dc","tag-deborah-voigt","tag-defend-herself","tag-descendants","tag-diva","tag-ethel-merman","tag-fighting-chance","tag-foundation","tag-francesca-zambello","tag-future","tag-glimmerglass","tag-good-looks","tag-great-legs","tag-ha-ha-photo","tag-high-energy","tag-high-notes","tag-highbrow","tag-highbrows","tag-irving-berlin","tag-lip-sync","tag-long-term","tag-lowbrow","tag-lynch-pin","tag-material-calculation","tag-melodies","tag-memory","tag-microphones","tag-millie-vanilli","tag-modern-musical-comedy","tag-museum","tag-music","tag-natural-habitat","tag-ny","tag-nyc","tag-oklahoma","tag-opera-singer","tag-opera-theatres","tag-opera-world","tag-pasta","tag-pizza","tag-pizza-emporium","tag-plastic-plant","tag-praise","tag-priority-system","tag-quest","tag-remember","tag-revival","tag-revivals","tag-san-francisco","tag-short-term","tag-show","tag-silk-flower","tag-singing-trade","tag-sixth-street","tag-soap-box","tag-sophisticated-amplification","tag-standard-practice","tag-stardom","tag-steak-au-poivre","tag-steak-tartar","tag-talent","tag-tenor","tag-theater","tag-theatre","tag-tickets","tag-trouble","tag-unamplified-performance","tag-united-states","tag-vilified","tag-vinas","tag-vocal-demands","tag-vocal-training","tag-vt","tag-washington","tag-washington-post","tag-without-a-mike","tag-word","tag-words","tag-yell"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/rockwellblake.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/02\/Rocky-Pizza.jpg?fit=1200%2C800&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2kj1l-DM","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rockwellblake.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2466","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rockwellblake.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rockwellblake.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rockwellblake.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rockwellblake.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2466"}],"version-history":[{"count":34,"href":"https:\/\/rockwellblake.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2466\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2881,"href":"https:\/\/rockwellblake.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2466\/revisions\/2881"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rockwellblake.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2454"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rockwellblake.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2466"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rockwellblake.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2466"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rockwellblake.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2466"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}