Last night I had the great pleasure of serving as piano accompanist for a recital featuring the young voice and piano students of Rita Torcaso, a very gifted young woman from Kenosha who sang under Polly at Tremper High School, sang under me in Carthage’s Chamber Singers, and student taught with Kathy, so we have all kinds of ties to Rita and feel such affection for her, her family, and her fiance Ben. (Her brother Joe is a voice student of mine at Carthage.)
I knew that Rita had already begun doing some teaching even while finishing up her studies – and had even heard a couple of her students at solo and ensemble – but this was my first opportunity to really see her in action as a teacher, and I liked what I saw. Rita is so far ahead of where I was in my early twenties, when the only teaching I had done was to give a couple of informal piano lessons to my sister Randi. I was very much wrapped up back then in being a student and a singer and was pretty clueless about all matters pedagogical. In fact, I sort of shudder when I think of the very first voice lessons I taught at Carthage back in 1991, having at that point never formally studied vocal pedagogy. (And boy did it show with my female students. With the guys I sort of knew what I was doing . . . sort of.) I have come to be a good teacher, but when I was Rita’s age I knew nothing about what that meant.
Actually, I thought of one other little bit of teaching experience I had before coming to Carthage. During my last months in Chicago back in 1986, one of my colleagues in the Lyric Opera Center for American Artists departed the program early and returned to New York City. (The Lyric could offer her next to nothing in terms of roles during the fall season, and she rightly felt that to remain would be a waste of her time- especially when her husband Elliot was back in NYC.) Anyway, Ellen was anxious to hand off a private voice student she had from the Philippines, a lovely young woman named Pura, so her voice lessons could continue. She was not especially gifted but she loved to sing – and I can still remember how she would react to just about any new piece of music I would play for her in our lessons. “That’s so BEAUTIFUL!” she would exult with that lovely accent of hers. . . and little by little, in working with Pura, I developed some skills in listening carefully to the female voice and discerning how good singing could be improved. And working with someone for whom English was a second language deepened the challenge a bit because I couldn’t just trot out the familiar phrases of my own teachers (like Mr. Greedy’s “let the breath do it” or Cherie Carl’s “think dumb and think snarl.”) I had to get creative and find ways to talk about tone and placement and support that would make some sense to her – and I couldn’t have done too awful a job because she kept coming and kept smiling. And seeing her improve over time and sensing the great pleasure these lessons gave her was my first inkling of how fully satisfying teaching voice could be. It was not just something singers did when they didn’t quite manage to get their name in lights. It can be its own adventure and its own delight.
Anyway, Rita is already a fine teacher – working so supportively and perceptively with her young charges, giving them helpful and clear suggestion linked with affirming words of affirmation. Each and every one of her singers took their place at the front of the room with a look of complete confidence – and sang with a real sense of pleasure. Not a single singer gave off the all-too-common vibe of “I would gladly dive fully clothed into a giant vat of rancid salad dressing rather than be up here singing this stupid song for this stupid recital.” They seemed delighted to be part of it – and seemed to think of themselves as singers. And it was fun both during and after to see Rita’s evident pleasure and pride as her singers (and pianists) one after another did so well. . . even her little third grader, who sang a pretty darn good rendition of “Over the Rainbow.”
Polly attended the recital and it was fun from time to time to glance out in the audience and see her smiling face. It had to give her tremendous pleasure to see a former student becoming a fine young teacher and knowing that she had something to do with that. I had a similar sensation when I went down to Montini High School last winter and worked with the choir of Paul Marchese, a former student of mine at Carthage – who led his choir rehearsals in a fast-paced, humor-laden, heartfelt fashion reminiscent of my own style. If there’s anything that equals the pleasure of making beautiful music yourself, it is in seeing your own students making beautiful music- and especially in seeing your students become teachers themselves helping their students to make beautiful music. I know I’m not exactly a paragon of clarity at the moment, but I mean every word.
pictured: Rita’s third grade student about to rehearse “Over the Rainbow” the night before the recital – with another student in the background – as well as her grandmother just barely in view, sitting out in the living room. (I asked her if I could take her picture.) I love how you can barely even see her over the pile of books – but boy she sings out pretty fearlessly.