Throughout all my acting experience, I have been told that the best way to connect with your audience is to connect with your character. After that, all the stylistic stuff comes naturally. Dynamics, accents, and other things used to denote feeling DON’T when they are not connected to your own experience. We, as human beings, are emotional. Now, I’m not telling prospective performers to go out and deliberately have negative experiences. The defeats the whole purpose. Drawing from your own basic experience is always the best way.
You may not have a similar experience. In opera, there are many different situations that would be a hard to come by in modern society. Still, we can look and find similarities. Love triangle? Look at your crush. Your father could die, your guardian could decide to marry you, love at first sight. The point is, find some aspect of the situation that you can draw on.
Un Bel Di Vedremo is an aria from Puccini’s opera “Madama Butterfly”. The opera tells the story of a 15-year-old girl, Cio-Cio san, who gets married to an American sailor by the name of Pinkerton. He ultimately abandons her for an American woman, Kate. The aria sings of Butterfly seeing the sailor’s ship come into port, and her believing that everything was going to be ok. It’s not, of course. Butterfly ends up committing suicide from sadness.
Preparing the Character
Before I knew the aria’s translation, it had been one of my favorites. I love the haunting melodies, dynamic changes, and the heartfelt voice of the singer. After I translated and started to prepare it, it became a whole different animal. This a**hole literally sailed away and left her to pine. He ghosted her, you could say. Anyone who’s had that happen knows how painful it is.
I am a domestic abuse survivor, and I remember feeling such abandonment and disappointment as my marriage died. Butterly waited 3 years for Pinkerton to come back. She gave birth to their son. And still, she waited. Madame Butterfly is one of the most famous leading characters in opera, and challenging to perform because of the sheer emotional breadth of the character. The video I’ve chosen for you is the amazing Renata Tebaldi. (I don’t yet have a recording of me singing it.)
The point I’m making is that I was able to use that horrible experience to my advantage. That is one of my favorite arias to sing. It has become somewhat cathartic for me; it helps me to deal with what my ex did. Madama Butterfly was also the first opera I really got emotionally invested in, because I had that experience. All the pain and misery I felt… no wonder Butterfly committed suicide. I’m glad I didn’t, because I lived to sing through my pain.
(In other news, I have no idea who painted this picture of Cio-Cio San. If you know, let me know so I can give the artist proper credit. Thanks!)
