Last year, Mrs. Card was kind of a shock. I sang "Ein Mädchen oder Weibchen" from Mozart's Die Zauberflöte, and she told me that my German diction was not up to par and that I needed to work on my acting. I was a little surprised, not because of the feedback she gave, but mostly because of the way in which it was delivered. Mrs. Card is very blunt, and she will not sugar coat anything for you. This year, I made sure to remind myself of her personality before going into the mock audition so that I wouldn't be so surprised again.
Now, I don't want to give the impression that Mrs. Card is rude or mean, because she isn't that way at all. She is actually a very kind person. What I'm trying to say is that she is very up front about what she doesn't like about your performance, and that is because her goal is to make your audition etiquette better, and she is a very great instructor. She just tells it how it is, and I really admire that.
This year, I sang "Madamina, il catalogo è questo" from Mozart's Don Giovanni. I felt pretty good about my performance, but also felt that it could have gone better. However, when I walked into my one-on-one with her afterwards, I was shocked again by her response. She gave me a hug and told me that I did wonderfully! She did give me a few notes that I hadn't thought about before, and I will work on those things for the masterclass, but she told me that it was very apparent that I had been working really hard all year. I couldn't be happier with the way my audition worked out! It was a pretty fantastic morning.
That evening, we had rehearsals for our sextet from Cosi fan Tutte, which went remarkably well. The girl who was supposed to be our Despina couldn't get a visa in time for the program, so Professor Stone and Alejandro had to cast another girl, Ellen, into the role the night before. Ellen did a really fantastic job at that rehearsal, having only been given the music a few hours before. Since it was the first time any of us (including the pianist) had run through it together, it was a little bit rough; I'm sure that it will be fantastic, though. Alejandro is a great conductor, and he knows exactly what he wants and expects from us, so we will be fine.
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Today we started our Italian lessons with Scuola Italia, and then rehearsed in the afternoon. My schedule today is very light, and I don't have to be in rehearsal until around 8:15, so I did some grocery shopping and now I'm at the house resting for a while. We're rehearsing our three Verdi opera choruses tonight. We'll see how that goes!
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