vote for Brenda

Hey all! We're in Munich, and Brenda is getting ready to make her role debut as the Queen of the Night in Mozart's Die Zauberflöte tomorrow night. Brenda had her first and last day of rehearsal today, which is a short rehearsal period even for her. If I remember correctly, she sang the title role in Lucia di Lammeroor for the first time with just five days of rehearsal, but that is a much longer role. The Queen only has two (very challenging) arias, a quintet, and several lines of dialogue. The performances are close together by opera standards (four in eight days), and after the last one we'll head back to Frankfurt for a brief stay before flying to the U.S.

You may recall that Brenda sang the title role in Berg's Lulu at English National Opera earlier this fall. The performances went very well, and the website What'sOnStage nominated Brenda for "Breakthrough Artist in UK Opera" in its 2017 opera poll.  It appears that anyone can vote for the winner, so even if you didn't see Lulu (or any of the other operas that received nominations), you can still make your voice heard. If you'd like to cast a vote for Brenda, you can do so here. Voting closes at 11:59 PM (UK time presumably) on December 31, 2016.

In other news, I'm sick. It's been years since I've felt under the weather, and I'm being a big baby about it. Some hot tea sounds nice, so I think I'll play the sick card (again) and see if Brenda will go make me some. I hope you all have fun ringing in the new year, and we'll talk to you next week!