Olga Makarina Interview

Classical Domain:  We are recording our conversation in a restaurant and to test the background noise level I recorded myself when I arrived, I just played it back and I was reminded that I don't like the sound of my own voice on tape.

Do you like hearing your recorded voice?

Olga Makarina: I hate hearing my voice, specially my speaking voice. I had a program on the radio in Russia where we talked about opera. We talked about opera as entertainment, sophisticated entertainment, but entertainment, a fantasy world. My speaking voice is breathy, I didn't like the sound of it on tape, I think it sounds ugly. It took time for me to get used to it. But the funny thing is that people would call in the station and say that they liked to sound of my voice, of course maybe they just liked the topics.

CD:   What about CDs, you have three recordings out now, what is it like listening to those?

OM:   It varies, I try not to listen too much during the process. During editing sessions the recording sounds so different from the way I hear the performance. In a way it's like a curse — you can never hear what you are doing. The performance is exciting, people are cheering and you can't really hear what's going on.

I don't think you can ever really know what you sound like. So many different things can happen acoustically in the house. There is the volume of the orchestra, the overtones and the blending with the singers, their projection, the house itself, is it acoustically “dry” and so on. So many different things affect the way you hear a performance and really when you are in the middle of it — what can you hear?

With a recording it all comes down to the microphone. I have a very high voice so there are many overtones that the microphones can't capture. All those microtones, so certainly, it's still different.

So when I get the CD there are times when I like it and there are times when I know the process doesn't really capture my voice.

CD:   And of course among all the other variables is playback, it could be in the car, or on a $50,000 stereo system.

OM:   Sometimes it seems like it depends on the day, people say a recording is incredible, some people hate it. Even for Pavarotti, for me I think he reaches absolute perfection, real beauty, but some people hated his voice.

CD:   Callas, there's some one who polarizes listeners. Some people love the drama the substance in her voice, other feel that there is a substance keeping out a beautiful sound.

OM:   What she does in terms of style and drama is incredible, some of the negative things people point out do not bother me. On the other hand, there are those singers who are very dramatic, but whose voice has no beauty at all.

CD:   So along these lines, when did you first think about singing opera?

OM:    In Russia it was fashionable to teach music to children. So I studied the piano since I was very young at a special music school. There we all had to take chorus, I loved being in the chorus. Being in the chorus meant that we had to take one voice lesson once a week, so I learned the basics of singing. I decided to study the piano, again I took chorus, by this time I was singing pop and jazz in groups, but working with the choral conductor was an incredible culture shock — and then when you sing Bach, that's it, it's like a disease.

I switched after my first year to study voice.

CD:   Was this in St. Petersburg?

OM:   No, this was still in my hometown of Archangel. Very far North, close to Finland.

CD:   What was the change like going from pop to formal vocal studies?

OM:   First of all, with pop and jazz, you rely a lot on the microphone. You use the breath and tone of your voice differently. In the classical voice you have to produce everything inside. The voice has to be pure and strong, there is no microphone.

You have to lean how to breathe, because only air will produce the sound you want. You train, not so differently from an athlete. You train your muscles.

CD:   Beside the technical aspects, and not dissimilar to your pop life, you have to learn what makes the music work.

OM:   I think people forget that singers are musicians too, really it's the first thing we need to be. We learn different styles we learn to make decisions — vocally there are things we can allow ourselves to do, but you have to know the score and the composer's instructions, like any musician.

CD:   You have been praised a lot for your technique and your musicality, is it an innate feeling or is it a result of concentration or a close reading of the score?

OM:   I teach a lot, I teach master classes all over the world, and I find people sing will sing the same notes in many different ways, not just loud or soft, they do what ever they want. But it's not the music, it's not really what the composer wants. If you just follow the composer's directions first then you will see that it will create a character right there. It will answer the questions, not the least of which is forte and piano.

Another thing, the words. In the theater, we don't speak all the languages, at the MET we are particularly lucky because we have native speaking coaches. So if you don't speak Italian the can show you the how to give meaning to the words. They can show you what is important in a phrase, what to emphasis: you say “oh my god” and they will show where the emphasis is on “oh mio dio.” That way you can translate your feelings into that language, once you understand that you can go further with your approach to the role. Technique and interpretation go together.

CD:   I presume that's how you decide on embellishments....

OM:   Absolutely, embellishments are a matter of understanding as well. Embellishments for Bellini cannot be used for Mozart, it's a different diction. Mozart's is a Viennese classical style, the structure is more conservative. In Bellini it's a little more expected, the cabaletto goes twice and the second time you just go for it. Singers can go overboard, they do so much that it harms the original intention.

CD:   We have the beginning, when did you come to New York?

OM:   It's funny now, but at the time it wasn't. My husband and I were “fresh” immigrants, we did “the route,” 10 days in Austria and then half a year in Italy.

CD:   First you had graduated from St. Petersburg Academy in voice and piano?

OM:   Yes I graduated and we left that same month. When we reached New York. I did not speak English and we did not know what to do. People told us that the MET has free, open auditions every week you have to go and somebody there will tell you what to do.

We did not have any money. For the audition I found out that you needed a pianist and a picture. I didn't know anything about these pictures so I went to a place that does passport photos. Now the cost, around $6.00, was a huge amount of money for me.

In the building where we lived there was a woman who played the piano, she had an incredible family, but she was a little... well... seriously mentally challenged. So she played for me and we went to do the audition at the MET. I did Violetta's first act aria from La Traviata — but I did it in Russian, I was singing and turning the pages for the pianist, she didn't know when to turn the pages, she couldn't really play. I had to do the audition because I needed the advice.

Can you image what it music have looked like — coming in with this horrible picture, a pianist who can not play and I'm singing and turning her pages — holding an e flat at the top!

CD:   Did they say anything after the audition"?

OM:   No, they never do, it was just “Thank you very much” I spent weeks checking the mailbox... We stopped telling people we were musicians because they said we’d never find work.

Months later we met some “fresh people,” some new arrivals. We started talking and we asked them what they did, they said they were musicians, and we said we are too! We started talking, the husband of the couple had an aunt owned a store, and grocery store, and she had a customer who had a piano store, and he had a customer who as Alexander Rohmer who was then a coach at the MET.

Now in America no one will give you someone else's phone number, but I had been in the country for months and through this chain I got his phone number. Now I did not have any permission to call, but I was desperate.  I was told that he was always out of the house working or on tour, but I called and he was home. So I said I'm so sorry to bother you, this is my name and I would like to know if you could recommend something that might help me. He said that he could not recommend anything since he did not know me and he has never heard me.

I said please could you hear me? So he agreed and he put off our meeting several times, I guess he was stalling hoping I'd go away, but finally three of four months later I went to his house.

We spent a couple of hours, and sang through everything. He said you need to go to college here. I said to learn English? He said No — he took my hand and we went to Mannes School of Music. He said, “I'm from the MET and this is Olga Makarina, she doesn't speak any English but she is a good singer and she wants to study here.”

They looked at me and they said, OK, we need an audition. They called somebody from the extension division, I did not know what the extension division was so I said OK, and I sang, they said no, I was too advanced for the division.  So then I sang for the college division, they said no, you're too advanced.   Then I sang for the Masters program — they accepted me, and gave me a full scholarship. A year later they paid for master classes with Giuseppe di Stefano in Italy.

They did so much for me, all during this time I didn't have any money. I remember when I was studying, the subway was one dollar and I won't have enough money to buy two tokens. I'd have to call in and say I was sick because I was so embarrassed. In Italy they paid for the lessons plus room and board.

CD:   What was different about the training you had in the west?

OM:   When I was studying In Russia they would tell me that my voice is too small and I would never sing in Opera, but look where I was, in Russia they had huge voices.

When I sang for Giuseppe di Stefano an aria from I Piritani, I didn't know what it was, I just knew it was a beautiful tune. But he told me I was born to sing bel canto.  I don't know how and I don't know why, but he sensed it.

CD:    I think how is a really good question.

OM:   I remember in the beginning they would give me the Snow Maiden and some other Russian arias, but I didn't sound Russian (not “Russian” the way they thought was “Russian”) they did not know what to do with me.

In Russia I sang Mozart and Bach — so they put me in Mozart and Bach. When I came back from Italy I began studying more bel canto.

I grew up during the cold war and I was taught that people in America were very angry and selfish. When I came here so many people helped me.

CD:   So how did you make the transition to the professional ranks?

OM:   I won the Musicians Emergency Fund Auditions, a singing contest at Alice Tully Hall. Right after that I received a call from The New York City Opera asking me if I would like to audition? I said of course, I sang one aria from Semiramide, Usually at a City Opera audition they ask you to sing a second aria. for me they just said “Thank you very much.” I was very upset, why didn't they ask me to do anything else?

So what happened was, right after the audition they called my agent and said that they would like to do a production for me, so they revived their Lucia di Lammermoor production for me the following season.

CD:   Your first time on stage?

OM:   My first opera

CD:   And you started as Lucia, well good...

OM:   It's a good thing that I didn’t know it was so difficult, they said she sings bel canto she can be Lucia, I said OK.

CD:   This season at the Met your singing Elettra, in Mozart's Idomeneo, I suppose one of the joys of your repertoire is that you get to play a lot of crazy, spurned or otherwise mistreated women, so Elettra fits right in.

OM:   Yes, but Elettra is not crazy, she is mean. This is a part where you can get your frustrations out in the character. I mean, you can give out every thing you feel, the more you give out the better.

Elettra is multi-dimensional, In the stage direction for Idomeneo Elettra collapses and dies at the end of the opera because she looses out on snaring Idamante — but I get so many compliments expressing sympathy, I think it is a little misplaced. The music is beautiful, but she is mean, she may exhibit a nice side, but she's a spoiled princess.

She is nice because earlier in the opera everything is going her way. She's getting her man, she's going home, she had money and attention — and she has beautiful music.

For this role, I remember something I was taught a long time ago. Don't be afraid to be ugly, vocally, don't always think about making that beautiful sound

When your angry you don't produce a beautiful sound, the challenge is how to do that so it carries in a theater and fits the style of the opera.

When you sing Lucia it's always beautiful it's always heartbreaking, she's going crazy but it's so beautiful. With Elettra there is more freedom, more range of possibilities to treat the character.

CD:   Is this the first time you’ve worked with Levine?

OM:   I first worked with Levine in a production of Ravel's L'Enfant et les sortileges (Ms. Makarina’s Metropolitan Opera debut in the 2001-2002 season). At the first rehearsal usually the conductor will go through the notes and make a comment or a conductor will tell you what he wants. With Levine, the first thing he said to me was “Do you have any requests for me? Are you having any trouble, do you need my help in any way?” You can imagine I was stunned, I'd never heard this from a conductor.

In the Ravel the orchestration is very loud and complex. At the piano it's easy to hear that when a note changes, the harmony changes — these are your cues — But on the stage there, and we are on the side of the stage, there orchestra is so big that it is difficult to hear when those changes happen. I had four cues, but the changes musically are little changes, but it was important for me to know the exact timing since those were my cues. So I asked him if he could indicate when the changes happen because it was difficult for me to hear them. We had seven or eight performances and at every one when that section came Levine gave me a subtle gesture to indicate the changes in the orchestra, he never forgot.

He is very conscientious, he knows what he wants to hear. For instance, he will say “I want your voice to float a little more here.” He may feel we have pushed our voice a little bit, but he would never say this. He is very gentle with his comments.

Yesterday, in rehearsal, even though we have started performances, Levine wanted to make a change, he said “look at me,” he got my attention and we went a little faster and it worked. It worked better for me, and for the scene. He commands the show, but at the same time he follows your needs, if he feels it works.

CD:   Your coming back to the MET for two more roles, later in the season, in shorter runs. After that what else do you want to do that you haven't done.

OM:   First more Mozart. I'd like to sing the Contessa in the Marriage of Figaro I have recorded the arias, but I've never done it on stage. There are so many ways to play the character. Donna Elvira and Donna Anna in Don Giovanni. I have done the part, and I want to do it again: Desdemona in Verdi's Otello, I know people give me a look when I say that, but I did it and I was very convincing.

Voices change, they mature, in Italy they think I am too dramatic for some roles now, they don't think I am right for Gilda in Rigoletto anymore.

CD:   You are identified with Lucia, would you ever think about becoming, later in your career, like one of those Broadway actors who tours in a single role forever? In other words would you settle for being identified as great Lucia?

OM:   Something like this happened years ago, I did concerts of Semiramide arias, there are crazy runs and very, very high notes. For years everybody wanted me to sings these arias, but I told them that I can sing something else, I have always felt it is possible to go on autopilot singing the words but thinking about something else, I don't want to get that comfortable, it’s a danger.

There is so much to learn, I hate memorizing music by the way, I love rehearsals though.

CD:   Olga, thank you so much for taking the time to speak with me. enjoyed seeing you in Idomeneo, and continued success at the MET.