I always look forward to my yearly residency at Caramoor. The people who work there give us a beautiful welcome, our presence is clearly something they anticipate, and the opportunity to settle down with a single project in a calm, quiet environment with a talented group of musicians is an oasis in a year beset with stress. Our concert this year is called To the Sea, a collection of songs in seven languages (oy vey) whose action takes place on the ocean—or on the shore—or nearby a lake or river. The repertoire ranges from Tchaikovksy to Rossini and gives everyone a chance to strut their stuff in songs, duets, and quartets. “Everyone” includes soprano Shiyu Zhuo, mezzo-soprano Anna Maria Vacca, tenor Nathan Romportl, baritone Will Kim, and pianist Luís Villarreal. Blessedly at my side is NYFOS’s Associate Artistic Director Bénédicte Jourdois, a veritable geyser of energy, wisdom, and irreverence.

This year, I admit, does feel different from previous ones for one simple reason: it is taking place a week earlier than usual. Bénédicte had been giving up her week playing for the Metropolitan Opera semi-final auditions, which overlapped with our regular schedule. But this year she wanted to get back to her old gig—for many excellent reasons—and we moved the Caramoor residency to the first week of Juilliard vacation, not the second. February’s concert and recording sessions had pretty much drained my batteries, and boom! Ready or not, here we come to Caramoor.

Today I didn’t feel as if I were firing on all cyclinders, but I gave it my best shot as I attempted to help the cast find the right color and movement for their songs. Bénédicte and I thought it best to begin with the ensemble pieces—three quartets and a passel of duets. The group numbers always need the most attention because they’re hard to prepare on your own. (Good first readings are rare, though not unheard-of.) One of them was our opening number, sung in Swedish—a song by Wilhelm Stenhammar with a simple, folky tune and a pain-in-the-ass accompaniment that disguises the downbeat, with the result that the singers were never sure if they were lined up correctly with the piano. All three pianists hammered it out for the singers: Luis playing the Stenhammar printed music, Bénédicte doubling the melody on his piano, and me banging chords on the downbeats (admittedly, struggling to hit them correctly). Eventually we were all able to land on the first beat of each measure with confidence, in spite of Stenhammar’s deceptive arpeggios.

A Rossini quartet was in a style more familiar to this group of opera singers; it just needed a major infusion of musical oregano to come to life, and the red sauce was simmering by the time we moved on. The most amusing debacle of the day was the encore. I shall keep the title a secret, and just say that it is a very famous American song that everyone already knew, even our Chinese soprano. I made a simple arrangement of the tune, sent it ahead, and proceeded to watch it crash and burn today not once but over and over again. I think everyone must have looked at it and thought, “Oh, this one’s a no-brainer, let me get back to that song in Catalan…” We came back to it at the end of the day, and put Humpty-Dumpty together again.

Caramoor’s Terrance W. Schwab Vocal Rising Stars program is made possible by generous support from the Terrance W. Schwab Endowment Fund for Young Vocal Artists.
The Merkin Hall performance is underwritten by Eileen Caulfield Schwab.