Mon 4 Jan 2010
More than 25 years ago my father stood on this Opera stage. The set I’m standing on is now for Tosca, a modernized design with 20th century props, but this room is the same — the famous Sydney Opera House.
Having parents who were both opera singers has always been a curiosity, a fun conversation on dates, and an aspect defining my life as slightly different. The trade-off to moving around the world, switching schools, needing to make new friends and never quite knowing any place as home, is here on this stage. It’s impossible to describe what it’s like to hear a dramatic tenor singing full volume on an opera stage, and doubly so what it’s like to have that man be your father. And it isn’t about silly things like seeing your father die on stage, but rather the overwhelming voice.
Here in Sydney, home to the most beautiful and unique opera house, an architectural masterwork, one that was supposed to cost $6 million dollars and take 3 years to build, but instead took over 13 years and $103 million, my father sang as a guest tenor.
Halfway around the world I’ve traveled to see this, and to walk around the dressing rooms on the behind the scenes tour. We visited what was recently Liza Minnelli’s dressing room and I played chopsticks on the Steinway that has been used by so many famous musicians — probably not to play chopsticks. The dressing room has quite a view, out onto the Sydney harbour no less. But all that pales in comparison with imagining my father dying on this stage. ;-) Doesn’t the hero always die in operas?