Big birthday

Today is William Shakespeare’s 445th birthday, which leads me to one of my greatest musical joys recently. I have been fortunate to play two productions at the Houston Grand Opera within the last year together with my oldest son, Jakob. The first one was Puccini’s La Bohème in May of 2008 and the second one was, you guessed it, Benjamin Britten’s beutiful opera based on Shakesepare’s A Midsummernight’s Dream in January and February of 2009.  Jakob has been in the children’s chorus for these two shows, and it’s been great fun for both of us.

Initially he didn’t want to have anything to do with opera, but when Jakob realized you actually get paid a little bit, he was ready to go to the audition. After the first rehearsal he was like a transformed kid, Puccini was the greatest composer ever, all the grown-up singers were the coolest guys he’d ever met, and he just couldn’t get enough! One big part was that they don’t treat the kids like little kids,  they’re just as important (especially in Britten) as the rest of the cast, and they’re expected to live up to that responsibility, which they do.

I heard somewhere that Shakespeare actually had to make up about ten percent of the words he used in his plays, pretty amazing, so here’s to the Bard!