Singing Teaching in Paradise: A personally interesting and not to be repeated three weeks ! A new baby ! A Youth Opera first !

I apologise for the lack of posts over the last month but I have been somewhat preoccupied with a few health matters which kept me from teaching ! I am back now and in full swing, albeit working a slightly shorter week. Teaching singing is a very physical job - I find it tiring physically and mentally, and I imagine every teacher who is passionate about their subject or skill feels the same. So when I stop and take a rest I know it must be needed !

My lovely ladies have all taken to a lesson share scenario for which I am eternally grateful, and even though it means they only have a lesson every two weeks, they are coping with it with great fortitude ! They kindly inform me they would rather have a lesson every other week than none at all if I retired ! How pleasing, and to a degree, merciful is that attitude ?!

So this last week I taught only three days and felt absolutely fine by the end of my week, and ready to begin again tomorrow ! It also had a real positive in that this term's concert has been cancelled as well as a mini Song School, which means that it was new repertoire all round. Most of the music which pupils had been studying was for one or both of those happenings but if we kept on with the same songs and arias they would be very stale by February or March 2017 !

I gave out some fabulous music including Mimi's first aria from La Boheme which I love, the fantastic Deh per Questo from La Clemenza di Tito, an aria of lyricism, drama and so utterly Mozart it gave me real pleasure to use it once again. The beautiful Qui Respexit from Bach's B Minor Mass was also another exciting and challenging choice - and I trust all this fantastic music will keep my pupils firing on all cylinders for the rest of the term !

On top of these and other pieces, 10 of my pupils are taking exams on December 1st, and that simply has to go ahead - after all they are all entered and paid for ! Actually the exam session will be they only pressured moment in the term, and I am sure that will pose no problem to me or my recovering physique !

Very exciting however is the up coming performance of the first Inner Sound Youth Opera production. In February 2017 I intend to put on Benjamin Britten's children's opera 'The Little Sweep' ! These are the type of ventures I want to do, so pacing my normal teaching week more sensibly will allow room in my slightly curtailed working life for such delightful performances. More on this to follow !

Our past leading lady in Pirates and Patience, L, with her partner D have produced another Inner Sound grandchild ! What joy for us - a very pretty little boy, James born on Oct 19th, healthy and enjoying life with his doting parents !

So you can see, it has been a busy and 'interesting' few weeks for myself, my pupils and our loyal Paradise audience. My house is like a florists shop window, and my trips to the Co op are peppered with good wishes and lovely get well messages. What a place to live.......