Today was one of those mornings at WGTD radio when I felt like one of those circus performers juggling six flaming plates while balancing on a unicycle…. except that when I finished out the morning with what amounted to a perfect dismount, no one even knew about it. Nobody in the whole world knew what kind of a crazy morning was for me- except me! (And now you, thanks to this blog.)
My wild Wednesday actually began last night as I was collapsing into bed after a day and evening which included a standard day at the radio station, seven voice lessons, a visit to the Kenosha Pops Band rehearsal, a return to the station to record an interview, attended by worry – which eventually gave way to relief – over the surgery of my voice student, Nick Huff. By the time I crashed into bed, it was all I could do to glance at the calendar to see what awaited me the next day (today.) That’s when I saw the traffic jam in my calendar for the next morning … a 7:30 interview recording with Gateway Technical College president Bryan Albrecht, an 8:00 interview recording with the cast of a local production of “Seussical”, a live interview for part two of today’s Morning Show, and then a recording with James McManus, author of “September Hope: The American Side of A Bridge Too Far” …. a book which I had not even glanced at. I’m discovering all this at 11:15 p.m.
I am grateful that I managed spring out of bed at 5:20 a.m., having slept very soundly- and was at the radio station by 6:30 (a half hour early) to do what I like to call Heavy Skimming, knowing that once I got started with these interviews, I would have scarcely a moment to breathe, let alone to prepare for that interview. The book, by the way, is a really interesting examination of a moment in World War II – in the fall of 1944 – when the Allies’ prospects for victory turned sour, thanks to an ill-conceived campaign called Operation Market Garden which Britain’s Field Marshall Montgomery thought would be the ticket to a quick and decisive victory over Hitler, but which instead proved to be a frightening reversal of fortune. It’s a complicated story that the author, John McManus, examines in great detail, and plowing quickly through so much information was not easy, and I honestly wondered if by the time I was done with three other interviews before that if I would retain the slightest bit of information gleaned from my frantic, last-minute cramming. (Don’t try this at home, folks.)
I crammed right up until 7:30, when I began recording an interview with Gateway Technical College President Bryan Albrecht and a guest from Trane, Inc,- one of the college’s major corporate partners. President Albrecht is one of the nicest people I know, but it’s still a bit stressful to interview him, because he is – in effect – the head honcho, at least as far as the radio station is concerned…. so I’m always anxious to do as good a job as I can, and preferably without dragging a six inch piece of toilet paper on the back of my shoe – and anxious that there be no technical glitches along the way, like ending up with a blank tape when we’re done. Happily, there were no mishaps today and all went well.
The second I was done with them, I ushered them out and ushered into the production room Bob Allen, director of the Kenosha Youth Performing Arts Company’s production of “Seussical” – and five guys involved in the production. (The female leads in the production were all tied up in rehearsal.) I had zero time to properly prepare for this interview, but at least knew a little about “Seussical” because it’s performed every year at Carthage as part of our library’s annual Seuss-a-thon …. so I didn’t sound like a complete idiot. Actually, Bob chose five very bright, articulate and personable young men to be part of the interview, so all I had to do was float a question here and there and let them carry it away. It was tremendous fun.
While I was recording that interview (for airing next week) today’s Morning Show was airing … an author interview I recorded last week, which news director got started for me. Part two was a live interview about a choral concert this weekend at Carthage, and I thought I was going to have about 5 minutes break before starting it- – – except that I got a phone message from the guest telling me that he was on campus but unable to find the building! That meant that I was going to have to fill a little time, and rather than relaxing in that brief break, I grabbed my laptop, went to iTunes, bought a motet by Luca Marenzio (whose music was the topic of part two of today’s program) and burned a disk of it in time to play it over the air …. and I finished that frantic little operation with about 45 seconds to spare! And by the time that bit of music filler was done, my guest – Ken Lenz – was safely in the guest’s chair, ready to be interviewed about the challenges of taking a choral score from 1585 and converting it into modern notation that a modern day singer could read and understand. Interesting stuff.
No sooner was I done with that chat then it was time to return to “September Hope,” but it felt at first like I’d never so much as glanced at the thing. To give me a fighting off the bat, I asked a couple of general questions about McManus’s interest in military history …. and about how the “chaos of war” can make it exceedingly difficult in the midst of battle of even in its aftermath to know precisely what happened- or why. And by the time he had batted around those two questions, I had cleared my head of all matters related to the training of workers for the heating/cooling industry, the Cat in the Hat and Horton Hears a Who, and Italian motets of the 16th century … and was able to ask some halfway intelligent questions about the waning days of World War II. It was fun.
Today was a potent reminder that one of the best things about the work I get to do at WGTD is that it leaves me mentally pirouetting between so many different things. (Now there’s a pretty picture: Greg Berg in a tutu!) Not every day is quite as wild a ride as today was, but I get at least one very healthy mental stretch every single day that I’m there… and usually more. And I am SO happy in that kind of scenario. People sometimes ask me if I wouldn’t be deliriously happy if I were to land a job at the Lyric Opera of Chicago? Wouldn’t that be fun for an Opera Nut like me? Opera every day, all day? And I can answer in all honestly ….. No. As much as I love opera, I can’t imagine it being the sole focus of my professional life. I am happy because my life brings so many different things across my path, to the point where I never – and I mean never – say “I am bored” or “Today was a boring day.” And after my wild WGTD morning, I got to give voice lessons to three fine young men: Austin, Andrew, and another Andrew. I got to rough-house with my niece Lorelai. I got to let my hair down tonight at the bandshell, singing something jazzy with the Kenosha Pops Band. And I got to finish the evening by watching the ESPY Awards, and the presentation of the Perseverance Award to the Hoyts- the father/son team who have entered hundreds of races over the last several decades, with the dad pushing his son in his wheelchair. Incredible. Towards the end of the telecast they replayed a speech from the very first ESPY Awards telecast back in 1993, delivered by coach Jimmy Valvano in one of his last public appearances, 8 weeks before he died from cancer. He said:
“To me, there are three things we should do every day. We should do this every day of our lives:
#1 is laugh. You should laugh every day.
#2 is think. You should spend some time in thought.
And #3, you should have your emotions moved to tears– could be happiness or joy.
But think about it. If you laugh, if you think, and if you cry, that’s a full day. That’s a heck of a day. You do that seven days a week, you’re going to have something special.”
I am so grateful that today, like so many days, was “a heck of a day.”
pictured above: These are the guys I interviewed about Kenosha Unified’s production of Seussical, which opens next weekend. The young man on the far left is Andrew Dorst, one of my voice students – and the guy standing behind them is Bob Allen, co-director of the production. The interview will air next Monday.