Choir Tour

It's that time of year again. Choir tour is upon us and I'm filled with a mixture of excitement and dread. I'm excited because we always get to see really cool things and I do love hanging out with all of my favorite people and singing with them. We get to make beautiful music in fun places. We meet interesting hosts and and their families. We bond, we laugh, we make memories. Every coin has another side though. That other side is spending too much time with all of my favorite people. We endure long bus rides, movies we don't all want to watch, noises we don't all want to hear, and sights we don't all want to see. People get sick, and tired, and cranky, and down-right angry. Some people are more verbal about their malcontent than others so you have to listen to people whine and complain. We have to do the best we can to shake it all off and have a good concert anyway. In the end, it's all about the music.

This tour is a little different for me. It is the only year that I feel like I'm going with very few friends in the choir. I have people I love, don't get me wrong, but I'm also surrounded by people who don't know that I know what they say about me behind my back. I hear the most ridiculous things about myself. I get to hear rumors about things that I say and do that never happened. It is really quite a mystery to me what I did to these people to inspire such angst and flat-out story telling. Most recently, I told one of the sopranos that I swapped her with a different soprano that doesn't like dealing with me. I told her that I picked her because she is my favorite. When I heard the story re-told to me later that week, it was said that I told her that I picked her because she needed the most work. I was flabbergasted. It wasn't even in the ballpark of what I actually said. So someone who witnessed or was apart of that conversation turned around and told a bald-faced lie to make me look like a bitch. I've never done anything to this soprano. I mistakenly thought that she and her boyfriend were my friends. But now I hear from a few people close to them that this isn't the case. It would have been nice to get the memo of hatred from the source but...some people can't man up and say what they mean. The exact same people started a rumor that I don't like my friend Jordyn because I'm jealous of her because she's a better singer than me. Again, my jaw dropped when I heard this. Jordyn is a sweet girl and I adore her. She is an extremely talented musician who has all the potential and work-ethic needed to take over the world of music. I hang out with Jordyn on a semi-regular basis and it never even occurred to me to be jealous of her. She is ridiculously talented but I'm just beyond the point in my life where I want what other people have. My teacher has taught me to make the most of the instrument that I have. It doesn't make any sense to dwell on an instrument you can never have. Jordyn has a ridiculously amazing instrument that I can never have. So I'll just be happy for her and go back to what I need to do to make my instrument the best it can be. When I asked her if she had heard the rumor, she said she had. Luckily, she didn't let it impact her opinion of me which I'm grateful for. That shows amazing maturity on her part. I just wish that the people who are trying to destroy my friendships would develop the same maturity. It seems like these people are purposely trying to misunderstand the things that I say so that I look like the bad guy. I've only ever tried to do what I thought was best for the choir. The mean spirit inside these people is mostly what makes me dread tour. It is that kind of drama-creating/drama-loving attitude that ruins everyone's good time. It makes me so glad that the end of my time in this choir and university are coming to an end. I've met wonderful people and made unforgettable memories in this choir. Unfortunately, the bad is standing out more than the good right now and I want nothing more than to be free of it. I can only hope that with myself and select others being gone next year, the choir can grow and succeed without the lies and the contrived drama. I really want nothing more for this choir than epic amounts of success. I digress.

The opera has been coming along really well. We are doing the memory check for covers today. Katie and I had a bit of a slip-up yesterday so hopefully we can pull it together today. We get to start staging and exploring character soon and I'm very excited about that. It is my favorite part of the whole process. Learning what kind of space you have to work with and what kind of interaction your director wants you to have just makes everything better. I sing so much better after I've got all of that worked out. I can just let go and become my character.

In other news, after tomorrow night, I don't work at Walmart for 14 whole days. I can't think of anything better than that!!!