Recitals for Dummies

April showers may bring May flowers, but far more importantly, April 1 is the official beginning of recital season. For those of you readers who are only tangentially aware of this particular season, simply imagine a shake ’n bake combination of wedding season and hunting season, i.e. formal wear, nervous small animals, a problematic [a] vowel, and five hundred people in orange vests with Browning BL-22s.

Recital-related stress tends to manifest itself in a variety of ways, depending on the singer. Some of the most common symptoms are hysterical crying, night sweats, food-related hallucinations (i.e. Pavarotti bathing in olive oil), and a neurotic urge to crawl around looking for high Cs in the carpet.

Some singers are better than others at hiding these symptoms of stress as the date of their recital looms ever nearer, but chances are, they still are teetering on the precipice of an operatic breakdown. The best test is pupil dilation: once those babies hit the size of quarters, it’s probably a good time to hit the singer over the head with your “Tännhauser” score…just to provide some perspective.

Surprisingly, I myself have been suffering from some unfortunate symptoms related to stress, particularly, an obsessive preoccupation with the term “recital.” As of this moment, I am still mulling over the fact that if you remove the letter “i,” you have a much more accurate description of the excremental nature of voice recitals.

But really, such overwhelming stress is completely unnecessary. If anything, huddling into a fetal position to escape the image of Pavarotti playing warship in Bertolli Extra Virgin is only going to distract from the more important preparations for your recital, such as watching fifty episodes of “West Wing” to solidify the emotion behind your Schubert set or calculating which pair of high-heels would be the most aero-dynamically supportive of the final high note in your Rossini aria.

Of course, mere will power isn’t enough for a singer to overcome their recital neuroses and focus on what really matters. But don’t worry, Lily is here to save the day, this time with a solution for every single recital concern you could possibly have.

Music: Unfortunately for many of us, you simply cannot put on a recital without singing at least fifty or sixty minutes of music. This, of course, means that you actually have to PICK fifty or sixty minutes of music.

The best thing to do is to pick a theme that really inspires you. Not some rainbow-sunshine theme like “Songs about Love” or “Voices of Women,” but something that truly expresses your inner sensibility. Two such examples: “Songs that Are So Bad They Make Me Want to Stab My Pianist With a Tuning Fork” and “Songs Written by Composers Who Were Addicted to Paste in the Third Grade and Then Changed Their First Name to Harold.”

Or my personal favorite: “Songs that William Wallace Would Have Sung if He Were an 18th Century French Opera Singer with Mommy Issues Instead of Mel Gibson in a Kilt.”

Memorization: Once you have selected a theme for your recital, you have to be sure to memorize each song in your program. Some people recommend writing out the lyrics on flashcards and quizzing yourself, while others suggest going on a strict starvation diet until you can repeat each phrase backward.

My suggestion is to scrap these tired memorization techniques and take advantage of the Chamber Music Loophole. This oh-so-helpful rule allows a singer to use a music stand for any and all chamber music pieces, thus ensuring that you don’t have to waste precious hours of the day on memorization.

And if your recital program doesn’t include any chamber music pieces? Trust me, Schubert and Strauss would surely have preferred their art songs performed with a tambourine obbligato.

Dress: The gown that you wear for your recital is far more crucial than anyone thinks. Not only does it give you an opportunity to look fabulous (and perhaps finally close the deal with that baritone), it also provides a helpful vocal safety net by ensuring that the audience will be so dazzled by the number of sequins on your bodice that they won’t even listen to the first three sets of your performance.

If the second half of your recital is just as problematic as the first, the halfway point might be a good time for a costume change (perhaps with twice as many sequins).

Audience: According to tradition, a voice recital isn’t much good if you don’t have an audience of at least 20-40 people. Parents, siblings, boyfriends (if more than one is invited, I highly recommend assigned seating), voice teachers, conservatory colleagues…their presence in the recital hall weighs heavily on a recitalist’s already dangerously heightened nerves.

As far as recitals are concerned, I am a proponent of the “less is more” mentality when it comes to the audience, simply to cut down on the possibility of multiple fainting fits backstage. By all means, invite friends, family, and teachers to your recital. Just be sure to tell them the wrong location.


So there you have it. If you know what to do, recitals are really no big deal.

For all of you singers who have recitals coming up, break a leg, toi toi toi, and in bocca al lupo!

And that reminds me…

Don’t forget to come to my recital on Tuesday, April 21st at 6:30pm…

…in Yamoussoukro.

C-flat My Valentine?

February 14th is a day that some people dread with every fiber of their being.  The plethora of lace-edged hearts and trite love poems, red roses, and mobs of lovey-dovey couples tossing small nougat-filled chocolates at each other...really, it's enough to make anyone try to use a Russell Stover box as a plunger.

If you have a lover/partner/baritones, you are required by law to spend the evening as Robert and Elizabeth Barrett Browning, i.e. feeding each other chocolate-covered strawberries and limiting your conversation to words that rhyme with "love," "snuggle," and "canoodle."

If, on the other hand, you are currently between lovers/partners/baritones, you are forced to endure the personal humiliation of an evening spent at home, watching "When Harry Met Sally," drinking from a heart-shaped bottle of whiskey, and reminding yourself that, in addition to not getting into any summer programs, you are going to die alone and unloved, surrounded by twelve cats named Bach.

Don't get me wrong...I happen to adore chocolate, and I have been known to wear the color red on occasion.  In fact, I even wrote a Valentine love poem to Charlie Anderson in the ninth grade along the lines of: "I want your body.  You're such a hottie."  (For some reason, he changed his phone number and filed a restraining order the next day, but I really think that we had a connection.)

And, though it may be hard to believe, Valentine's Day does serve an important purpose to our society.  First, it helps fill in the depressing holiday gap between Christmas and the 4th of July.  Second, it reminds us that expensive cardiologists are unnecessary because the heart is actually a two-dimensional symbol surrounded by lace.  Third, it helps our beloved country maintain its Olympiad status of obesity.  Huzzah!

In essence, what truly enrages me about Valentine's Day is the extent to which opera singers are cut out of the holiday.  Three hundred and sixty-four days of the year, we are the experts on love: whether it's romantic love, carnal love, parental love, incestuous love, perverted love, intellectual love, culinary love...you name it, we sing it in our opera houses.

But then, when February 14th rolls around, the civilians decide to mutiny against our romantic monopoly and take matters into their own hands.  And what is the result of this heavy-handedness?  Coconut-flavored chocolates and Celine Dion's "My Heart Will Go On."

With that in mind, I have taken it upon myself to reinvent Valentine's Day as a holiday that can be celebrated best by opera singers.  Russell Stover and Hallmark will continue to churn out chocolates and banal poems, but, for this year at least, I have created a few Lily Puns replacements for those painful Valentine traditions.

Box of chocolates:

Buy a box of Mozartkugeln and write a short note that reads: "Batti, batti, but my love for you is come scoglio."

If your inclinations are more toward early music, you might want to consider accompanying your chocolate with: "I love your well-tempered clavicle, so I'll definitely be Bach" or "If I don't get a Handel on you, my heart will be baroque."

Or, for a more generic Valentine saying, I would recommend either: "Roses are red, charcoal is black, I just don't like your vocal attack" or "Roses are red, votes need a ballot, my teacher says that you need more palate."

Seductive sonnet for a handsome baritone/tenor

Perhaps you've noticed how I look at you

At school, in class, especially when you sing

I've spent some time constructing plans to woo

A bari-tenor.  You are just the thing!

Your dulcet tones are sweet, the truth be told

But even more, I like the way you place

Your vowels up front, your [i] and [a] so bold.

I've just so glad that you are not a bass.

I think you might be dating someone new

But honestly, her high notes are quite weak.

My Mimi, Tosca, Anna, and Lulu

Make hers sound like a toilet with a leak.

So drop the broad, and be my Don Jose

We'll sing a duet Valentine, okay?

Break-up sonnet for your current baritone/tenor so that you are free to pursue the handsome baritone/tenor mentioned above:

Oh God, I cannot stand it any more.

We're done, we're through, you owe me last month's rent

You weren't that smart and really such a bore,

But, worst of all, your voice was nightmare sent.

While we were close, I felt the need to lie.

You tried your best (I guess) at singing well,

But when you'd vocalize, I'd want to die...

Eight months with you was tantamount to Hell.

Your tone is harsh and thick, you tend to crack,

And as for pitch, you might as well be deaf.

Your low notes wobble with the breath you lack;

Your high notes shriek and struggle at mere F.

So that's my reason: simply, straight, and true...

My vocal taste demands much more than you.

Show me the money!

During the first few days of 2009, I had high hopes for my bank account. Things have been tight, to be sure, but the New Year, new President, and new national optimism would surely result in a few extra zeros magically appearing at the end of my check book balance. At the very least, I figured that Mr. Obama would stop by and give me a coupon to Denny's.

Alas, my grasp of economic theory has never been strong. Instead of watching my wallet swell with additional Grants and Franklins, I instead have been watching opera houses close, small businesses fall into financial ruin, and Britney Spears make a come-back – all horrific signs of an economy that now has the stability of expired cottage cheese.

Sadly, the time has long since passed when I prepared for such disasters by stashing sweaty dollar bills between pages 386 and 387 of "Anna Karenina" and plucked out my gold fillings for safe keeping in the toe of my left bunny slipper.

Still, always the optimist, I have decided to take this economic down-spiral as a chance to refine my craft. I have happily turned "Yes We Can" into "Yes We Can Subsist Solely on $1 Hot Pockets" as a way to really grasp the character of Mimi, sunken temples and all. Plus, the yellowish tinge to my skin has done wonders to highlight the jewel tones of my favorite ball gown, and my consumptive fainting fits as Violetta have never been more realistic.

Perhaps you think that I am approaching this economic crisis from a slightly skewed perspective. I simply should tighten my corset strings, hold my head and soft palate high, and get a regular job like the rest of you.

Pish and posh! Please do not offend my artistic sensibilities with such a suggestion! Hot pockets and scurvy are one thing, but a civilian job is something else entirely. Let me assure you that my wallet could never shrink to such a wasted shadow of its former self to require a step of such drastic proportions.

So, instead, I have come up with several cunning plans that will supplement a limited "-ina/-etta" income without betraying any operatic inclinations.

1) Find an elderly gentleman who keeps his cash safely stored in an old Bud Light bottle beneath his front porch. Transfix said gentleman with a rousing rendition of "Glitter and Be Gay" until he begins to asphyxiate, then take the money and run. If you feel guilty at such gold-digging behavior, remind yourself that "Candide" isn't really an opera and you can't be held responsible for your actions.

2) Lock yourself in the airplane bathroom during a transcontinental flight and channel Florence Foster Jenkins as you alternate between the high Es of "Durch Zärtlichkeit und Schmeicheln" and the high Fs of "Der Hölle Rache." By the second hour, the passengers will begin pushing tear-stained $50 bills underneath the door. Just remember to give the pilot ear plugs unless you want to make an unscheduled stop in the Atlantic Ocean.

3) Form a mafia family with your fellow opera singers and go to the mattresses against all of the a cappella groups in the country. If they refuse to pay monthly dues for "protection" against awkward harmony and flat singing, send them to sleep with the Rhine Maidens.

4) Rip out the pages of your least favorite opera aria anthology and sign each page as Johann Sebastian Bach. Dip them in a bath of jasmine tea and Slippery Elm cough drops for effective aging, and then sell those puppies on Ebay for $5,000 a pop. If anyone asks you, assure them that Bach did, in fact, write "The Rake's Progress."

5) Write a self-help book brimming with nuggets of operatic wisdom. Assume a suitably punny pseudonym and then sell it to other opera singers for an absurdly high price.

There you have it: five foolproof ways to beat the economic odds, all while maintaining your elegant opera singing persona.

But these are only the first five of hundreds of brilliant strategies, all described in full detail (with color illustrations) in my new book, "Lily Puns: Surviving the Hindenburg of Economic Recessions While Maintaining Your Charmingly Tremulous Trills," only $39.99 if you order now!

Or buy a copy for one of your friends, and get two books for the low price of $89.99!

Don't miss this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to solve your financial problems!

Will that be credit or debit?

Bach Humbug

Only a few days are left before Christmas Day and all of its holly-encrusted delights. Presents have been wrapped in charmingly cherubic wrapping paper, Christmas trees have been trimmed, gingerbread men have been decorated with ill-matched frosting ensembles...everything points toward good will and a joyous holiday spirit.

Please gag me with a candy cane. The holiday season isn't all baked ham and egg nog. Presents, trees, and gingerbread men are all well and good for materialistic, tree-hating cannibals, but let's take a closer look at some holiday statistics.

Over the course of this holiday season, three million unhappy individuals will discover too late that they are fatally allergic to the color combination of red and green; five million, three hundred thousand and four performances of "The Messiah" will be sung embarrassingly out of tune; seven hundred thousand and nine awkward couples in matching reindeer turtlenecks will inadvertently consume poisonous berries while attempting to canoodle under mistletoe; five hundred thousand and eighty-six utterances of "Happy Chan-oo-kah!" will set back Judeo-Christian relations by 500 years; and seventeen members of the Associated Union of Reindeer will finally reveal that aggravated syphilis was the true cause of Rudolph's luminous nose.

And, if you are expecting Santa Claus to pay a house call this year, don't hold your breath: old Saint Nick was just diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes and is now confined to a wheelchair and restricted to a steady diet of pureed wheat germ.

So, there you have it. Society has pulled the pine-scented wool over your eyes, and, as your faithfully-opinionated blogger, I have a moral obligation to A) burst your Christmas bubble, B) splinter your candy cane, C) amputate the limbs of your favorite gingerbread man, D) contaminate your egg nog with salmonella, and E) generally "grinch-ify" your Christmas in every way possible.

Truth be told, I may have a slightly ulterior motive when it comes to destroying your holiday spirit. It may be hard to believe, but my acerbic wit and cynical sarcasm were once decidedly pro-Christmas.

But then, one fateful Christmas in 1990, all of my Christmas spirit was disastrously and irrevocably destroyed.

In my color-coded Christmas letter to Santa Claus, I had asked for only one thing: Kiri te Kanawa's Christmas album. Yet, when the key moment arrived and I gleefully ripped open my Christmas present, I discovered not the charmingly alliterative "Christmas by Kiri," but rather that premiere Christmas album by...CHARLOTTE CHURCH!

It was seventy-three days before I was able to consume solid foods again.

Ever since that traumatic day, I have faced every holiday season with undeniable hatred. Plum pudding and baked ham turn to dust in my mouth; the scent of gingerbread makes me froth at the mouth; even the slightest hint of Bing Crosby singing "White Christmas" causes my right foot and left nostril to twitch uncontrollably.

After decades of extensive anti-Christmas therapy (involving several unnatural uses of reindeer antlers and Christmas ornaments), I have finally determined that the Christmas spirit is not to blame for my affliction, but rather Kris Kringle himself. After all, it was none other than Santa who gave me the wrong cd and thus burned the permanent image of sugarplum Charlotte Churches into my brain.

With that in mind, I have decided to postpone my war against other sopranos for the time being and focus all of my malignant power on that unnaturally rosy-cheeked, diabetes-inflicted figure of holiday evil. I urge you to do the same, if only to prevent the same unhappy experience from damaging another impressionable young soprano.

So, I beg you: inject your gingerbread cookies with gallons of insulin, spray your Christmas tree with poisonous pesticides, and set your sniper rifle to the "reindeer" setting.

I myself plan to build a roaring holiday blaze in my fireplace on Christmas Eve and enjoy some delectable Santa flambe.

Could someone please pass the salt?

Sniffle This!

Winter is just around the corner. And, like every other year, this winter season beckons with arctic winds and sporadic snow showers, not to mention hot apple cider and unflattering turtleneck sweaters. Non-singers can revel in the beauties of the changing season, frolicking in piles of snow, humming a pitchy version of "Jingle Bells," and even -- gasp! -- holiday shopping sans scarf.

Singers, on the other hand, are well aware of the truly malevolent nature of the winter season. A beautiful falling snowflake is nothing more than a pretext for hundreds of dastardly microbes that float innocuously among the population, biding their time until they can find a singer to attack.

Within a few minutes of this first contact, a singer's vocal folds are coated with a layer of impenetrable phlegm. Soon after, the sniffles begin, followed by a rasping cough, aches and pains, the loss of high notes, the loss of low notes, the loss of all remaining notes, and, in some cases, the loss of sanity.

Scientists have studied this phenomenon for centuries and, despite spending billions of dollars on research and performing dozens of illegal experiments on opera singers (the results of these experiments are known as counter-tenors), they still have no good explanation.

At this point in my post, you probably expect me to provide some sage advice on how to avoid Mother Nature's minions of winter fury. Sorry, but I usually just lock myself in a bomb shelter lined with Ricola cough drops and Kleenex boxes and hope that my supply of ding-dongs and coffee will last until March.

That said, don't despair! Your Texas-sized wad of contaminated phlegm may have ruined your summer program auditions, but there is no reason why you can't use it to ruin someone else's summer program auditions as well.

Biological warfare in the winter months has been a standard practice for ambitious opera singers for centuries. During the French and Indian War, Lord Jeffrey Amherst gained notoriety by sending smallpox-infected blankets to the enemy tribe and effectively starting an epidemic. What the history books failed to mention is that Amherst's wife was a lyric soprano in fierce competition with Little-Doe-With-High-F-Like-Thunder, the famed Native American coloratura.

Coincidence? Perhaps. Then again, after just a few choice blanket deliveries, Mrs. Amherst's squeaky high notes were once more unrivaled by anyone in Massachusetts.

These days, opera singers don't need to go to quite so much trouble for the sake of their competitive spirit. Besides, the waitlist for a vial of smallpox pus is always excessively long this time of year.

But, just in case, here are the top four foolproof strategies for a little biological warfare:

1) It may be the oldest trick in the book, but nothing beats the used Kleenex technique. The most popular method of delivery is simply to drop a wadded-up Kleenex into a purse or book bag. If you are unobserved, you can make the most of the drop by first wiping the inside of the Kleenex along the outside of the purse and/or wallet within. Symptoms develop within seven hours.

2) Another brilliant method is the water spit technique. When your rival is distracted (it might help to introduce a diversion of some kind, possibly in the form of a tenor or baritone), simply open their water bottle and spit inside. Be sure to shake the bottle in order to disperse the phlegm before replacing. Symptoms develop within six hours.

3) A slightly messier but no less effective strategy is the death via boyfriend technique. Contaminate your mark indirectly by seducing their significant other and engaging in 3-4 minutes of saliva exchange. If the significant other is strangely immune to your charms, knock him over the head with your nalgene bottle and place the viral strain directly into his blood stream. Symptom develop within three hours.

4) Last is my personal favorite: the subtle, but oh-so-sneaky cough in vocal anthology technique. Simply borrow one of your enemy's vocal anthologies for a few minutes and cough into the pages as you flip through. By coughing at a rate of 8 coughs per minute and flipping the book at a speed of 13 spm (songs per minute), you will effectively spread your contaminated germs across 73.8% of the anthology after only seven minutes. Symptoms develop within twenty minutes.

Some of you may be appalled by my zeal for contaminating other singers. After all, you argue, wouldn't it be better to spend your time recovering instead of infecting other singers with your disease?

Hmmm...you do raise a good point. I had never considered the well-being of my fellow opera singers in that context, and I am now horrified at my own behavior. Clearly, I need to go think about your argument for a few minutes and reassess my life.

But while I am gone...

...would you mind holding this used Kleenex for me?

A Lot of Superstitious Hocus Pocus

Performers are known for their superstitions. The most respected Shakespearean actor will cringe at any inadvertent reference to “Macbeth”; the most elegant prima ballerina will quake before her thirty-two fouetté turns after hearing a hearty cry of “good luck!”; the most refined concert pianist will worry about razor blades in the piano keys after crossing paths with a black cat. Even the most rational and anti-superstitious performer can’t help but take a moment to question the wisdom of opening an umbrella indoors.

Opera singers are no exception to this rule. In fact, opera singers are far more neurotically superstitious than any other type of performer, a fact that is directly linked to the same “diva” gene that necessitates contract clauses, soprano catfights, and the placement of a dozen white lilies in the lead tenor’s dressing room.

Opera superstitions fall into two categories. First, there are pre-performance superstitions: relatively harmless traditions used by individual opera singers to ensure a successful performance. These superstitions can range from the benign (drinking a cup of jasmine tea and watching “The Sound of Music”) to the bizarre (sleeping with a musical score under the pillow in order to transmit musicality through osmosis) to the positively fanatical (dressing up in Joan Sutherland’s old nightgown and hopping on one foot while singing “The trumpet shall sound”).

The second category of opera superstitions is made up of more personal, more potent, and far more dangerous superstitions. These beliefs generally don’t have anything to do with opera in the grander sense but they are somehow always found in massive quantities in the twisted psyche of the average young singer.

To the untrained eye, Claire Coloratura may appear to be a well-adjusted young woman. She comes to rehearsals on time, engages in healthy competition with her fellow sopranos, and hits a hell of a high E on a regular basis. Scratch beneath the surface of those shimmering cadenzas, however, and you will discover that Claire has been wearing the same pair of lucky socks every day since the 7th grade. She also brushes her teeth in 147 cycles of counter-clockwise rotation, eats a jar of capers with milk every Thursday at 4:13pm, and has taken a personal vow only to date men named Sam.

And it isn’t just the sopranos. Barry Baritone certainly looks like a regular Joe six-pack (without the six-pack, of course), but he also has fourteen lucky turtles, only speaks in Pig Latin to his girlfriend, and paints his toenails a delightful shade of maroon before every performance.

Tommy Tenor coordinates the color of his boxer-briefs to the musical keys of Pavarotti’s Greatest Hits albums and writes emails in a code constructed from “Die schöne Müllerin.” And, in case you couldn’t tell from his inspiring performance as Don Ottavio, Tommy also sings a rousing falsetto rendition of “Sempre libera” every morning between shampooing his mustache and shaving his chest.

These personal superstitions may seem to be innocuous. After all, Claire’s obsession with capers, Barry’s penchant for poikilotherms, and Tommy’s color-coordinated Calvin Kleins do not affect their operatic performances in a negative way. Just the opposite, in fact: listen to one of Claire’s coloratura runs, and you’ll be damned if you don’t notice that each staccato note is as dazzling clear as a tasty caper.

But don’t be fooled. These superstitions may appear to help opera singers achieve success, but they are actually more likely to transform a performer into post-op Bruce Banner than Beverly Sills.

Moreover, this threat to musical sanity is growing more powerful every day. Dozens of new singers are infected on a daily basis, and the superstitions are getting more and more bizarre. I recently met a young mezzo-soprano who makes every life decision depending on the responses of her Magic 8-Ball. Clearly, it is only a matter of time before we have Toscas who brandish rabbit feet instead of daggers and Mimis who die of triskaidekaphobia instead of consumption.

Still, I urge each of you to try your utmost to defeat that sneaky demon of superstitious nonsense. Superstitious traditions can’t replace solid hard work when it comes to a performance, and only a fool would actually expect those crusty socks from 7th grade to help with that melisma at the end of “Spargi d’amaro pianto.”

The only way to overcome your superstitions is to face them. So, make friends with black cats, walk underneath ladders, and wish everyone a boisterous “Good luck!” for their production of “Macbeth.”

And if you still don’t think that you’ll be able to overcome all of your superstitious hocus pocus – don’t worry.

I’ll be crossing my fingers for you.

Soprano versus Soprano

Opera is no stranger to the grand passions. Sex, murder, ambition, incest, battles between gods and giants – the opera stage sees it all, witnessing more power struggles on a daily basis than the World Wrestling Federation and the United Nations combined. Considering the opera world’s penchant for passion, it should be no surprise that the battle for dominance wages even more fiercely offstage.

Step into the green room and see the truth: in the left corner, Alfredo is pelting Rudolpho with throat lozenges; in the right corner, Germont is dodging Papageno’s rotten eggs; in the back, Cherubino is challenging Octavian to a beer-chugging contest; and, of course, in the middle, Violetta and Pamina are throttling each other.

The ego wars between tenors, baritones, and mezzos are certainly ferocious, yet none can compete with the epic battles of soprano versus soprano in terms of sheer savagery.

Sopranos follow a simple but precise model of behavior. Each year, Soprano A reviews and facebook stalks all sopranos joining her musical community. After determining which sopranos pose the greatest threat to her territory (i.e. “fach”), Soprano A initiates several stages of “friendly” behavior with the one deemed to be the most dangerous: Soprano B. Over coffee and amid friendly discussions of repertoire, the ever-cunning Soprano A pretends to bond with Soprano B in order to gain her confidence and gradually discover each of her vulnerabilities. At the exact moment that Soprano B reveals her greatest weakness, Soprano A plans to impale her with her most piercing form of passive aggression and thus, maintain her dominance.

If you are beginning to worry about the safety of sweet little Soprano B, fear not. She is not an innocent victim, but actually just the opposite, having selected Soprano A as her archrival weeks ago and hastily planned a suitable counterattack.

If we look closer, we see that Soprano A is already losing this battle. So far, her “friendly” behavior has only helped her to discover that Soprano B has a tremulous vibrato. Soprano B, on the other hand, has discovered that Soprano A has a problematic high F, insufficient breath support, a preference for handsome baritones, and a pair of extremely ugly sandals. Within a few minutes, Soprano B will strike, Soprano A will be defeated, and the power in this fach will shift. Soprano A will spend the evening licking her wounds in a practice room and then plan for another battle tomorrow.

Those of you who saw Susie Soprano and Corinne Coloratura eating lunch together yesterday witnessed this power struggle in real life. Nothing appeared to be out of the ordinary, but a gauntlet had clearly been thrown. Each bite of sandwich was carefully timed; each comment was a subtle test in the waters of the other’s insecurity; each friendly smile was simply a feint before a cutting blow. And who won the battle? The triumphant flash of scarlet in Susie’s eyes in between bites of grilled cheese tells us everything we need to know.

The opera world is a dangerous one, and we must all learn the best way to protect ourselves. Having battled numerous nemesis sopranos since 7th grade, I have learned to expect a soprano attack at any time. And, after years of carefully study, I have crafted a handbook of tried-and-true defenses to use against the most lethal soprano assault. I offer you the top five:

1) Always carry a digitized recording of Florence Foster Jenkins singing “Der Hölle Rache” on your person. When threatened by a savage soprano, simply play the recording as loudly as possible and wait for the soprano to run away screaming.

2) Memorize the following three phrases: “You have SUCH a cute voice,” “Have you ever thought about doing something else with your life?” and “Your voice teacher is really sweet to keep trying to help you sing better.” Use any of these phrases whenever necessary to clear sopranos from your path.

3) Always travel in the company of a tenor or baritone (see blog posting “Falling in love…and not just with opera”). When an aggressive soprano approaches, push the tenor or baritone toward the soprano and run away as fast as possible. A small gratuity for the tenor or baritone might be considerate, depending on the extent of the soprano’s hostility.

4) When a soprano begins to talk to you, cough loudly. The soprano will immediately leave the area in order to find some Airborne, Vitamin C, or Mucinex. Sniffles, sneezes, and excessive throat clearing are equally effective.

5) Walk around with a wooden stake, a crucifix, several heads of garlic, and the complete series of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” on DVD. Sopranos will definitely steer clear. Unfortunately, so will everyone else.

No matter what dangerous vocalists lurk in the halls, a true opera singer cannot help but thrive on a little passion and danger. And, who knows…perhaps one day Soprano A will extend a proverbial olive branch to Soprano B, the two will break into an exquisite rendition of the Flower Duet, and peace and happiness will reign supreme in the world.

But, for now, it might be best to make friends with the instrumentalists.

And keep your back facing the wall at all times.