Gee, let me just concentrate on Journalism class when i know the cast list goes up in an hour and a half. Totally doable. Working on it right now.
by krisis
Personal
Some Things (or: Change Happens).
I have never ever ripped the knee of a pair of pants before last night, when during one of the kneel-skid-kneel routines in my dance audition i caught the worn khaki fabric of my pants on a seam of the stage. I didn’t notice until we got home and i went to poke at the huge purplish bruise on my knee only to find my finger poking clear through the leg of my pants.
Callbacks, for all you who so kindly inquired, went decently. I was convinced that we’d have to sing a bit more tonight, so i don’t think i had any dairy all day and am now making up for it with the most massive bowl of ice cream i’ve ever had. It’s obvious that i don’t have the voice or presence to play any of the cast roles, so i was basically just being used as filler in the scenes we read. Which, honestly, i don’t mind. I just want to sing. The Cast List will be up tomorrow at 1pm.
Lindsay says she can hear everything that goes on in my room, and i suppose she must be able to; i can hear everything that’s said in hers and, though i can’t usually hear her move, my floor is her ceiling. So, i’ve been trying to be very still, and not as stompy when i wake up in the morning.
I had breakfast again today. Somehow, my days have been better every time i’ve had breakfast in the last week, but if i were to be scientific about i think i’d find that the relationship between the two isn’t causal in nature. I really don’t try to dissect better, or happy, or any other good thing too much — lest it disintegrate and flow from my hands like grains of sand. It’s irony, really: you want to have something to hold on to, but have to keep your hands off. Proverbially, that is. Or not. Blah, time for bed.
Oh, gee, now i remember why i don’t like theatre.
It’s a shame this thought always strikes me after i audition.
Art and beauty are so subjective that i’m sometimes frightened by them. A song that almost wound up going unplayed has become everyone’s new favourite. Last night someone told me they thought i was sexy. Some people read my page, and some don’t.
My audition was terrible… i couldn’t understand where the piano-arrangement fit in with my vocal notes, and i just kept shooting the pianist a befuddled look while my voice teacher sat in the back row and scribbled furiously on her legal pad. Corrections, for our next lesson. Rounder ‘O’ vowels, “remember” should be “ri-mem-bur,” breath before the phrases, don’t move my arms around so much. I don’t remember singing it at all, but i know what i did wrong. In fact, i thought that my audition was pretty terrible — panicked glances to the accompanist are rarely the mark of a chorus-member in the making.
At the end the voice inside my head said “Fuck it, Peter. Show them you can sing.” I shut my ears tight against the pianist and looked straight ahead. “Can lead to joy. And hope. And love… yes. Love.” C, D, Eb, E. Flawless. I just grinned as the piano roll to the end of the song began. The cheering was wonderful; i walked off as calmly as i could and proceeded to totally collapse in my chair hugging Elise and whispering “i did it, i hit it, i did it.”
No one mentioned my high notes, but everyone claims my song was wonderful. I didn’t think so, and i keep saying “But, what about the end?”
Tonight i’ll be at callbacks. Someone thought it was okay.
Every day is a day that your whole life has been leading towards; each step is the step that all of your life has been preparing you to take. Until the next one.
Two years ago i auditioned for Hair. I had so far only had a bit part in a main stage show, and i had never sang on stage before. But, i had the most hair of any of the boys who were auditioning. This, i was sure, was my shoe-in.
Our director asked who would sing first, and a hush fell over the room packed with aspiring tribe-members — no one wanted to set the bar. So, i did… with assurances that i could get up and try it again later. It was one of the most terrifying experiences of my life: my arms went numb, i forget my lyrics, and i couldn’t understand the piano arrangement. I barely remember the act of singing so much as i remember the lights blinding me as i wandered off the side of the stage, knowing that my second try would not make much of a difference.
When i didn’t get a callback, i was not entirely surprised.
Everything between then and now has been my stumbling rehearsal for tonight’s audition for Fiddler on the Roof. Every failed audition, and every successful one. Every note i’ve hit and every note i’ve missed. Every smile, every tear, everything. Yes, it’s about whether or not i can hit my E, as i am acutely aware. But, it’s also about who i was when i took the stage 730-odd days ago and who i can be tonight.
It’s not about hitting your stride in the moment, every moment, living for each. It is about sustaining through them all, stringing them together like a legato string of pearls.
Not coincidentally, that’s what my voice teacher keeps telling my about hitting the high notes in my audition piece. Maybe after i get it right in my singing i can manage to apply it to life.