Christmas markets around the globe...

Hello all! Chad and I just got back from a whirlwind trip to NYC and are hoping to not feel the effects of jet lag too badly, since we were only there for 4 nights! I went to have lessons with my voice teacher, and was lucky enough that Chad felt like joining me. We haven't gotten too much time together in NYC since we lived there, so it was great to visit some of our old haunts. We didn't get to see too many friends since it was such a short trip and we didn't want to wear ourselves out (well, especially me, since I am in the middle of shows!) so if you're reading this and you're in New York and we didn't contact you: we're sorry!! But my voice lessons were great and we had no travel problems so all in all it was a great trip! We also got to stay at Chad's aunt and uncle's place again, which is always wonderful.

We found a little piece of Germany in New Jersey! I'm sure Chad was tempted to buy this, since we haven't even had Stollen in Germany yet this season!

Apparently German things are really "in" right now in New Jersey. The little blue flags are for Munich's Hofbräuhaus beer. 

It's always fun looking at all the decorations up for Christmas in NYC. This is the lobby of the Shops at Columbus Circle, and if you look through the windows, you can see an outdoor Christmas market set up!

Standing outside in New Jersey with a view of lower Manhattan behind us. The big skyscraper is One World Trade Center. 

To help us stay awake today, we met with our friends Barb and Michael at the Weihnachtsmarkt. Today instead of drinking Glühwein, we had some Feuerzangenbowle, which we've talked about in previous years. We even have our own set to make it at home! 

Before I end this blog post, I should mention some rather exciting news. In April of 2013 I was part of a project that culminated in the first full recording of Milhaud's L'Orestie d'Eschyle and that recording was just nominated for a Grammy! The awards ceremony is on my birthday, so maybe I'll get a really good present this year! 

Well, one week from today, Chad's parents will be joining us in Germany for Christmas, so we look forward to sharing all the fun we have with them! Have a great week!

Brenda on the radio tomorrow!

Hi all! I'm sorry I forgot to mention this earlier, but Brenda's first performance of La Sonnambula, which was recorded on November 30th, will be broadcast on the radio tomorrow (Hessischer Rundfunk) at 8:05 PM German time (1:05 PM US Central). If you'd care to tune in, you can find more information on the Hessischer Rundfunk website, although it's in German. I'm sure all you need to do is follow the link and click "Livestream" at the appropriate time. Enjoy!

that sleepwalker can sing

Hey all! Let's get right down to it. Brenda's opera opened on Sunday and she was fantastic. I know I always say that, but it is no less true this time. In fact, she was exceptionally fantastic on Sunday, and based on their deafening applause, the other fourteen hundred people in the audience agreed with me. The critics also agree, but don't tell Brenda. She has no interest in reading reviews or hearing about them until after her performances are over. Her next performance is tomorrow night in case you want to come check it out.

As I mentioned in our last blog entry, the Weihnachtsmarkt opened last week and I've already been a few times. The first time was with a few classmates who had never been there before. I enjoyed showing them the shops and telling them about the various holiday foods. Brenda and I went again today and met up with a friend. As we were leaving it started to snow, which was somewhat unexpected because it hasn't been that cold lately. I'll be headed back to the market again tomorrow because my German class is going on a field trip. You might think that I'd get sick of going, but I'm not too worried about that happening. I have an exceptional amount of Christmas cheer.

Brenda at the Weihnachtsmarkt yesterday enjoying her first cup of Glühwein this year.

After telling you about how much I've been standing out in the cold lately, it may not come as a surprise to you that I've come down with a cold. Shortly after Brenda started feeling normal again, I started sniffling. I'm not saying that she gave me her cold, but I kind of hope that she did so I can't get her sick. This role she's singing at the moment isn't the easiest part to sing, and I'm sure Brenda doesn't want to cancel a performance almost as much as the opera house doesn't want her to.

To cure my illness, Brenda is currently making a delicious smelling soup. I'd better go see if I can lend a hand. I hope you're all having a wonderful week, and we'll talk to you next Tuesday!

Christmas Market Eve

Happy Thanksgiving! I know I'm a couple of days early, but that's how it is for us this year. Brenda's show opens on Sunday, which means that she has a lot of rehearsals this week and no time for a celebratory dinner on Thursday. (We're working on convincing Germany to add Thanksgiving to its list of holidays, but that will take some time.) We celebrated this past Sunday instead with our friends Barb and Michael. Brenda prepared an amazing vegan dinner that was very German. We had fresh pretzels, cooked red cabbage, Brussels sprouts, potato dumplings, a veggie-friendly beef roulade and beer-flavored gravy. For dessert we enjoyed some soy ice cream with candied almonds and walnuts. And to make the evening even more authentically German, Brenda wore her dirndl and I wore my lederhosen. It was a fun night.

Brenda caught a cold a couple of weeks ago and has been having trouble shaking it. With her first performance coming up on Sunday, she decided a trip to the doctor was in order. It turns out that her cold is actually a sinus infection. The doctor prescribed some antibiotics and told her that she should be feeling better soon. My guess is that it's easier to sing the title role in La Sonnambula when you're healthy, so feel free to send healing vibes this way.

In case you're looking for a stocking stuffer, a new recording of the opera Ariadne auf Naxos was just released with Brenda singing the role of Zerbinetta. As far as I can tell, it's currently only available on the Oehms Classics website and in Oper Frankfurt's lobby during performances, but I'm sure you'll be able to buy it on Amazon and iTunes soon enough. I was lucky enough to hear a rough copy of the recording, and I can tell you that Brenda sounds fantastic.

Even though I'm holding a copy in my hand in this picture, we still haven't gotten our copy yet. I can't wait to listen to it!

In other news, I've been busy with my language classes and they're going well. I keep making mistakes so apparently I need to keep going to class. I'm meeting up with a few of my classmates before class tomorrow so we can take a class trip through the Christmas Market (tomorrow is the first day!).

I should call it a night. I hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving, and I'll talk to you next week!

a long way from home

Good morning! Huh, it's strange to write "good morning" in a blog entry because I normally don't work on the blog until after dark. Lucky for me it's been so cloudy these past couple of weeks that it feels like evening almost all the time. But I'm not complaining! I wouldn't dare, considering the fall that some of you in the U.S. are having. There's a time and place for freezing cold weather and snow, and the middle of November isn't it. I hope you're all keeping warm.

My German class started yesterday and I really enjoyed it. There were around twelve of us from countries all over the world (e.g. Morocco, Columbia, Korea, Taiwan, Ukraine, Spain, Iran), but I'm the only one from the U.S. I also seem to be the only one older than 26 (the average age appears to be 20), but I'm used to that from law school. What really amazed me was that most of my fellow students moved to Frankfurt within the past few weeks. The guy sitting next to me arrived on Sunday! Many of them studied German in their home countries so they could enroll at a German university. 

I'm really impressed by my classmates' courage in moving to a foreign country, especially one that is so far away from most of their home countries. We did an exercise in class that really illustrated how isolated many of my classmates are. One of the main topics yesterday was learning how to discuss relationships in German. The teacher had us do an activity where we walked around to other students and asked them a few questions including "How many friends do you meet up with regularly?" Most of the students I talked to said "none" because they don't have any friends in Germany yet. I'm sure that will change quickly, but until it does I can only imagine how lonely they must feel. 

My German class is held in this rather stately looking building.

I have class everyday in the mid-to-late afternoon, which means that I'm busy when Brenda is usually on break from rehearsal. Fortunately, we won't have to keep up this schedule for long. After Brenda's show opens in a little less than two weeks she'll have a lot more free time, although she'll be busy learning her next role. By the way, her rehearsals seem to be going well. I'm very excited for the first performance.

So that's what we've been up to. I hope you're all having a great week, and we'll talk to you next Tuesday!

let's ramp up the Deutsch

Hey all! Remember last week when I mentioned that Brenda was going to have to work for three weeks straight without a day off? Well, good news (sorta). With the exception of a costume fitting, Brenda didn't have to go to work on Friday or Saturday. That worked out pretty well actually, because Brenda caught a cold last week and needed the time off to recover. What didn't work out so well is that Brenda had a performance of Die Frau ohne Schatten on Thursday and one on Sunday, but she managed to get through both performances without a problem. Her cold continues to linger as colds often do.

I've been keeping myself busy lately by working on my German. I'm still enrolled in an online class and have also started meeting with two of our German friends weekly to practice my spoken German. In fact, we met yesterday and had a lot of fun, or at least I did. I'm hoping they don't find speaking to me in German to be too tiresome. I can imagine that a person can only endure so much mutilation of his or her native language before it becomes unbearable. To further improve my language skills I'm starting an intensive five-week German class next week. We'll meet Monday through Friday for a few hours each day. I'm operating under the assumption that if I throw enough German at my brain some of it will stick. I'll let you know if it does.

When I walked past Frankfurt's city hall (Rathaus) the other day, I saw that they already had the big Christmas tree up. In spite of that giant harbinger of Christmas, Brenda says it's still too early to listen to crooner Christmas albums. Bah humbug.

And since we're on the topic of Christmas, Brenda and I bought our Advent calendar today. We chose a calendar filled with marzipan, which will taunt us for the next three weeks until we can finally start opening it.

So that's what we've been up to. I hope you're all having a great week, and we'll talk to you next Tuesday!

finding the right balance

Hey all! I hope you had a nice Halloween. We decided to celebrate the holiday by watching a movie on Netflix which, by the way, just started offering its streaming services in Germany in September. It wasn't a scary movie because, well, I'm a bit of a wimp, but it was still Halloweeny. Much to my surprise, Brenda and I saw several people around town also getting into the holiday spirit. There were real live trick or treaters ringing a doorbell just a few blocks from our apartment building, and Brenda saw kids in costume on the subway. It looks like Halloween is starting to take hold in Germany.

With Halloween behind us, Christmas is up next (unless Thanksgiving starts to catch on, but that seems unlikely). Of course, stores are already selling stollen, advent calendars, and Christmas decorations, but the Christmas markets are still a few weeks away. The other day, however, Brenda and I were able to enjoy a little preview of what's to come. We went for a walk around Frankfurt and came across a stand that was selling Glühwein, bratwurst and french fries (aka the three German Christmas food groups). It wasn't terribly cold outside (Germany had its third warmest October in over a century this year), but the Glühwein still tasted as good as it did last year.

 You'll probably see more pictures like this one next month.

 Since we're on the topic of food, I thought I'd share pictures of a dinner Brenda made a few nights ago. Our main course was a delicious pastry dough filled with roasted mixed vegetables and feta.

As a side dish we had minty mushy peas, which were really tasty.

Lest you think we're eating too well, Brenda and I have been jogging regularly to balance out our caloric intake. The city forest is still our favorite jogging spot.

In other news, Brenda has been rehearsing a lot. She had the day off on Sunday, and she really enjoyed it. Good thing because she probably won't get another one for three more weeks. Speaking of which, Brenda is about to leave for rehearsal now, and I'd better say goodbye. I hope you all have a wonderful week, and we'll talk to you next Tuesday! 

P.S. Happy Birthday, Jim!