This post is shamefully late; I should have posted at the beginning of November. Apologies.
Here's a blurb about a quick trip to Vienna to audition for the Konzertvereinigung der Wiener Staasoper (the chorus of the Salzburg Festival). It was a mad-dash...I received the invitation to audition on a Tuesday, and the next Tuesday I was on the plane! I ran into Maestro Timothy Vernon on the plane from Toronto to Vienna...what a coincidence!
I auditioned the same afternoon I arrived in Vienna, having been up for 36 hours in a dehydrating airplane. Oh the joys of international auditions.
When I arrived at the Staatsoper for my audition, I looked around for a place to warm-up (of course there was none and I was was relegated to a bathroom). After an hour of waiting outside the room I was supposed to be auditioning, with no one in sight, I finally asked a stage-hand if the audition room had been moved. He said that yes indeed, they had. (Great - thanks for telling me.)
So off I went to the other side of the building, and sure enough, there they were.
I checked in, and guess what - I was not even on their audition list! (cue heart-attack - I had flown thousands of kilometres and spent piles of money for this audition).
Thankfully (or unthankfully), the Austrians are pretty relaxed, and they were able to fit me in. So I chatted with some other singers I knew from Uni and the Stephansdom Choir and waited for my turn.
I arrived in the audition room, and was told that they hadn't received the e-mail I sent confirming that I would indeed be participating in the auditions. Well, that explains it. (I later discovered that they had received it, but had not "processed" it).
The audition went swimmingly, and I skipped off to meet my friend Nora at the Theater an der Wien, where we watched a production of "Idomeneo" that a few of my friends were performing in.
Then I had a few days to spend with friends and enjoy Vienna.
This is Sara-Bigna and I at the Musikverein in Vienna, witnessing the genius of Ricardo Muti conducting the Verdi Requiem. Sara-Bigna surprised me with 2nd row seats on my last evening before leaving Vienna. Talk about surround-sound!
Here's Sara-Bigna and I at the Zentral Friedhof, paying our respects to Schubert on Allerheiligen (All Saint's Day).
The good news is that the audition was successful, and I did get offered a position in the Chorus of "Fidelio" at the Salzburg Festival. But after reviewing the fine-print of my contract and crunching some numbers, I discovered that it wasn't going to be financially feasible to commit my summer to this project - especially since I was going to have to pay my own travel and accommodation expenses. Again, the joys of international performing life :S
