In other news, now that my time with Finger Lakes Opera has ended I have begun my focus on Cosi fan tutte, which I will be performing in Detroit this September. I have learned all of the music and am in the throes of attempting to memorize an entire role for the first time. I took some advice from my friend and colleague, Gregory Kunde, and have made cue cards of my part. Already, this has been very helpful in getting some of the text down. I also have an upcoming audition in Pittsburgh and some other big pending news that I will have to wait until next month to unload on everyone.
Showing posts with label FLR. Show all posts
Showing posts with label FLR. Show all posts
Saturday, August 16, 2014
Level up!
I'm going to start this post with something I haven't really talked about in a while - language. Last night I was working at the hotel (my "rent" job) when a gentleman walked in looking for a room. I explained to him that we did not have any vacancies and he asked if I knew of any other places that did. As I was talking with him he asked me to speak slowly because he did not speak English very well. Being the naturally inquisitive person that I am, I asked him where he was from. Then it happened; he said he was from France. I immediately proceed without hesitation to speak to him in French while calling around to other hotels in the area looking for a room. Our conversation ran the gamut from talking about why he was in Rochester of all places, to me giving him directions, to finally talking about my career as an opera singer and me giving him my website. All in all we probably spent 20 minutes conversing solely in French! Those of you familiar with Moses McCormick would call this a "level up!" Towards the end of our conversation he gave me his card so that I could reserve a room for him at another hotel. I noticed he had an Italian last name and he told me that he is actually Italian, but lives in France. I proceeded to tell him that I speak Italian as well and we went on for another few minutes talking in both Italian and French. This is the reason why we learn languages: to communicate with people! As a singer, I obviously learn these languages so that I know what I am singing (which is another form of communicating), but in a larger sense it events like last night to happen. I have set aside working on my language studies for a while due to financial and personal obligations that force my hobbies to take a back burner, but things like last night really make me want to get back into my studies. Perhaps in the next few months I can get back to it.
Friday, February 18, 2011
العربية الأسبوع ٧
This week I have continued my FLR work and am pleased with what has come of it. I do not know how much I am necessarily retaining of my reading, I think that aspect of the work manifests itself most during my writing exercises at the end of the week. I do know however, that my listening and vocabulary seem to be becoming strong as the time progresses. With both, I add one unit's worth of exercises per week. While this leads to a smaller vocabulary, I find that the words I do add implant themselves better in my brain with the time allowed to focus specifically on them.
I have decided to focus on small things vocally. By this, I mean that I am taking single exercises and continually doing them until I achieve a desired result and then moving on. Sometimes this only takes a couple of repetitions, other times it takes 5 or 10 minutes worth of work. The benefits of this however are noticeable even the next day. For example, since my lesson three weeks ago I have been working with the [ð] occlusive in my exercise regimen. I perform a 5-note scale beginning with [ð] and moving to [i] ascending to the fifth and then descending back to the root. I tend to struggle with not cracking, or slipping, at around A above middle C. So, I will continue to do this scale starting on the D above middle, refining and honing in on the correct sound and sensation, until the note no longer slips. Upon achieving this I move up by half-steps until about C5, the tenor's high C. I am currently relatively consistent in this exercise on the A now and have moved on to B-flat and B as my main focus.
I have also noticed the importance of rest in the voice building process. On average I vocalize about five days a week. During this time I make progress daily, however my largest progress always comes after those couple of days of rest. I think that this fact proves that training a voice is a muscular activity. When training any muscle, the growth does not come during the exercise itself, but during the rest period when the muscles can rebuild and adapt to the new standards being required of them. This is why and good exercise program should require rest periods. Even in running and other cardiovascular activities, at least one day of rest is prescribed. As the weeks go by, I continue to grow towards my ultimate goal of being the best singer possible. Knowing that this process is a muscular one enables me to find satisfaction in the gradualness, but consistency of growth.
Methodology Minute - Trust Your Intuition
In most areas of intelligence, our intuition leads to more results than anything else. Unfortunately, most of us do not trust our intuition, especially in areas that we do not consider ourselves experts. A quick example: When I speak to my friends in either French or Italian I generally come to a point where I want to say something, but do not necessarily know for certain what the correct word is. During these times, I occasionally have words pop into my head from seemingly out of nowhere. If I am comfortable with the people I am speaking with, I will tentatively try out the word in my head, usually with a positive affirmation of my offering. I always check my thoughts after the fact if I am by myself practicing, but the percentage of time that I am correct is far greater than the times I am wrong.
If we have done enough work in a subject area (in languages this equates to input and building a passive vocabulary) eventually and inevitably this passive knowledge will become active when the opportunity presents itself. My encouragement this week is to trust that little voice in your head. Often it will be correct.
I have decided to focus on small things vocally. By this, I mean that I am taking single exercises and continually doing them until I achieve a desired result and then moving on. Sometimes this only takes a couple of repetitions, other times it takes 5 or 10 minutes worth of work. The benefits of this however are noticeable even the next day. For example, since my lesson three weeks ago I have been working with the [ð] occlusive in my exercise regimen. I perform a 5-note scale beginning with [ð] and moving to [i] ascending to the fifth and then descending back to the root. I tend to struggle with not cracking, or slipping, at around A above middle C. So, I will continue to do this scale starting on the D above middle, refining and honing in on the correct sound and sensation, until the note no longer slips. Upon achieving this I move up by half-steps until about C5, the tenor's high C. I am currently relatively consistent in this exercise on the A now and have moved on to B-flat and B as my main focus.
I have also noticed the importance of rest in the voice building process. On average I vocalize about five days a week. During this time I make progress daily, however my largest progress always comes after those couple of days of rest. I think that this fact proves that training a voice is a muscular activity. When training any muscle, the growth does not come during the exercise itself, but during the rest period when the muscles can rebuild and adapt to the new standards being required of them. This is why and good exercise program should require rest periods. Even in running and other cardiovascular activities, at least one day of rest is prescribed. As the weeks go by, I continue to grow towards my ultimate goal of being the best singer possible. Knowing that this process is a muscular one enables me to find satisfaction in the gradualness, but consistency of growth.
Methodology Minute - Trust Your Intuition
In most areas of intelligence, our intuition leads to more results than anything else. Unfortunately, most of us do not trust our intuition, especially in areas that we do not consider ourselves experts. A quick example: When I speak to my friends in either French or Italian I generally come to a point where I want to say something, but do not necessarily know for certain what the correct word is. During these times, I occasionally have words pop into my head from seemingly out of nowhere. If I am comfortable with the people I am speaking with, I will tentatively try out the word in my head, usually with a positive affirmation of my offering. I always check my thoughts after the fact if I am by myself practicing, but the percentage of time that I am correct is far greater than the times I am wrong.
If we have done enough work in a subject area (in languages this equates to input and building a passive vocabulary) eventually and inevitably this passive knowledge will become active when the opportunity presents itself. My encouragement this week is to trust that little voice in your head. Often it will be correct.
Friday, February 11, 2011
العربية- الأسبوع ٦
This has been a decent week for my Arabic studies. I began a new approach this week which was developed by Moses McCormick. I modified this a little bit, which is probably slightly to my detriment, but I skipped over the first couple of phases of the method and went straight to the textbook work. Moses has put out a number of videos on youtube highlighting his skills as well as his method. I have noticed a lot of progress this week, which I am not sure whether to attribute this to the FLR method of Moses or, more likely to the amount of time put in, which I will discuss in my methodology minute this week.
I have been continuing to have wonderful progress vocally. I had a realization this week that I had not been practicing as effectively as I could be. So, I have modified my approach to practicing so that I can be more intensive in my work, which should compound my achievements.
Methodology Minute - The Power of Patience and Perseverance
I had a few interesting things happen this week which solidify for me the concepts of patience and perseverance. First, while I was working through my Anki deck this week, I had a day where all of a sudden I simply knew all of my cards. Additionally, I was watching some Arabic TV the other day and suddenly I was able to pick out words here and there that I knew, I had come out of the fog. Thirdly, I have noticed that I have started to think and play around with the Arabic that I have learned thus far, enabling me to actually greet people and have some very basic conversation. My theory is that all of this corresponds directly with the amount of time I have put in up to this point. In the next couple of days, I will cross the forty hour mark in my studies. I believe that this is an important number in which things start to solidify in the brain and become more concrete. I have had similar things happen vocally, where I try to approach a specific pitch, or a specific phrase multiple times and then suddenly the phrase or pitch falls into place. I believe that there are specific numbers of hours, or minutes, which mark points of achievement in almost all aspects of skill acquisition.
There are many linguists who maintain that the key to learning is to put time in every day, no matter how much. I would venture to apply this to all areas of skill acquisition. Learning compounds over time and in areas such as language acquisition the time spent is more important than the method used. In areas where technique is important, it is only with time that the technique becomes ingrained. It should be the goal of anyone who is learning a skill to spend at a minimum fifteen minutes a day working on their skill. As I said above, I believe that there are specific times associated with milestones; so the more time put in daily, the quicker these milestones will occur.
The second half of this minute I need to spend on perseverance. For the last few weeks I had been struggling and frustrated with my lack of progress in Arabic. Similarly during my six months without a voice lesson, I was continually frustrated by what seemed like a lack of progress. However, by pushing through these times, I am now making large strides in both fields and have a renewed vigor in my studies. All things in life work in cycles. There is a business cycle, a geological cycle, and a motivation cycle. Many people get hung up when they reach the valleys of their motivational cycles and never progress past their initial motivational peak. However, if one can push through the valleys of frustration there are greater rewards in your next peak than what you found initially.
Steven Kaufmann of lingq has been making a series of videos on the 7 steps of a successful language learner on youtube and I felt that it would be of value to post a couple of them here which pertain to this methodology minute for perusal:
This first video of the series focuses on the topic of spending the time to learn. Continual work will lead to mastery.
The fifth video in the series advises the learner to be patient; contrary to our instant gratification culture, anything of quality takes time and effort.
I have been continuing to have wonderful progress vocally. I had a realization this week that I had not been practicing as effectively as I could be. So, I have modified my approach to practicing so that I can be more intensive in my work, which should compound my achievements.
Methodology Minute - The Power of Patience and Perseverance
I had a few interesting things happen this week which solidify for me the concepts of patience and perseverance. First, while I was working through my Anki deck this week, I had a day where all of a sudden I simply knew all of my cards. Additionally, I was watching some Arabic TV the other day and suddenly I was able to pick out words here and there that I knew, I had come out of the fog. Thirdly, I have noticed that I have started to think and play around with the Arabic that I have learned thus far, enabling me to actually greet people and have some very basic conversation. My theory is that all of this corresponds directly with the amount of time I have put in up to this point. In the next couple of days, I will cross the forty hour mark in my studies. I believe that this is an important number in which things start to solidify in the brain and become more concrete. I have had similar things happen vocally, where I try to approach a specific pitch, or a specific phrase multiple times and then suddenly the phrase or pitch falls into place. I believe that there are specific numbers of hours, or minutes, which mark points of achievement in almost all aspects of skill acquisition.
There are many linguists who maintain that the key to learning is to put time in every day, no matter how much. I would venture to apply this to all areas of skill acquisition. Learning compounds over time and in areas such as language acquisition the time spent is more important than the method used. In areas where technique is important, it is only with time that the technique becomes ingrained. It should be the goal of anyone who is learning a skill to spend at a minimum fifteen minutes a day working on their skill. As I said above, I believe that there are specific times associated with milestones; so the more time put in daily, the quicker these milestones will occur.
The second half of this minute I need to spend on perseverance. For the last few weeks I had been struggling and frustrated with my lack of progress in Arabic. Similarly during my six months without a voice lesson, I was continually frustrated by what seemed like a lack of progress. However, by pushing through these times, I am now making large strides in both fields and have a renewed vigor in my studies. All things in life work in cycles. There is a business cycle, a geological cycle, and a motivation cycle. Many people get hung up when they reach the valleys of their motivational cycles and never progress past their initial motivational peak. However, if one can push through the valleys of frustration there are greater rewards in your next peak than what you found initially.
Steven Kaufmann of lingq has been making a series of videos on the 7 steps of a successful language learner on youtube and I felt that it would be of value to post a couple of them here which pertain to this methodology minute for perusal:
This first video of the series focuses on the topic of spending the time to learn. Continual work will lead to mastery.
The fifth video in the series advises the learner to be patient; contrary to our instant gratification culture, anything of quality takes time and effort.
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