When I Was Small and Christmas Trees Were Tall

I am certifiably a huge fan of Sarah Brightman. Last night was the fourth time I’ve seen her in concert and it never ceases to amaze and choke me up. But let me back up and try to explain how this one little, and she is little, English woman came to be the center of my musical adoration.
The original cast of The Phantom of the Opera has always enthralled my mother. I don’t remember the first time I heard it but I do remember it was only a tape of highlights from the show. The woman playing the lead had an amazing voice and I wanted to be just like her. We listened to other stuff by Andrew Lloyd Webber but I don’t remember being anywhere near as interested as I was with Phantom. “Cats” was just because it had singing cats and that was damn cool to a four year old, I remember that much.
As I grew up and chose Choir repeatedly over any other elective or pass time, my need to learn the parts for the play increased, trying my voice out in different styles and pitches. And in high school when all the rich kids got to have private lessons I cloistered myself away in my room and learned from Sarah. Pitch, tone, phrasing, breathing, diction, the list goes on. The more I tried to perfect every second of those songs the more I was teaching myself technique without the help of an expensive vocal teacher.
I feel it’s paid off… people comment now that they can hear the obvious influence in my voice but it’s also set me apart from most singers milling around Seattle/Tacoma right now. I’m self taught so I kept my individuality I feel and I understand my body so much more in my striving to make the correct noises rather than squawking at a teacher until they say I have it “right” and never knowing how I got there or why I need to in the first place.
In a world where people immediately think of American Idol as some sort of measuring stick for vocal talent I can only shutter at the thought. Being able to sing rock, country, jazz, show tunes, RnB, and Classical is not what TALENT is. Being devoted to your instrument as much as any guitar or horn player, and really understanding its capabilities is talent. A person can play the notes but you must also feel them and that is the rest of the talent. What is music without passion, without emotion? Nothing… its just a bunch of sounds.
And sounding like every other one to come before you isn’t talent to me. You can fit into a genera and not be a carbon copy. Music should come from within and channel that individuality. I cherish that people hear the influence of Sarah Brightman in my voice, but I would never want to hear that I sound just like Sarah Brightman. That’s not who I am, but she helped me get to who I am. That’s an important distinction.
That’s enough about me…. Now let me talk more about her. I am not one of those stalker fans that knows her favorite ice cream flavor or what three items she would take if abandoned on a dessert island. I believe Andrew met her when she was cast in Cats, and that the role of Christine Diaa, the female lead in Phantom of the Opera, was written specifically for her voice. (You don’t get any more romantic than that.) In that same world that is American Idol dependent, she is a true voice in the midst of lip-synch artists, so great in the studio with auto-tune turned to overdrive but unable to truly perform in public without ruining the illusion. I have no idea about her schooling as a singer, I only know she has amazing range and control. I have no idea what or who she spends her time with, I only know that she is worth any ticket cost to see in concert.
The first time I saw her was for the Eden Tour and I had total nose bleed seats, but the show was basically sold out so I was just pleased to be in the building. Right as she preformed “Wishing You Were Some How Here Again” which is from Phantom, the lady next to me offered over her binoculars and I could have just cried at the perfection of timing. At that time I had not heard the CD or knew anything about her commercial albums. I only knew her from Broadway and simply had to see her. My boyfriend and I were the youngest people in the building who had bought our own tickets.
The next tour was La Luna and I was going with my now ex-boyfriend/fiancé. It was an awkward night but the floor tickets were totally worth it and being the night before Halloween there was just a sense of magic in the air. La Luna remains my favorite album. I’m sure a lot of it has to do with what was going on in my life at the time. That relationship was abusive and completely unhealthy and even though I wasn’t as firm as I should have been during the initial break-up I was still taking a leap into the wild blue yonder in the idea of not spending the rest of my life with that jerk. The self-discovery and the sense of both personal peace and freedom still fill me when I think of my room in that old apartment or listen to that CD.
The Harem Tour happened totally by chance. My then separated, soon to be ex-husband, had called me up from another state to tell me he had noticed that Sarah was coming to Seattle in a matter of days. I immediately jumped on the Internet and bought the best seats left for the show. As it turned out I was thirty some rows from the front but the stage plan included a long walk way, so for most of the actual show I was only six or eight chairs away from her.
It’s been at least four years since she’d toured with Harem and the new CD wasn’t all that impressive to me, but I knew from experience that she didn’t just preform the songs from the title album. She’d sing maybe three hits and the rest would be favorites from past albums. The stage shows have always been amazing, from the flying back-up dancers in the Eden Tour, and La Luna and Harem both had amazing set designs that flowed around her entire performance.
I was on vacation with my boyfriend at his parent’s in June, and got up extra early in order to be on Ticketmaster the minute they went on sale. I was so proud that I had gotten excellent center seats a mere nineteen rows from the main stage. I was going to get to share Sarah with the guy that had been instrumental in getting me going musically. As with pattern I’ve just now realizing, he and I broke up not too soon after, leaving me scrambling these last couple weeks looking for someone to use the other ticket.
Nicole ended up agreeing to go and I was pleased because I knew she would appreciate the experience even if she didn’t ADORE Sarah. That was all that mattered to me. Every other time I had gone with a guy who really didn’t get interested until they saw Sarah’s scandalous costumes and beautiful back up dancers.
Just when I thought I had it all figured out, a nasty winter storm came in and everything was snow and ice. Thankfully Nicole was still willing and able to come up from Tacoma and drive us into the worst area of the storm effect, way up north in Everett. Even with all our stops and starts that night and nasty, pure ice conditions in around the sports arena, we were parked and in our seats with a half hour to spare. We had made it.
Two women sitting next to us turned into good friends that night. They were a riot to talk to. We discussed everything from bon-bons to the crazy outfits some women had braved even in the absolutely arctic weather. As much as I had wanted JN with me, Nicole and I had a lot to talk about and I got the first chance to really gush about how happy I was my current romantic intentions. That was really nice in the face of the ridiculous drama I had been dealing with on the topic.
The show was amazing as always with the special effects that blew everyone away. It was just generally a good night. I could go on about the staging, the effects, the set list, the costumes but it won’t really portray how really moving the whole thing was for me. When she sings and I realize that that little woman has been blessed with such a voice and has not wasted it I tear up. It’s not perfection but its close and its real. All that she is comes out in her voice and it’s amazing to listen to and to watch. That’s the bottom line.
I’m sad now that I don’t have the concert to look forward too… until the next album I hope. Christmas is coming and I feel really content with my passion for music and the friends that I have still around me. Life is good.