The Voices That Have Gone, Part 6: The Two Sopranos

In my yeoman’s days as a singer in New York City, I had a friend whom I loved and admired. We were very close, but we could never be best friends, because we were both sopranos, and such a thing simply could not be. We performed together once in a production of Figaro (she sang the Countess, I sang Susanna), and later in a concert with the group I had formed to present specialized repertoires. That latter gig was a stressful one for both of us. She was on her way to the venue when she realized she’d forgotten her gown. She went back to get it, and ended up warming up and doing her makeup in a cab on her way to the concert hall. She was also recovering from an ailment that caused her serious vocal distress. In an important segment of the concert, an extended duet cantata by Rossini, she found herself unable to continue singing. Although at that point I was pretty upset with her, I summoned all the love I could muster in myself and poured it out in her direction. Amazingly, she was able to recover her voice and finish the piece. I remember taking her hand at the end, during the piano postlude. In my dressing room afterwards I made a mental vow never to perform with her again. But she told me a few days later, in tears, that the power of the love she had felt from me had made the concert one of the greatest musical experiences of her life.

Right around that time, my former obsessive, driving ambition for success as a singer had started to crumble. My first marriage had ended, and at the same time I had switched fachs and begun singing the lyric mezzo-soprano repertoire. Although theoretically I might have gotten more work as a mezzo, where the field was not as crowded, I asked my manager not to send me on any more auditions. I simply couldn’t stomach continuing along the path that I believed, because of my ambition for it, had led my whole life astray. But I was very slow in learnng the lesson my friend provided during that fraught moment in Rossini: that the love with which we sing, and the love with which we regard our friends, is the better part.

My friend got married and started a family soon after, and I went to graduate school. She later moved across the country, and we have not been in touch for some time. I’ve been dreaming about her for the past few nights, though; I feel as if she is speaking to me in my dreams. She was always an incredibly tender and wise person, and in my dreams I have been able to experience her tenderness and wisdom. In spite of the real disappointments and frustrations in both of our lives and careers, she is someone I wish I could be more like.