This interview was originally recorded on April 30th, 2025.
The Oral History Project is supported by the Arthur F. and Alice E. Adams Charitable Foundation.

Lauren Flanigan, soprano

Lauren Flanigan (born May 18, 1959) is an American operatic soprano who has had an active international career since the 1980s. She enjoyed a particularly fruitful partnership with the New York City Opera, appearing with the company almost every year beginning in 1990. She has sung more than 100 opera roles on stage during her career, often appearing in contemporary works or more rarely staged operas. Opera News stated that “Flanigan has enjoyed one of the most distinctive careers of any artist of her generation, one marked by a high volume of contemporary works. Modern composers love her because of her innate musicality, dramatic power, and lightning-fast skills and instincts.”

Transcript

Marc A. Scorca: Lauren Flanigan, I am so thrilled that you're spending time this afternoon with us to contribute to our Oral History Project. You are one of the great American sopranos, and we're honored you're with us.

Lauren Flanigan: Oh, you're so funny; thank you. Super happy to be here.

Marc A. Scorca: And especially to be talking to someone who I've known for 40 years, so it's really great fun. I'm really looking forward to our conversation. I always start with: who brought you to your first opera?

Lauren Flanigan: My first opera was The Barber of Seville, San Francisco Opera, and it was with my school.

Marc A. Scorca: And was your first experience positive? Did you enjoy it? Did you think, "Hey, this is cool?"

Lauren Flanigan: This was like around second or third grade. I already played the violin, so I was kind of like inclined toward classical-type things. I was in love, like crazy in love, with musical theater, and so I liked it, I would say. I remember it. Yeah, I have like these very vivid memories of the production. I don't remember who were the singers, but I have like, these really vivid memories of like what it looked like, and I also remember laughing a lot.

Marc A. Scorca: Those student performances: they had value then, and they have value now.

Lauren Flanigan: Totally.

Marc A. Scorca: So, Flora: tell me about Flora.

Lauren Flanigan: So, I played the violin in the orchestra. There was a guy (I forget his name), Gary something. He played the oboe. He had a crush on me, and we had sung a few things with the orchestra. It was at Herbert Hoover Junior High School, and one day I came in, and written across the blackboard was 'Lauren Flanigan see Gary something'. And I was horrified; I was 11 years old, right? So anyway, I eventually did see him, and it was a Friday. It was the same day that San Francisco Opera's touring (company), the Western Opera Theater, was holding auditions for The Turn of the Screw. And he told me about it, where it was, and so I enlisted my cousin Kate to come with me. My mom used to ship us off to any camp that would take us, so we went to like Catholic camp and Jewish camp, and, you know, the whole thing, right? And so, that summer I had learned a lullaby, (sings) "Little boy kneels at the foot of the bed, Droops on the little hands little gold head, Hush! Hush! Whisper who dares! Christopher Robin is saying his prayers". Sorry, I didn't warm up for this. But anyway, when I got there, it was Edward Korn and Richard Woitach.

Marc A. Scorca: Oh my goodness. Ed Korn gave me my first job, my God, and Richard Woitach. My goodness.

Lauren Flanigan: And I didn't know them. I didn't know anybody. I was just a street kid, just grew up in San Francisco. And they said, "Do you have a resume?" And I was like, "I don't even know what that is". And, "Did you bring music?" And I was like, "Why would I do that?" So, Richard Woitach very kindly said, "Listen, why don't you go back in this room, and we're gonna hear a lot of other people before you, but you think of something you'd like to sing". "Okay". So, all I could think of was, weirdly, that lullaby, right? And so, he eventually came for me. I waited like an hour, an hour and a half maybe? I was like 11 years old, 12 years old. And he came and got me, and he said, "What would you like to sing?" And I said, "I'd like to sing this lullaby, Christopher Robin". So, there was like silence after I sang, and then they said, "Can you sing it again?" And I said, "Sure". So, I sang it again, and there was silence, and they were all talking to each other. And then they said, "Humor us, but could you sing it one more time?" And I literally was like, "What the fuck for? What are you talking about? That's not enough?" You know me, I had a little bit of a mouth on me back then. And so, I was like, "You know, okay". So, I begrudgingly sang it again, and then Richard Woitach came and he said, "If I play something on the piano, can you sing it back?" And I said, "Well, I play the violin, so yeah, I could probably do that". And he played (sings) "Lavender's blue, diddle diddle, lavender's green, When I am king, diddle diddle, you shall be queen". He played that. And so, that's rather simple, right? So I did that. They called me back, and then boom, I got cast. And Gary, whatever-his-last-name-is, nada. Isn't that crazy?

Marc A. Scorca: So, here you are as a pre-teenager in your opera, and then you go on and, of course, I have your educational trajectory of Boston University and Manhattan School and Juilliard. But connect me from what - 11 or 12 years old and The Turn of the Screw to going to college. Did you continue singing? Who started to say, "Hey, you know Lauren, you got something".

Lauren Flanigan: Nobody really, like nobody. But I did get a full scholarship to the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. I did get a full scholarship, as a result of being in The Turn of the Screw. It was for violin, and then like, lots of sight reading, and I got to take voice lessons with Alice Taylor. And then this very strange thing happened, where I was cast, at like 15 or 16, to understudy Aldonza in Man of La Mancha with what they called Skyline Opera Theater, or Skyline Musical Theater. The story always makes me cry, but one day the girl, Gail Cadroza, was not well. And so they said, "Well, we need you to do the rehearsal". And so, she stepped out, and then I did a lot of the rehearsal. And later on, Ronald Weidman, who was the director, said, "Oh, I'd like to see you in my office", and I thought like, "Oh God, I'm bad. Like, this is going really badly". And he said, "Gail would like to speak to you". And I was just like, trembling, right? (Welling up) You know, the key to my story is that people were just so kind to me, my whole (career). They were so kind to me". And she said, "I wanna coach you, and you're gonna do this part. I'm not gonna do it anymore".

Marc A. Scorca: Wow.

Lauren Flanigan: Yeah, that happened. And then that led to me doing summerstock. I met Tom (Thomas) Schumacher, who runs Disney Theatrical. It's like, the key to my story is how kind everybody was to me. You know, I came from like really kind of violent circumstances. People were so kind.

Marc A. Scorca: That's so touching to hear. Here you are in high school with this encouragement to do the work, and studying violin, and then having voice lessons.

Lauren Flanigan: I dropped that violin when I was like 13. I was like, "Forget that, (sings) 'The show is Broadway'"

Marc A. Scorca: Lauren, I think of your voice as such a natural gift. When you sing, there's no artifice about it. It is like you are just coming straight out with your gift. And in studying singing, are there things you actually really had to learn, or was it a kind of natural gift that just had to be discovered?

Lauren Flanigan: I mean, everybody has to learn to sing on an exhale. You know, air moves notes. And that I think for me, was the key, and I would say that was like Mac Morgan at Boston University, and then of course, Judith Raskin, so I had a kind of a voice that got me far, you know, into Boston. And then Judith Raskin really opened up my voice. She had that thing called Cornelius Reid technique, and it was where you develop the voice in its registers, and then you blend them together. Except she died, and nobody blended my voice together. And that's about the time I met Robert Larsen, because she died in '84. So, in '85, I'm at Des Moines, and then in about '86 or '87 is when I meet Denes Striny, who then becomes my teacher forever.

Marc A. Scorca: So, connecting the dots here, you started with Judith Raskin, and then you auditioned for Des Moines to be one of the apprentice artists in the season, and that's where you met Robert Larsen.

Lauren Flanigan: Well, I auditioned. I didn't know it didn't pay, you know what I'm saying? So, when Doug (Douglas) Duncan called me to say we want you to come and be a young artist, I was thrilled. And then I was like, "Does it pay?" And he was like, "Oh, no". And I was like, "Oh, I can't go then; I can't go". And so that summer they were doing Cenerentola, Of Mice and Men and Faust. And so he was like, "Oh, okay, well, I'll have to call you back". So anyway, long story short, that's when he said, "Okay look, we'll let you do Curly's Wife, and we'll let you do Clorinda in Cenerentola, and we'll give you $2,000". And I was like, "I'm your girl".

Marc A. Scorca: Wow, and let me just footnote that DMMO does pay the apprentices now, so just a footnote to that. But those were the old days.

Lauren Flanigan: That was the old days where nobody got paid, but there were far fewer singers.

Marc A. Scorca: So 1984, you're out of college. Did you go to MSM at the time?

Lauren Flanigan: I had just finished MSM and I had done one year at Juilliard.

Marc A. Scorca: And were there people who are egging you on and saying, "Lauren? You keep going. This is going to be really something".

Lauren Flanigan: Interesting. People like Buck Ross, who started the program at University of Houston in Texas; Robert Larsen. Of course Judith Raskin was, just any chance to give me a voice lesson, like, "Hi, balance my checkbook, do this, do that". You know what I mean? And, "Organize my scores", that kind of thing. But I wasn't like, Dawn Upshaw - that was like the one where everybody was like: she's it. Dolora Zajick - we were all in the same class. And so I was sort of like the alternative girl, you know what I'm saying? At that time, I had met Anne Bogart, and I studied acting at ACT (American Conservatory Theater) in San Francisco one summer while I was at Boston University, and then I worked with all of the acting teachers at Boston University, and then one summer, we did the Massenet Cendrillon, which had text by Eve Ensler. It was called Cinderella/Cendrillon, and it was at Music-Theatre Group, Diane Wondisford. And I met Anne Bogart and like my head exploded, and I was like, "Wow, what is this?" Because it kind of put everything I knew about acting and movement, like together, but also it seemed not to interfere with like, how you support the choice to sing. It was fascinating, absolutely fascinating.

Marc A. Scorca: I'm gonna stick with this, because you talked about studying at ACT for a summer, and then Anne Bogart. Lauren, in your work, you have been one of the great singing actresses; your stage presence is commanding, you throw yourself into it hook, line and sinker, and I wanted to ask how you developed that. Now, of course, stage presence, part of that is a gift, as your voice is, but part of it too, is learned. How did you learn to put it all together as a singing actor?

Lauren Flanigan: Like, I was taught real acting, you know? I was given like really basic fundamental principles, and Dorothy Uris, like, how do you pronounce English? The great speech coach, Edith Skinner, you know, at ACT. We went around the room and she was like, "What is your name?" Very commanding. And when she got to me, I said, (starightforwardly) "Lauren Flanigan". And she dropped her cigarette, and she looked, and she goes "With a name like (boldy) Lauren Flanigan, why would you say (rushed) Lauren Flanigan?" And I was like, "I'll never do that ever again". And that was like this idea of presence, like who you are in the world, right? And how do you bring a sense of importance to everything you do, right? How do you bring that kind of attention, you know? But I knew how to sing, that's the thing. I knew how to sing, and it never got in the way. Like, I learned the piece. That was a funny thing at City Opera, they're always like, "Flanigan's in the building". You know what I mean? It's serious now. And so that first rehearsal: no music, sang it down. Just look at the conductor, just sing it. It was memorized. And then, the whole thing is about how do you create those moments to moments? Do you know what I mean? 'Cause you know the piece. If you don't know the piece...

Marc A. Scorca: And I don't wanna minimize that, but you essentially got the singing done first, and then were entirely available for the theater of the piece.

Lauren Flanigan: Yes. That's how you were taught back in the day. See, back in the day, technical mastery first. People who come to my mind with that, like Lorraine Hunt - technical mastery, and then she had that amazing facility. Like, I'm thinking of like, my contemporaries like Dawn Upshaw too. My God. Dawn Upshaw, that Ilia at The Met - mind blowing. And yet the way she was able to like, take in Carol Vaness, or take in Cheryl Studer, or Luciano Pavarotti, you know what I'm saying? It was breathtaking; it was just breathtaking.

Marc A. Scorca: Your first season at Des Moines included Clorinda in Cenerentola, and then Curley's Wife is an illustration of the repertoire of your career, where you spanned the repertoire: new work, old work, old work that is rarely performed. You really just covered the gamut. Was the gamut what interested you, or was there a particular part of the gamut that really was your favorite?

Lauren Flanigan: I love singing classical music, like Rossini makes me super-happy. Mozart, super-happy. It's just that pull into modern music, into that idea of what is American realism. That became this thing. So, I used my regular Rossini/Mozart technique, Verdi technique in those pieces. And then like all those directors just kept pulling me back. Just when I thought it was like safe to go back into Rossini, Verdi, Donizetti, I got pulled back into (modern works). But a really important thing happened. In like 1991, I was in Barcelona covering Edita Gruberová in Anna Bolena. (Marc looks in disbelief). Yeah, I know; that happened. And that was the year that The Met sent a fax to me saying that they wanted me to cover and sing one performance of Lombardi, cover and sing one performance of Rusalka, cover and sing one performance of Lucia, cover and sing one performance of Musetta, blah, blah, blah. That was the sum. And I was sitting watching Gruberová rehearse and watching how every time Richard Bonynge said one thing to her, she went right straight to the front of the stage. And there was this weird moment when I suddenly thought like, "Oh my God, they think that I'm that; they think I'm that". And that was when I just went, "Oh, oh Flanigan, what did you just do?" And I went to the cathedral every day, and I lit a candle, and I was like, "Please Jesus, she cannot get sick". I was like, I would love to sing, and I did a Rossini concert there, but no, the audience would've been so disappointed that she wasn't performing, 'cause it was like a cult. And that's when it occurred to me. I remember asking Kris (Kristine) Jepson to stay up all night with me, so we could go get a card and then call on the payphone, and I remember calling my teacher Denes, and saying, "Oh God, they think that's me". And he was like, "It's you". And I was like, "No, no. I'm like, the girl, the downtown. I'm like, that girl". And he was like, "No, no, you're that girl; that's who you are". And I had just covered Lella Cuberli in the Otello at Chicago Lyric. It had never occurred to me like, "Oh, they think that's me". Yeah, wild: right?

Marc A. Scorca: And it was you, and it wasn't you, because you could deliver the goods, but you had a different approach to it.

Lauren Flanigan: I mean, technically, I just sang everything as far as I could go. I sang, I think, everything technically perfect. It was well done. I never read any reviews, so I have no idea what people said about me. I never read them. One review, Michael Tilson Thomas sent to me, and was like this beautiful, beautiful thing that one of the guys in the San Francisco Chronicle said, but I read that one, and that's it.

Marc A. Scorca: And what I'm hearing in this, is that you do prepare for new or old repertoire the same way, which is that you absolutely learn the music, you use your rock-solid technique to bring it into your voice and your voice to it, and then, you follow the drama.

Lauren Flanigan: Yeah. So, you technically master something. And so for me, and my pianist used to joke all the time that I would sing Rossini for maybe 45 minutes to get my voice working the way I like it to work, before I moved it into the modern piece. That's what I did, and I did it my whole career.

Marc A. Scorca: And yours was a big voice, and you could move it. Just hearing you sing, you would not think that you could move that voice the way you were able to move that voice. It was always remarkable when you did that.

Lauren Flanigan: I just love Rossini, like, it really makes me happy; he just makes me super-happy.

Marc A. Scorca: So, let's talk about New York City Opera, which, in a way, became a home for you. In one of the articles that I read, you were referred to as a City Opera superstar. You did so many roles, in so many seasons, and I can attest, in front of an audience that adored you, because I remember those Roberto Devereux performances, and the ovation was just incredible. What was it like to have a kind of home company in those years?

Lauren Flanigan: Well, gosh, wow. I mean, it felt like home, but it was also like, challenging. It was real. You have to be Lauren Flanigan, right? It's like, not for nothing. Do you know what I mean?

Marc A. Scorca: 'Cause you sold out the shows. It wasn't Roberto Devereux that sold out the shows, it was Lauren Flanigan.

Lauren Flanigan: I knew my box office. It was always above 90, about 93%. Sometimes things were sold out, whatever. I knew my box office, but that was based on, in my opinion, excellent singing, you know what I'm saying? And yeah, I mean, everything about Paul Kellogg made me happy. And I remember going to him when we did Intermezzo at Glimmerglass, and then we did The Turn of the Screw again at Glimmerglass - I remember going to him and saying, "Whatever you want, like, I'm happy to like, be a part of whatever your vision is, for whatever you wanna do". And he ran with that.

Marc A. Scorca: What was it about Paul that made working with him so special?

Lauren Flanigan: You know, it's hard to say. You know, Paul Kellogg was like gardening the grounds. Paul Kellogg was putting up the tents. He came to all the rehearsals, and he was annoying as all get-out, don't get me wrong. You know, like when we did Turn of the Screw, he took issue with like a blow-up beach ball on a child's bed. Out of that whole crazy production, that's the thing he took issue with. You're like, "Wait, what?" You know? Just to have someone believe in you at that high level. And also, his right-hand guy was Sherwin Goldman. I mean, Sherwin Goldman, they just liked what I did. But they also loved Christine Goerke, they loved Amy Burton, they loved David Daniels, they loved Lisa Saffer. Oh my God, Lisa Saffer, remember that? I mean, Jesus, she was like, just so exact and charming and adorable, and Amy Burton, you know? That was just such a heady time.

Marc A. Scorca: The pressure of knowing that the house is close to sold out or sold out at the New York State Theater because of Lauren Flanigan singing whatever she's singing. What's it like getting up that morning and realizing, "Okay, I have to be that Lauren Flanigan tonight".

Lauren Flanigan: You know, by then, that's who I was; that's what I did. The funny thing about that, is that when I did The Mother of Us All, remember how I had to come in through the audience, and Christopher Alden had said, "Find some reason to stop". I was like, "Oh God. Find some reason to stop". 'Cause remember it didn't have the aisles; it has the aisles now. You had to go all the way through all those people, and people had stuff on the floor, and I wasn't supposed to speak to them, and then it's so interesting, at dress rehearsal, somebody said, "That's her, that's Lauren Flanigan". And that was my motive: anytime I heard someone use my actual name, I stopped. I stopped. I'd look at them, and then kept going. That was such a friendly theater. I loved singing in that theater. I know a lot of people didn't like it. I loved it. I loved everything about that theater. I loved everything about the fact that the ballet was upstairs. I loved everything about all those people, my God. Michael Lonergan and Yuval Sharon... We're all in the office, like trying to make everybody as happy as possible with no money.

Marc A. Scorca: And not a whole lot of rehearsal.

Lauren Flanigan: No, no. I know, right?

Marc A. Scorca: You should have studied improv theater too.

Lauren Flanigan: I might be about to actually, we'll see.

Marc A. Scorca: Some of my memories of outstanding performances of yours are in American operas. I was thinking of Mourning Becomes Electra (Marvin David Levy), which I just think is a wonderful piece. I remember your Antony and Cleopatra, your Cleopatra. And, in a moment, I'll illustrate one of the reasons I admired you so much. But these pieces I think have real merit, but they don't get performed very much. Were those highlight works for you too? Antony and Cleopatra, Mourning Becomes Electra?

Lauren Flanigan: Yeah. Antony and Cleopatra, Mourning Becomes Electra, The Mother of Us All, Esther - Hugo Weisgall. I mean, Lizzie Borden.

Marc A. Scorca: Great piece. Jack Beeson.

Lauren Flanigan: Yeah. I feel like I was made for American realism.

Marc A. Scorca: You said in The New York Times in an interview, "My biggest frustration is that the opera business does not take non-mainstream opera seriously".

Lauren Flanigan: Well, that was a hundred years ago.

Marc A. Scorca: I was gonna say...

Lauren Flanigan: Now...

Marc A. Scorca: So, how do you see it? That was a moment in time; today, very different.

Lauren Flanigan: Right. Don't you love it though?

Marc A. Scorca: Yeah.

Lauren Flanigan: I mean, I love it. I did a reading of this piece called Mila, Great Sorcerer. It was Jean-Claude van Itallie and Andrea Clearfield, and Will Liverman was in it. And I remember going to that first rehearsal and people were like, "Whoa". And then Andrea Clearfield said, like, "We're here because of you, because of what you did". Because I just kept doing all these modern American pieces. I love them. I feel like all my training was really about American realism.

Marc A. Scorca: So, were you a quick study? Could you learn music quickly?

Lauren Flanigan: Oh my God, I'm like a savant, really? I mean, I learned Philomel for Christ's sake.

Marc A. Scorca: And you as an actress - I remember I saw the Antony and Cleopatra that City Opera did in concert at Carnegie Hall. And it really was in concert; I mean, it was not staged. There you were with a music stand. And your use of your eyeglasses, as a prop, and I just kept watching how when Cleopatra had her moments and needed to put on her glasses - I mean, you just, you found a prop any place, and your eyeglasses and the beautiful scarf you had on, those were the props for that concert performance. It was remarkable.

Lauren Flanigan: And, you know, here's the interesting thing: that was right when I got diagnosed. That's why I was on the end, and not next to George Manahan. And my dear friend, Julie Goodale was sitting in like the box on the side at Carnegie Hall, and she would kind of go like this (points forefinger up) if I needed to think sharp and try to sing sharp. So, I was just like, zeroed in...that level of concentration then, because my balance was off. Everything was starting to just go haywire, and I didn't understand it. Nobody knew. Like, they were all like, "I have no idea what's wrong with you". You know what I mean?

Marc A. Scorca: You never would've known it in the audience that day. Now, a couple of reviews, and if you didn't read them and you're hearing it for the first time, good. About Esther: 'Lauren Flanigan was stunning, using her body and voice with ferocity'. Another one said, 'Vocally blazing and vulnerable performance'. About Oberon, this was said, adoringly, 'Flanigan picks it up like a club and simply batters us into submission with bear-like personality'. (That was Bernard Holland). And then Jack Beason, 'In six performances (speaking of Lizzie Borden) she didn't do the role exactly the same way twice.

Lauren Flanigan: Never.

Marc A. Scorca: So, I wanna explore all that. So yeah, you did throw yourself, and you just battered it down.

Lauren Flanigan: Here's a little side note about Oberon. So, I was just taking a walk. I ran into Roger Rees, who was a narrator, and who's a really good friend, and I was like, "Oh, I'm coming to see you". And he's like, "Oh great, we'll go out afterwards". I go home and (phone machines, back in the day), there's a message from Robert Bass, and he's like, "Hey Lauren, will you gimme a call?" And I called him back, and he was like, "Hi, how are you?" And I went, "Wait, what?" And he goes, "How are you?" And I said, "Fine. This isn't like, can you learn Oberon in 90 minutes and sing it at Carnegie Hall? Is it, Robert Bass?" And he said, "Well...".

Marc A. Scorca: Oh my God.

Lauren Flanigan: So I said, "Let me call Miriam Charney and see if she can teach it to me".

Marc A. Scorca: Wow.

Lauren Flanigan: I learned all of Oberon in 90 minutes. I learned it with her. We went to his house and then, the next day, I walked in to sing Oberon with orchestra. And then we sang it on Tuesday night at Carnegie Hall. So that was Sunday, Monday, Tuesday. Crazy, right?

Marc A. Scorca: So many singers protect their voice. What's the old Zinka Milanov (saying)? 'Sing with your interest, not with your capital'. You didn't hold back? Did you think about just giving it all, or was your technique just so solid that you could just throw yourself at it?

Lauren Flanigan: Technique was super-solid. It was just super-solid. I would wake up, I would do a few things, and then I'd be like, "Oh, okay". And then in the dressing room, I would just do a few things and line everything up, and then I was good to go. Always good to go. But it was always Rossini, Rossini. I'm serious about that whole thing, you know? It was just like, as much Rossini as I possibly could.

Marc A. Scorca: And then Jack's comment about never doing the same role quite the same way - six performances, everyone a little bit different. And did you perform really in the moment every night, so that it actually was different every night? I wonder how your colleague artists worked with that, but did you find that you just were very much present every day for however it was going that day?

Lauren Flanigan: Well, the thing is that...see, singers aren't aware of this, but we're always different every performance. No performance is the same. The thing that I think real acting training helped me do, was be sensitive to how different... 'cause Phyllis Pancella, amazing, right? Phyllis was slightly different every performance. So, I was very aware of that, and so I made certain adjustments. I remember one time her doing a slow burn to me; that had its own thing. And then one time she went like that (quickly). And I had to make that (adjustment). You can't have the same reaction to two different things. I feel like that's where like real acting (occurs). Look, I'm a (product of) Anne Bogart's Viewpoints training; that idea of creating awarenesses, where you learn about what's in your environment. So, you're always open and reacting. But you can also then bring it forward, so the audience sees what's happening. But the other thing is, Jack just loved me. We adored each other; his wonderful wife and their daughter Miranda, it was just so wonderful. So, he was more inclined to catch the nuances that I did, or the subtleties in the reaction time, or something like that.

Marc A. Scorca: Europe. So, a triumph at Scala, the toast of Naples. Was it different to sing in Europe than in the United States?

Lauren Flanigan: They know the opera! And they argue with you about it. Like, you can't leave the theater. Like, people are arguing with you. It's crazy; it's so wonderful. I wish everybody could like, sing somewhere where audiences have a history with that piece. Then you get this beautiful feedback from how they experienced you. You know, when I sang Nabucco in Naples, they were like, "Signora, why you make the opera more difficult, because it already very hard? But now you make the ornament", (gestures 'why'). It was very funny,

Marc A. Scorca: In one of the articles I read, you said that in Naples, they would recognize you on the street and stop you on the street to have a conversation about the opera.

Lauren Flanigan: So crazy, right? Yeah. And there were no pictures of us anywhere. The people were just like, "Oh, that's you".

Marc A. Scorca: How wonderful.

Lauren Flanigan: I was in like, Capri and someone stopped me, and then they wanna have a whole conversation with you about your choices.

Marc A. Scorca: Isn't that the world we want to inhabit in some way, where opera is what you talk about at the street corner?

Lauren Flanigan: Yes, yes. I know.

Marc A. Scorca: Any role models for you? I mean, through this incredible career as a singing actor?

Lauren Flanigan: Role models? I don't know. I loved when I finally met Joan Morris, right? And I met Joan when I was singing in like a summer music festival up in Maine. She and Bill (William Bolcom) came up and we were gonna work (together). I'd never met them before, but I'd seen them many times. And her wonderful ability for rediscovering a song over and over and over again, I loved her so much. I still love her, and just being in her presence and her tiny little commentary when I would work on one of Bill's cabaret songs, like, "Oh, maybe rethink this a tiny bit and get back here", and yet her interest was always how it is completely my own. I idolized Gruberová; I idolized (Mariella) Devia. I idolized them.

Marc A. Scorca: So interesting that you named two great coloraturas.

Lauren Flanigan: I idolized them. Beverly (Sills). I mean, my God. And, you know, when I was a kid, people were like, "Oh, you're gonna be like Beverly Sills". And we just became friends. Do you know what I mean? I loved Beverly. Oh my God.

Marc A. Scorca: Did you listen to recordings?

Lauren Flanigan: Yes.

Marc A. Scorca: So, would you put on a recording of someone like Eleanor Steber, or others, and say, "Oh, so that's how they did it".

Lauren Flanigan: Yes. Especially like, as I was like singing more modern American stuff, I listened to like a lot of Jan DeGaetani; I listened to Phyllis Curtin, and Beverly because of Baby Doe, right? I wanted the signs of like, where is the technique in that piece? What are the vocal signs, the oral signs of technical mastery of that piece? And so, I became like a real student of modern American music. Oh, that brings back a lot of memories, Marc.

Marc A. Scorca: I'm sure. You and young artists today. And you are someone who is available to hear people sing, to work on roles, to care for them as people, not just as singers. So tell me a little bit about you and this commitment to young singers.

Lauren Flanigan: Well, when whatever happened to me, happened to me, and I had to sort of retire, I don't know, I just was thinking about what's needed. And I thought at the time, so this was like 15 years ago, "Okay, I feel like what's needed is like a safe place to land; a place where you can come that's like judgment-free, where you can be who you are, and we can just sort of meet each other in that place". And that's how Music and Mentoring House gets born. I'd already been teaching acting through the American Opera Projects, and they were like sponsoring me to teach Viewpoints training and do like simple acting, like, but real acting, like, how would you put a character together? And so, we were doing like Saturday classes, and I was living in Harlem at the time, and they were like, "Oh, so like, can we just like, stay up here where all your music and your books are, and then you can be down there, Lauren. Like, we're okay with that." And I was like, "No, go home. Like, no". And it was like, people just kept staying longer and longer and longer. And then I just thought like, "Oh okay, this is what's needed".

Marc A. Scorca: And describe the 'it' a little bit more, for someone who may not be familiar with it.

Lauren Flanigan: An environment where it's more about learning. Look, I'm gonna turn this around. (Turns camera round to different aspect(s) of where she is situated). That's all the books and music, right? There's everything, right? And then, there's a whole bookshelf over there; that's all my music, right? And there's even more, right? And so, nothing makes me happier than to see my music on people's beds. And just like, pull it off, take it, read it, use it, do it, ask me questions. I hear their hopes and dreams over breakfast, and then I get to like, worm my way in and make a little suggestion here, chuck a book at their head there. You know what I'm saying?

Marc A. Scorca: How many artists are in residence at any one time?

Lauren Flanigan: Like in the past, I was able to have like, I don't know, 13. It's crazy; I don't do that anymore. That's too much work. This house, I can have like seven. That seems reasonable and doable, where I can give people the kind of attention they need. You know, make a suggestion about where they should go, who they should coach with, that kind of thing.

Marc A. Scorca: What is at the core of your advice to the aspiring, rising singer today?

Lauren Flanigan: You've got to be musically excellent. You've got to know the piece, and you've got to have technically mastered the piece. You cannot be in rehearsal figuring out how that piece goes. And in a way, that's what I think kind of separates like, Dolora and me and Dawn and like there was this idea that you don't even start like the acting part until you've technically mastered the piece. And so I'll say to someone, "You don't know this piece well enough to be acting it; you just don't know it well enough; it needs more technical mastery". And I feel like that's kind of what's missing - is everybody's kind of coaching the drama before it's technically mastered.

Marc A. Scorca: And it takes such time and effort to master it technically. These days, lessons are so expensive and housing is so expensive. And do you also have a full-time job that keeps you talking or exhausting yourself during the day? It's really challenging for today's young artist.

Lauren Flanigan: Well, here's the other thing. Nobody knows songs anymore. They know arias. They don't know songs. And for me, songs helped me create a very rich musical life. You know, Robert Larsen, and by the way, my one phone call, when I made my La Scala debut, Robert Larsen. I called him and I was like, "I'm going on. I'm going on". And he was like, "Oh my God". I didn't even call my voice teacher; I called Robert Larsen, 'cause he had given me so much. He believed in me so much.

Marc A. Scorca: They will love to hear that story in Des Moines. What do you mean by songs?

Lauren Flanigan: Like Schubert, you know, Brahms, you know, Schumann, Fauré, Duparc, Honegger. When I was in school, like, you had to learn songs. That was it. Boston University, you learned songs. Allen Rogers' song literature class. You had your songs for your voice studio; they were not the same. Then you had Robert Gartside's French art songs. Then you had Maeda Freeman's German arts song, and they were not the same songs. And so, I left school knowing 150 songs, you know, four years of undergrad. All those different classes were all those different songs. And then I go to Manhattan School of Music, more songs. The emphasis was more on how are we creating people that have a rich musical life, in my opinion. Now it's about creating opera singers. But, you know, Kamal Khan, Michael Recchiuti, like, we created so many recital programs. So many, I know so many songs. Then when you add Ricky Ian Gordon and you add Bill Bolcom, (the cabaret songs), and then you add in Marc Blitzstein, Ned Rorem, then you add in all the American canon - people are shocked at how many songs I know. They're shocked.

Marc A. Scorca: But it also shaped you as an artist.

Lauren Flanigan: Oh my God. I always was able to create a musical program, and then I would throw an aria in, you know what I'm saying? I sang at the Jan Hus church, I sang at Joe's Pub, and all songs. I sang anywhere anybody would have me. West Park Presbyterian Church got sick of me. And it was always with Kamal Khan, Michael Recchiuti - anybody would play, you know. I remember doing Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco's Shakespeare songs, with my friend Jim (James) Hay. He was a tenor - when I was working at McKinsey & Company. Remember I had a day job.

Marc A. Scorca: Wait, wait, wait. I don't know if I knew that.

Lauren Flanigan: I had a day job for 10 whole years.

Marc A. Scorca: At what point, while you were Juilliard?

Lauren Flanigan: Even at Manhattan School of Music. I started because Brian Jauhiainen was the one who got me the job. So that was in like the summer of like '83, maybe? '84? That was the year Judy (Raskin) died. So yeah, it would have to be '83 to '93.

Marc A. Scorca: What was your job?

Lauren Flanigan: I was a part of this thing called data-gatherers.

Marc A. Scorca: So when you came to Chicago to sing Curly's Wife, better than anyone ever has you had taken time off from McKinsey?

Lauren Flanigan: Yeah. Because it's a study by study basis, right? So you're assigned to a study and then if you leave it, then you have to wait to get assigned to another study when you get back. So it was sort of perfect.

Marc A. Scorca: Wow. I had no idea.

Lauren Flanigan: Yeah, yeah, yeah. For 10 years. And so, it was super funny, because like my City Opera debut, I worked the whole day. I got there at six in the morning. I worked until six in the evening. And then I left. I went to City Opera, got in the makeup chair, warmed up, and then they took me out on stage, 'cause I was the third and fourth cast, so I didn't get any stage rehearsal. And then I just remember Albert Sherman saying, "Don't leave this platform. Stay on this platform. Don't leave this platform". And so, I'm a director's girl. I did not leave that platform. Everybody else was like wandering around. So, I end up having a great performance, where everybody else was sort of like (waves hands in the air, indicating everywhere), because I didn't leave that platform, right? So anyway, so the next day, the phone rings and I answer it, and someone says, "Is Lauren Flanigan there?" I said, "Hi, this is Lauren Flanigan". And she says, "Hi, this is Lenore Rosenberg". And I was like, "Ha ha ha you guys. Very funny, very funny, blah blah. I don't believe you. Goodbye, Lenore Rosenberg", and I hung up the phone, right? And then the phone rings again, and I was like, "Oh, is this Lenore Rosenberg calling?" 'Cause I have a mouth on me, right? And she was like, "Well, as a matter of fact, it is". And I was like, "Okay, you guys". And she goes, "Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait". She goes, "I'm gonna give you this number; I want you to call it, and then I want you to ask for this extension". "Okay". And just then, all my friends came in the room and I was like, "Okay, thank you very much. I'll do that in just a minute. Bye". And I hung up the phone, and I was like, "Did you guys... are you... did you...?" And they were like, "Did we do what?" And I'm like, "Did you just call me pretending to be Lenore Rosenberg?" And they were like, "Why would we do that?" And I said, "I don't know, 'cause you were being funny?" And they were like, "Why would we do we wanna do that?"

Marc A. Scorca: So you called that number and someone said, "Metropolitan Opera".

Lauren Flanigan: And they said "Metropolitan Opera". And then, how would they know what her extension was? And I asked for extension, whatever it was. And then I heard "Lenore Rosenberg" and I was like, "Hi, this is Lauren Flanigan. I'm so sorry. I'm really sorry". Yeah, that happened.

Marc A. Scorca: That is wonderful. Oh my God.

Lauren Flanigan: And she said "Would you come to The Met on Saturday and sing a stage audition?"

Marc A. Scorca: Do you remember what you sang?

Lauren Flanigan: No. It was probably Rossini.

Marc A. Scorca: Wow.

Lauren Flanigan: I'm almost positive it was, and probably 'Quando m'en vo', because that was like one of my arias. Yeah. Crazy.

Marc A. Scorca: Lauren, I've known you and admired you for just shy of 40 years, and it is such a pleasure to capture some of these stories, so people, especially young singers, who are looking for advice in some fashion, can listen to this and hear what you devoted and how you developed your incredible career. I am so grateful to you for taking the time with me this afternoon, and I can't wait to see you and sit down and continue the conversation. But I just say thank you for everything you've done.