Why the “Fat Lady” Sings
Being thin has a negative effect on various qualities of the voice. A super talented and very pretty colleague once told me she wanted to improve her support, and was on a diet to GAIN weight! Her voice teacher called it “the power of breakfast.”
I loved that and often quote it to singers who ask me for advice to improve their singing. I tell them not to be guided by beauty standards on social media, but to always focus on their instrument first!
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Opera singers are athletes. Strong internal muscles allow for precise control of breath, tone and pitch while simultaneously moving around as if singing were as easy as sleeping. If you hug a singer (please ask first, thank you!), you’ll notice how firm their bodies are. Some singers even have athletic bodies, but they look more like strong men than bodybuilders because they can’t dehydrate for a toned look. You need to be hydrated to sing well. The voice needs moisture.
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Also, you can’t sing well on an empty stomach, so we eat before the performance. Singing makes you hungry, so we eat again after – in the middle of the night, the worst time to eat if you don’t want to put on weight! Plus, there’s something about screaming at the top of your lungs that makes your body crave food. I suppose it’s a primeval instinct, our bodies demand a feast after what clearly must have been a life or death situation! And so we put on weight during the season.
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When you then consider that big voiced female singers don’t reach vocal maturity until their mid-30s, when the female body naturally begins to build up “reserves for a rainy day,” you can see why the Fat Lady™ has been, is and always will be an essential part of opera – it’s normal, natural, healthy and just sounds better, plain and simple! Don't believe me? Just listen to recordings of Maria Callas before and after she got thin. We are better when we are a bit “saftig.”
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As a singer in an ensemble, the summer break is the only time I can go on a diet without jeopardizing my voice. I’m currently in the process of getting rid of some excess “support.” Slowly and carefully, constantly checking whether my sound is suffering from the diet. So far it has worked wonderfully! I know that I’ll have to do this again and again, because even though beauty standards have shifted in our favor recently, it hasn’t reached the minds of all directors yet.
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Unfortunately there are still many critics and also opera goers trapped in a thin-is-young-is-beautiful mindest. “You won't see us up close anyway!”, I would love to say to them, “Even from the front row you're still an orchestra pit away from us!” As I wrote before, body ideals are a fad, but it's going in a good direction right now. Brace for some great singers!
(Unfortunately, there's going to be a film about Callas, with Angelina Jolie in the title role. Go “figure”! 😆)
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But, despite all of the above, I’m now taking a break from my diet until Sunday, because I really want THE POWER OF BREAKFAST for my first public appearance as
TURANDOT
Yeah! I'm excited!
I'm singing «In questa reggia» and more from Turandot, as well as many more Puccini favorits the day after tomorrow (Sunday) at the “Italienische Nacht” closing concert of the Residenzfestspiele Darmstadt.
#operaSinger #opera #concert #openAir #Darmstadt #Residenzfestspiele #Turandot #puccini
Megan Marie Hart
Peterrone