This interview was originally recorded on November 5th, 2014.
The Oral History Project is supported by the Arthur F. and Alice E. Adams Charitable Foundation.

Christine Goerke, soprano 

Grammy Award-winning soprano Christine Goerke has performed on many of the world’s leading opera stages, including the Metropolitan Opera, Royal Opera House Covent Garden, Opéra national de Paris, Lyric Opera of Chicago, and Teatro alla Scala. She is widely acclaimed for her portrayals of Brünnhilde in Wagner’s Ring Cycle, the title roles in Elektra and Turandot, and other powerhouse roles in the dramatic Strauss and Wagner repertoire. A frequent soloist with major orchestras such as the New York Philharmonic, Boston Symphony, and Chicago Symphony, she has collaborated with conductors including James Levine, Andris Nelsons, and Seiji Ozawa. Her recordings include Grammy-winning performances of Vaughan Williams’ A Sea Symphony and Britten’s War Requiem.

She is a recipient of the Richard Tucker Award, Musical America’s Vocalist of the Year, and the Opera News Award.

Transcript

Marc A. Scorca: It is so good to see you here.

Christine Goerke: Thank you; it's a pleasure to be here.

Marc A. Scorca: I first wanted to start with a question I always start with.

Christine Goerke: Oh dear.

Marc A. Scorca: Who brought you to your first opera?

Christine Goerke: Oh, this is a very, very good one. I was never interested in opera. In fact, I was a clarinet player and I wanted to be a Broadway pit-doubler-type-person for woodwinds. And I managed to learn clarinet, flute, sax, oboe. I was really bad at oboe. I have a friend here who can attest to it, he's heard it. But when I found out that the bassoon had nine thumb fingerings, I said, "That's the end of that". But I was about 13 years old, and I was flipping through the channels on this little black and white television I had in my bedroom. And I came across something, and I thought, "This is beautiful. I wonder what this is". Titles on the bottom of the screen...watched it for a while. My father came up, "What is that?" And I said, "I don't know; I think it's an opera". "Okay". Turns out my first opera was Francesca da Rimini, of all things, but it was fantastic. And then I didn't actually get to go to my first live opera until years later. I was in high school and it was La Bohème at City Opera.

Marc A. Scorca: And you went with friends, or a field trip?

Christine Goerke: I went with friends. And it was just amazing. There's a reason that people say Bohème is a great first opera. It grabbed me by the throat and it did not let go until it was over, and I was hooked.

Marc A. Scorca: Clarinet?

Christine Goerke: Clarinet, sexy instrument (shakes head 'no').

Marc A. Scorca: Well, if someone plays it as well as you sing, it can be.

Christine Goerke: Yeah, I didn't.

Marc A. Scorca: But from your work on those instruments, and thinking about clarinet, has it informed you as a singer in terms of phrasing or breathing?

Christine Goerke: It did. The very interesting thing, in fact, was with woodwind instruments, it does teach you about breathing. I did not study well enough to know exactly what I was doing. It just worked. And it worked from the time I was, you know, eight or nine years old when I started. And I didn't really learn the inner workings of the mechanism of breath. And when I tried to transfer that to singing, I didn't have the information I needed to understand how the support mechanism worked, as far as singing goes. And it's not quite the same when you are playing an instrument, as when you are singing. It has to do with how much text you're using. It has to do with how wet consonants are and things like that. But I was very lucky that I came across a few teachers, and quite a few coaches, who were able to explain it to me very well.

Marc A. Scorca: So, music was a part of your family, that you were interested in playing instruments, or that they said, "You have to study an instrument?"

Christine Goerke: I was interested in third grade when it was the first year they were offering instruments and it was orchestral instruments. So, insert joke here - I was the only one that wanted to play viola. And I went to the first meetings and they said, "Okay, well, you shake your hand and this is how you hold it. You shake your hand". And so I shook my hand for three weeks. My father was determined that I was not going to stick with it, never got me a viola, and so I quit. And then the following year, they offered band instruments. And I came running home and I said, "Dad, I wanna play the flute". And he said, "I really like Artie Shaw, here's a clarinet". I was like, "Oh, no". So, that's how that happened.

Marc A. Scorca: And when you went away to college, it was to study music?

Christine Goerke: It was. I had a remarkable teacher in high school, who was our band director and who taught music theory, and his name was Peter Randazzo. I went to school out on Long Island. (I'm a New Yorker). And he was remarkable. He was so popular, and he made it so much fun and so exciting for people that he had two separate concert bands. This wasn't a gigantic school, but people were so in love with music and so in love with him that they wanted to be part of it. There weren't a lot of us that went on to be musicians, but he was remarkable. And I saw what he could do for students, and I wanted to be part of that. So, I decided I was going to go into music education, and I went to his alma mater, which was SUNY Fredonia, but I decided to start studying then, and within one semester, after doing a sight-singing test, they found that my voice was a lot better than my clarinet playing, which is terribly sad...

Marc A. Scorca: So, you were doing music theory and had to do sight-singing as people have to do, and they listened to you and said, "You know, you have a voice".

Christine Goerke: Yeah. They said, "You should come and audition for the Upper Division choirs". And I said, "I'm 17 and a clarinet major, forget it". But I did, and when I went in, I was one of the only ones they accepted into the Upper Division choirs, and I thought, "Well, I'll just teach chorus", because I was very interested in chorus as well.

Marc A. Scorca: So, still music education...

Christine Goerke: Still music education. And I thought, "Well, I should probably go home because my father's gonna have a heart attack". So I did. And when I got home, I went to Suffolk (County) Community College for a little bit because I couldn't quite make a decision, and I thought, "At least I can keep up my core classes". And while I was there, I started taking a few voice lessons and the consensus was that they thought I could do this. And so I transferred to SUNY Stony Brook, came across my very first voice teacher who was Elaine Bonazzi. She was absolutely remarkable and gave me a spectacular lyric-coloratura technique that served me beautifully for 10 years plus, and it was amazing. And I started auditioning for summer programs from there.

Marc A. Scorca: And it was rooted in that Bohème experience, where opera was something you knew you liked and can relate to, and suddenly you found that you had had a beautiful voice.

Christine Goerke: Well you know, the thing is, (this is an awful thing to say, but I bet you the singers can relate to this) I don't think I have beautiful voice. I can't listen to myself. I can't hear myself. I can't watch myself.

Marc A. Scorca: Really?

Christine Goerke: Really. I hate it. I absolutely hate it. I'm thrilled people hire me, 'cause I have two kids to put through college. But we are so critical of ourselves and we are trained to hear every little thing that's wrong, that after a while it became impossible for me to listen to myself with a clean ear. Does that make any sense?

Marc A. Scorca: Absolutely.

Christine Goerke: So, I am grateful that everybody else likes it.

Marc A. Scorca: So, like in Die Meistersinger, you make the marks on the board.

Christine Goerke: That's it. I keep my own tally of everything; it's awful. And I think, "Oh my God, what kind of face is that? Oh my God, why didn't I make more space on that?" So, I mean, crazy things, but we are thinking these things all the time. And I suppose that's a good thing because that enables us to better ourselves constantly.

Marc A. Scorca: Sure. Well, we'll come back to some of these other skills that you've talked about, because you are such a wonderful actress, and I want to get to how you developed that skill. So in 1994, you're already in important young artist programs. So, people realized that you did have a special gift and right out of college you were into some important young artist programs.

Christine Goerke: I was. It was interesting. In 1993, I auditioned for Glimmerglass and Paul Kellogg was there at the time, and I was given the assignment to understudy Fiordiligi. And that summer was the very first time that I was really exposed to the inner workings of a real company.

Marc A. Scorca: That was '93?

Christine Goerke: It was '93, yeah. '94 is when we met, apparently. The amazing thing about it was, I was surrounded by people who were like me and who were learning, but every single one of us learned in a different way. And we all had different things to bring to the table. And it was an amazing summer, because it was the first time I realized that we don't have to be mimics of each other. We don't have to all be the same. That's the beautiful thing about what we do. Everyone has something special to bring to the table. And I thought, "Right, now it's my job to find out exactly what I have to bring to the table". And it was a great summer, because I got to explore a lot of things. And when you're a young artist... I mean, I encourage anybody who's listening, who's still young/young artist, (not that I'm not young, of course. I'm young, but I'm less young than a lot of you) but take that opportunity to really explore things, make mistakes, make ugly noises, make bad choices, find out what the good things are. This is your chance to do that, and to find out the things that you're amazing at. That summer was great because I started to really find that, at that time, lyric-coloratura things were my thing. And so I started to really sink my teeth into Mozart and Handel. And I had a great time doing that for 10 years. In '94, I was in St. Louis, and I joined the Young Artist Program at The Met in '94 as well.

Marc A. Scorca: The Lindemann program.

Christine Goerke: That's right. In '95, I was at Wolf Trap and I got to sing my first Donna Elvira. And I also sang Nireno in Julius Caesar, dressed like a eunuch. (I will never forgive them for that. There are pictures; that's the worst part of it).

Marc A. Scorca: There is a lot of discussion in the field about the fact that young artist programs aren't necessarily good for large or unusual voices, 'cause the young artist programs, they want singers who can sing in chorus, they want singers who can do ensembles. And those ensembles don't often lend themselves to big, dark voices. But that's not the experience you had from what I'm hearing?

Christine Goerke: But I didn't have that kind of voice when I did this. I feel for big-voiced young singers today. I really understand this. And it is a problem, because when you are looking for people for a young artist program, of course you want to understand that it's a training program, and it is, and you wanna develop young voices, but at the same time, there might be one slot for a big soprano voice, 'cause you'll be covering someone who's singing some role. And it is very difficult for that reason. I will say though, that if you have an opportunity, as a big voice, to get into a young artist program and to be patient - patience is not a virtue of mine - but it really is important when you have a large voice, because it just does take time. Not every big voice will have the facility that mine did when I was younger. That doesn't mean that there's something wrong with it. It means that everybody's voice is different. But it might mean that you're singing things that are not where you're going to end up. And that is difficult, because sometimes it means you have to reign in your instrument to fit into what you're being offered. I'm not really sure whether or not that's a good or bad thing, but every experience that you have, and an opportunity to sort of explore different parts of your voice, that is a helpful thing. And any place that can keep you safe for a little while, if you have a big voice, that's a good thing.

Marc A. Scorca: And by 'keeping safe', I think I know what you mean by that, but explain to us what you mean by 'keeping safe'.

Christine Goerke: If you're 24, please don't run off and start singing Brünnhilde, mostly because I have two kids to put through college, but also because, really...we love this music. Gosh, the first big Wagner thing that I did was Third Norn at The Met, and I remember skulking offstage - you know, it's the best 20 minutes in Wagner, you get to get done in 20 minutes, get a check, everyone's there for five days. So the other two were in their dressing room, picking up their paychecks. But I was standing on the side of the stage and watching, and I thought, "Oh my God, I hope people are right. Oh my God, if they're right someday this will be so amazing". And thank God they were right.

Marc A. Scorca: Because people were telling you early on that...

Christine Goerke: Oh, from the time I was 24 years old. "Oh, you're a dramatic soprano". And my teacher would always say, "You stick your fingers in your ears and you smile and nod, you're a lyric coloratura right now. I don't know what you're gonna be in five years. I dunno what you're gonna be in 10 years, but today this is what you are". And she was absolutely right. We have to pay attention to not only where we think we're going, but what's happening in this moment, because this moment's gonna go away. And if we don't pay attention to this, we will have missed something. You know, if I concentrated on the fact that people told me, "Oh, you'll be a dramatic soprano", I would've missed out on 10 years of the best times of my life.

Marc A. Scorca: In terms of repertoire and roles...

Christine Goerke: Of course. My goodness. I mean, I miss it. I still mourn the fact that there's not a lot of Handel left for me. And I enjoyed it so much, and I enjoyed the Mozart so much.

Marc A. Scorca: And I expect that the repertoire that you learned to do so well in those 10 years, that that technique serves you today, even though you're not singing that repertoire.

Christine Goerke: It does. And in fact, it's very funny because this summer I was the artist-in-residence at Glimmerglass, and as part of that position, I had to give a recital. And I thought it would be great to involve the young artists since I was a young artist there. It was the reason I went back. And so we did some scenes from things that I did at the company. And as an encore, insanity, I decided to give 'Come scoglio' a shot.

Marc A. Scorca: Oh my goodness.

Christine Goerke: Well, that's what I thought. And I literally said to the audience, "I don't know if this is gonna fly, but clap anyway."

Marc A. Scorca: When was the last time you had sung it?

Christine Goerke: Probably...

Marc A. Scorca: Years?

Christine Goerke: Easily, five years before.

Marc A. Scorca: You just went out there and sang it.

Christine Goerke: For a joke. We tried it out when we were rehearsing and we both went (silent look of incredulity). I said, "Do those triplets come out?" And I said, "Okay, well, I mean, you know, it's just one day and there's cows surrounding us, so how bad can this be? Let's give it a shot". And it came out and I was so excited that I literally did a Mary Catherine Gallagher (raises her hands above her head) right in the middle of it, I was so proud of myself. And I thought, "Oh my gosh, my coloratura is still working". So, because of that, I decided to start looking at things that had a little more coloratura in it, and I'm nosing around Lady Macbeth at the moment, because it's still moving. And somehow I still have a D flat, so I better do it now.

Marc A. Scorca: I'm gonna go out of order a little bit, because as you enter into some of the repertoire that you're doing, you are in the realm of the famous, the legendary singers, which is only a little bit of pressure.

Christine Goerke: Yeah. No, not at all. Thanks so much.

Marc A. Scorca: And when we think about someone like, let's say (Birgit) Nilsson, who sang so many Brünnhildes. In between would be Donna Annas and Mozart. Do you think about some of those lighter roles or roles that would use your coloratura in between the heavier roles?

Christine Goerke: Absolutely. But I have to say that gone are the days that people would let you sing Brünnhilde and Sieglinde on opposite nights, and would let you go back and forth between Brünnhilde and Donna Anna. I've sung Donna Anna, but I really identify with being an Elvira. I'd love to sing another Elvira, but Mozart is such an ensemble-based composition. How do you find a cast that is not going to be unbalanced by somebody? And for me, that ends up being the problem with Mozart. I desperately love it, but I love it too much for me to destroy ensembles.

Marc A. Scorca: It's interesting because when you listen to those old Nilsson recordings, they certainly weren't perfect Mozart singing. We've become much more exacting today.

Christine Goerke: Well, it comes and goes in different waves. I mean, we are in a time right now where the lighter, flexible voice and the original instruments are being favored. If we go back 70 years, it was a different animal. I always laugh because we're talking about Donna Anna and people talking about dramatic sopranos singing it. It was really written for a very light voice; it was written for a coloratura. And then in the '50's they decided, "Well, why don't you sing this?" But in fact, what that does is instead of having a pyramid in an ensemble (makes pyramid shape with hands), it does this (flips shape over so apex is now pointing down). So that's very difficult to find a huge voice that can do this, on the top. And I'm too much of a theory geek, and I just pay too much attention to these things. I can't bear the idea of toppling the pyramid.

Marc A. Scorca: Let's talk about your wonderful stage presence. You are a wonderful actress. And we saw it all in Frau ohne Schatten. It was really spectacular.

Christine Goerke: Thank you so much.

Marc A. Scorca: And is that a separate course of study you follow? Did you come to it naturally?

Christine Goerke: Unfortunately, I came to it naturally. I was very shy. I know you're gonna laugh at that, but I really was. I was very introverted in high school, and it's not so easy to be a six-foot girl when you're in 10th grade. Between that and bari sax, I didn't get a lot of dates. But it was easier for me to withdraw and go away from being around other people. And I started to understand that I could let a lot of emotions out in front of people, and leave them there and walk away from it, if that makes any sense. And I was free on the stage. I am free on the stage. It's amazing, the minute I step out on that stage, then I get to leave everything that's crazy in my life behind for three hours.

Marc A. Scorca: And be crazier on stage.

Christine Goerke: And be crazier, and get paid for it, yay. But truly, it's kind of remarkable because the great actors and actresses, they're usually the most screwed up in real life. Everyone has to bring something from themselves, from their soul through the character that they're playing. So you may think you're looking at a character, but you're really seeing a lot more than that. And it's the people who can connect to that, inside of themselves that really bring out something really important.

Marc A. Scorca: Do you discover the character first through the words, or first through the music?

Christine Goerke: I think definitely the words. I have to know exactly what's going on, because the thing that's funny about the text being set a certain way - when you pay attention to the way that the text is set, you are hearing what the composer thought of the text, and then you need to decide what you think about the text. And then you have to make a decision as to whether or not you're gonna go with what the composer said about the text, or you're going to go against what the composer said about the text. If you choose to go against the music, then you have to have a really good reason to do that. How can you make that work? What is accented in the music? What words are accented? Does that work with your thinking? There's a lot to consider as far as that goes. And I am either the best person you wanna be on stage with, or the worst, because I never do the same thing twice. And people usually just give up and follow me with a spot, 'cause (gestures confusion). But it's very interesting, because I love to be able to react to what's coming at me from other characters. And if someone changes their interpretation even a little bit one night, then that changes what I'm thinking next. I mean, that's why live theater is so remarkable.

Marc A. Scorca: Learning a role, starting with words first?

Christine Goerke: First, I translate everything, and then I listen to it all the way through, and usually the music goes in my head quite quickly. Text takes more time for me, so I listen to everything. The music will go in, and then I will take a little book, (my favorite little TJ Maxx Marshalls books that you get for $4.99) and I write all the text out by hand, and somehow or another, putting pen to paper...

Marc A. Scorca: It then imprints it.

Christine Goerke: And then I put the score away and I sing outta the little book that I've written.

Marc A. Scorca: Because the music is in your head. That's fantastic.

Christine Goerke: And then if I sort of feel like I'm getting lost, I literally can see what I've written.

Marc A. Scorca: So in 2001, The Richard Tucker Award. How does an award like that change the trajectory of your career?

Christine Goerke: Oh, it's gigantic. We were literally just talking about this today, that I never wanted to sort of be a household name. I never wanted to be famous; I just wanted to sing and pay my bills. And I was so excited that I was doing that. I wasn't saving a ton of money, but I was paying my bills doing what I loved, and that was amazing. And I was in Japan singing Così (fan tutte), like you do. And my phone rang at some weird hour, and I picked it up and I said, "Hello". "Christine". "Yes". "Barry Tucker". I went, "Hello". "So, you're our winner this year". I believe I went, "Holy shit". Then I went, "Oh my God, I'm so sorry". And he said, "No, I think that was appropriate, actually". And it was completely remarkable. I never dreamed for a minute that that would happen. I never dreamed that for a minute anything from that moment forward would happen. I have to say that the Tucker Foundation and the people who work for it, all of the people who won awards, it's like a family. And somehow or another, you've become part of this amazing family. And it's amazing to have that kind of support and friendship to lean on.

Marc A. Scorca: I haven't done the research, but eight years from a first young artist program in 1993 to 2001 is probably a record time to get a Richard Tucker.

Christine Goerke: Really?

Marc A. Scorca: We'll research it. I'll let you know. Let's talk about fach change.

Christine Goerke: Yeah, let's do that.

Marc A. Scorca: So, you are now singing the meatiest repertoire there is to sing, and you're singing it beautifully. You're singing it with a healthy voice. It's really clear. And yet you are a lyric coloratura for many years. And then there were some years in between where things weren't working as you wanted them to. What was that like? What was happening and how did you deal with it?

Christine Goerke: It was terrifying. I am nothing if not fastidious about how I work and how hard I work on my craft, about understanding what I do about technical things. And like I said, from the time I was 24, people would say, "Oh, well, you're a dramatic soprano". So on the odd chance they were right, of course, I read up on the voice and I started to understand that there was gonna be a moment where there was gonna be a big gear change, and I would have to sort of stop, retool and go into different repertoire. But as I understood, it was sort of late 30's, early 40's, when that really starts to happen. Well, don't read books. So, that started happening when I was about 32. And I had no idea what was wrong. Suddenly my breath felt short, my pitch was weird, and that never was happening. I was exhausted, my throat was tired, and I could not figure out what was wrong. And for the life of me, I thought, "Well, I broke it". And I know that sounds silly, but I mean singers are so crazy, right? But I really thought, "I don't know what's wrong because I'm doing everything the way I'm supposed to".

Marc A. Scorca: And your voice and your body just weren't behaving?

Christine Goerke: No. Everything that I normally did, I was doing, I thought. And basically I thought, "Right, I have to make a change in my technique, or I'm gonna quit, and I have to make a try, and if I have to walk away now " (I literally had this conversation with myself) "I'm gonna be so proud of everything that I've done already, because what I've accomplished already is so unbelievable and so much more than I ever hoped to accomplish in my entire life". And I didn't believe a word of that, but I tried and I thought, "Right, okay". So I went and took some lessons with a few people, and I remembered a masterclass that I had when I was in the Lindemann program with Diana Soviero. And I knew she had started teaching. And I called her up and I asked to have a lesson. I was so tied up in knots in my head and in my gut, I couldn't get through Zueignung, three pages of Strauss. I was so terrified. And I barely got through it. And I was in tears. And she just looked at me and she said, "I have no idea why you've disconnected from your support, but that has to stop". And I thought, "What are you talking about?" It took a month for us to really figure out what had happened. And there was no giant crisis. I didn't break anything. There was nothing wrong. My voice had gotten so much bigger than it was, so much quicker than I had expected that (now this is actually kind of a smart thing) I had literally started coming off of my support to try and keep it in a narrow column to be able to sing the coloratura. So little by little, I'm singing off my support and higher and higher and higher. So my pitch is getting weird; my throat is feeling uncomfortable; I'm getting tired; my breath is weird. Perfect sense. The minute I reconnected to my support, all of a sudden I found there was twice the voice and the next month, it was twice of that. Twice again, twice again. And Diana made me laugh. She goes, "Oh my God, I can't teach you in here, you're too loud. We gotta find another room". So, off we went to another room. And, you know, within a couple of months, it really became clear that nothing was broken. It was just time to move on.

Marc A. Scorca: And were you doing engagements at this time?

Christine Goerke: I was. I was trying to work through all of this. And in fact, when I went to her the very first day, she said, "You just have to reconnect to your support". And I said, "Okay, I have a new production of Don Giovanni at The Met in three months, and if you can't fix this, I'm gonna quit singing". And she said, "Great, no pressure. Come back tomorrow". And here I am, so thank God for that woman.

Marc A. Scorca: And so you had to fulfill engagements that you were contracted to do that were old-voice engagements, as you began to take on new-voice engagements.

Christine Goerke: Well, exactly. But you know, the funny thing was, it wasn't necessarily an issue of old voice versus new voice. It was an issue that - over that year, I started disconnecting from my support. The minute I started reconnecting to the support, yes, I had to readjust things technically, but automatically everything went back the way it was supposed to. Now, I had to start readjusting it for the repertoire changes, but it really just became an issue of getting underneath this huge instrument that was waiting to come out, and it just happened a lot sooner than I was expecting.

Marc A. Scorca: So, we know you miss a little bit of the old repertoire. What do you enjoy about the new repertoire?

Christine Goerke: Everything. Oh my God, who gets to do this? Like, six of us; I'm so excited. I have loved this repertoire. I never dared to think that this is where I was going, though. When people say, "Oh, you're going to be this", you kind of hope, but you don't wanna get your hopes up too high, because if they're wrong, then you're heartbroken. But boy, I love this repertoire and I loved The Ring, and I prayed someday I was gonna get to sing Brünnhilde. And I remember sort of skulking offstage after a performance of Götterdämmerung, and being on the side of the stage and watching Jane Eaglen sing the prologue to Götterdämmerung, and I thought "This might be some of the most beautiful music that was ever written. And how many people get to sing this?" I am so lucky. I'm so lucky. Every time I go out on stage and I hear 120 pieces playing, or some crazy thing, I think, "Oh my God, even if this is the last time I do this, that's amazing".

Marc A. Scorca: And again, because you're singing this repertoire, you are in a class of singer, you are at the top of a pyramid that is quite small, so that yes, you are then compared to legends. You listen to legends, if you listen to the recordings. How does that work on you personally?

Christine Goerke: I could never put myself in a category with any of those people. I couldn't. I don't dare to do that. I just know what I can do. And I try to do the very best that I can, and I put my entire soul into it every single time I walk out there. It's hard because in fact, in any given generation, there's a handful of people that sing this repertoire. So, you will always be compared to somebody. But this is a very individualized kind of repertoire. And every single person that has sung it - and think of your favorites - none of them sound the same. And there's something beautiful and astonishing and powerful about every single one of them. And people say, "Who's your favorite Brünnhilde?" Who's your favorite Brünnhilde?

Marc A. Scorca: It depends on...

Christine Goerke: See, it depends on what you're listening for.

Marc A. Scorca: What I'm listening for, which recording, which interpretation, what mood I'm in.

Christine Goerke: Exactly right. And that's the thing. I mean, do I have somebody that I like to listen to in that repertoire? I love (Astrid) Varnay. I love Varney. For me, there's something about the color of that instrument that just grabs my heart. I think it's remarkable. I love Nilsson. I had the opportunity to hear her live once, and I almost had a heart attack. It was Maestro Levine's 25th anniversary gala at The Met. And I was terrified. I had to go in for (Teresa) Stratas. Oh my God, that lineup. And I was like, 26. I was like, "Oh my God, where's the bathroom?" But I managed to find a place to hide by the curtain, on the side so I could see the stage. And I didn't have to actually see any of these people, 'cause I was having a heart attack. And then she came out and she spoke to him, and I thought, "Oh my God, it's Nilsson. Oh my God". And then she sang a 'Hojotoho', and tears started streaming down my face, and I thought, "Thank God I got to hear this live once. Thank God". It was astonishing. And she was the nicest woman.

Marc A. Scorca: Now you talk about getting nervous. Do you get nervous, or do you get excited?

Christine Goerke: I get excited, but my nerves are funny before I go on stage. I could have just sung the entire role the day before, but I'll be standing on stage, and have to run to the stage manager and say, "Can I see your score?" And they'll say, "You just sang the..." "Shut up and give me your score". "I can't remember any of...I will take you down". Stage managers, beware. I cannot remember the first few pages. And usually I'm standing there going, "Oh God, I hope it's in there", and I just walk out. Of course it's in there, but that's what my nerves do to me.

Marc A. Scorca: Absolutely. So what are you thinking about as rep between the big rep?

Christine Goerke: Yeah. Well, Fantine of course.

Marc A. Scorca: Typecasting all the way.

Christine Goerke: I know, right? It's amazing. No, it's very difficult, and this is something that is interesting. I was talking earlier about the fact that years ago people would understand if you would flip-flop back and forth between jugendlich things and hochdramatisch things, but we don't do that anymore. And it kind of breaks my heart because I think not only is it interesting, but it's healthy. But I knew once I stepped over the line and I sang my first Elektra, there was no backing up again. So, it becomes an issue of trying to make sure that there are spaces between my engagements, making sure that I have periods to rest, making sure that I have periods to really learn the pieces as well as I need to. And for me, that means I also need to be able to spend time with an orchestral score, if something's new. I need to know what instruments are doubling me. I need to know what colors are coming out of the orchestra. I need to know what text is matching, what colors, so that everything is informed. So, that takes a lot of time. As far as things in between, I have a lot of German rep, but there are some Italian things that I would like to be able to do. And it's hard when you sort of get pigeonholed - like that's a big problem; this repertoire is amazing - but you start singing this German repertoire and you become known for the German repertoire.

Marc A. Scorca: And then Florencia in Washington.

Christine Goerke: And then Florencia also. That was fun. What a great piece.

Marc A. Scorca: It really is.

Christine Goerke: My gosh, I love it so much. It's so beautiful and it's lush and gorgeous. And what a great experience.

Marc A. Scorca: Have you done other new work like Florencia?

Christine Goerke: I haven't, and I'm really anxious to do that actually. I spent all that time in sight-singing classes. I totally need to use it. (It's like parallel parking). So I'm hoping that I'll be able to actually use them.

Marc A. Scorca: Producers take note: interest in new works. No, Florencia is a wonderful piece. You mentioned that you went back to Glimmerglass. And there you were in 1993 as a young artist, and then 2014 as the visiting guest artist. You were doing Ariadne, which was wonderful, and I saw it. 21 years later, and there you are giving advice to young singers. What did that feel like?

Christine Goerke: Old. Really old, but it was wonderful actually, because I stood where they were standing. I know what it feels like in that specific situation. And it was very cool, because I also was able to have a moment with a couple of them that were really having not vocal issues, just sort of career issues, trying to make decisions about how to go forward. And it was really great, because a couple I had over to where I was staying, and we sat down and just sat outside and chatted for a couple of hours. And I thought, "I wish I had this when I was in young artist programs. I wish I had an opportunity to sit down for three hours with somebody who's out there doing it". And I was so proud of being able to be a part of that.

Marc A. Scorca: What advice did you give them? And of course it's going to be one-on-one advice, individual singers, but general advice. What advice did you give them?

Christine Goerke: Persistence, patience. Don't run at the things that you think you're going to be singing too soon. It's very difficult to hold back.

Marc A. Scorca: Did people want to drag you into the wrong repertoire?

Christine Goerke: Not drag me. And I mean it wasn't the wrong repertoire in the end; it just wasn't time. I think that there is something that somebody told me, who is in my repertoire and who's quite a few years ahead of me, but it was very interesting advice and it was very interesting information. This is somebody who's an American, who basically made their career in Europe and who's lived there for a long time. And basically she said, "Please don't be obsessed by the numbers. Don't be obsessed about, 'I can't sing this role until I'm X age'. Because in fact, that's not really what is important. What is important is understanding what your voice does, making sure your technique is rock solid to do it. Because if both of those things don't happen, then you won't be able to accomplish what you're trying to accomplish. But also don't be afraid". Now that's easy to say, if there's a house that seats 800 people. But if there's a house that seats 2,500 people or 4,000 people, it's a very different animal. And I think that's why we're a lot more cautious when we are looking into when we start singing things in this country. Our houses are a lot bigger. But that said, there are things that I started working on when I was really young that I knew I wasn't going to be singing. And so there were a few singers who have very big voices, and they came to me with things that I knew were not for primetime yet. And they're like, "Well, I mean, I kind of have this". And I said, "Cool, let's look at it. Great". "Well, I don't know. I can't figure this out". And I was like, "So? This is exactly the time for you to be doing that. This is fantastic. Try it out. Make the mistakes. Learn from what you can and can't do right now. And then find the things that you can and put this on the back burner. Take it out next year and see if it's ready yet". That's what we do.

Marc A. Scorca: Do you still see a teacher?

Christine Goerke: Oh God, yes. Oh yes. She kicks my butt every time I go in there.

Marc A. Scorca: Is it still Diana?

Christine Goerke: Oh yeah, and it's funny because in fact, with every new thing, and what's cool about that is when I went to study with her, people were very confused by that choice. "She doesn't sing anything that you sing. She never did any of this stuff". And I said, "Well, I don't need her to do my repertoire. I need her to teach me technique". And that's something that is the most important. I go to my coaches for my repertoire, and to polish the repertoire. But I go to my teacher to learn technique.

Marc A. Scorca: I think young singers imagine that there's a point at which they're finished.

Christine Goerke: Oh God, no.

Marc A. Scorca: And one of the things that we try to talk about in our own training programs is, it never is finished.

Christine Goerke: It's never finished. Your voice changes every day of your life. You know, you get through your training and you get out there, and then all of a sudden, if you have a bigger voice, maybe you hit 32 or 33 and everything falls apart and you have to retool everything. And then maybe you sing something else, or maybe you are a coloratura and you're gonna be singing a bunch of stuff and at some point you decide, "Now I'm gonna be a lyric singer and I'm gonna be a lyric soprano, and these are the roles I wanna go into". You have to go and work your way through that. Same thing with tenors, baritones, everything. Our voice changes every single day of our lives. And wait until you get old and all of a sudden you're looking perimenopause in the face, and then you gotta study some more.

Marc A. Scorca: There's always Klytemnestra.

Christine Goerke: There is; you see? Going straight down...

Marc A. Scorca: Look at (Anna) Netrebko today, who's done a big fach change. 43 years old, it was reported in The New York Times - it's a big shift. And probably she's been working with a teacher as well, Iearning how to sing that new repertoire. It never stops.

Christine Goerke: It never stops. It never does.

Marc A. Scorca: What's coming up that you're particularly excited about?

Christine Goerke: Oh God. I have my Ring cycles coming up now. I'm starting into all of my Walküres...

Marc A. Scorca: Ring cycles, plural. It's four of them?

Christine Goerke: Yeah.

Marc A. Scorca: And I guess the first starts this winter.

Christine Goerke: It does. They're spread out over the three years. Some of them are already started obviously, but I have COC (Canadian Opera) starting with Walküre this year. And then I have a little break, and then I go down to Houston to do Walküre as well. And I am so excited. I had done semi-staged concert performances, which ended up being kind of really staged, of Walküre before. But this is the first time I'll actually get my hands on a spear, which I'm really excited about.

Marc A. Scorca: That's just absolutely wonderful.

Christine Goerke: You know, I'm overjoyed.

Marc A. Scorca: It shows. It's just great to see that. And does your family love what you're doing now?

Christine Goerke: They do. The thing is, I have two daughters. They're five and seven, and I never try to sort of drag them in. I want them to be aware of what I do, but at this age, I just want them to know that mommy's around. So I expose them to music. I'm sort of terrified by the fact that music is being cut from schools left and right, and that leaves the responsibility on me to expose them to things. And I took them to their first opera this past year. I took them to the family version of The Magic Flute.

Marc A. Scorca: So they have not seen you perform on stage?

Christine Goerke: If you sang Elektra, would you bring your kids? I mean, I'm already bad cop, but I don't wanna scare them that much. But they've seen me in costume beforehand, and they're like, "Mom, that blood looks so fake".

Marc A. Scorca: Now, I heard a story about the blood in Chicago.

Christine Goerke: There was an issue with the blood in Chicago. It was a specially designed blood (like you get) because there were a large set of steps and it had to flow down the steps at the end. So it was a particular viscosity (that's an SAT word) and it also came from a special studio. Now, the first time I was like all into it. I was like, "Great", so I grabbed it and I rubbed it all up on me, and put it all on my face and came off and I went, "Is this supposed to come off?" I don't even remember which of the 14 things we tried finally took it off. But I was kind of hoping I'd have to go home like that, and get pulled over. Like, "Here's my license and registration".

Marc A. Scorca: Drew Landmesser today told me the story. He was upstairs, and he said there was another scream offstage.

Christine Goerke: Yeah. There was a lot of screaming actually.

Marc A. Scorca: It was a wonderful, wonderful story. It is so marvelous to speak with someone who has such a great sense of humor and is so grounded, even as we see you up playing these crazy characters. Are there questions for Christine?

Audience Member #1:

Regarding the fach switch, whenever you decided to do that, who did you have helping you as far as your career is concerned with getting auditions, with getting some credibility to this new idea?

Marc A. Scorca: Did you stay with the same manager? Did you have to re-audition in this new voice?

Christine Goerke: I did have to re-audition in the new voice. It would only make sense. I was never offended by that. But if someone's casting a Dutchman and they'd say, "We'd like to offer this Fiordiligi", I mean, who's gonna buy that? So, I did. But I have to say about the auditioning, I hadn't been doing it for about six or seven years. I was a rockstar at auditions. I'd roll outta bed and go sing my stuff, be like, "Hey, have a good day", and take off. But I was terrified. I'd never been terrified before, and going into an audition, and being scared - we've all been there. But we know that it doesn't produce our best product and it doesn't show the confidence that someone hiring us needs to see, to understand that we can hold a 2000 seat house. So, I actually saw a sports psychologist for a little while and that really helped me because I got back on my game and I started to have my confidence back underneath me. People were very concerned that it was broken, and I completely understood that. But I had a lot of convincing to do and that was difficult. I am very lucky, because I have the best manager in the business. And I'm not just saying that 'cause she's here, but she is. But I'm very, very lucky. And it is so important to find the right person. And I will tell you that there is a difference between agents and managers, and there's nothing wrong with either, but you have to know what you need. If you want somebody who's gonna get out there and scramble for work for you, there are a lot of people who will do that and that's totally fine. But there are also people that will help you manage your career and there really is a difference between the two. And I'm very lucky to have a great manager.

Marc A. Scorca: Other questions?

Audience Member #2:

When you were talking about when this change happened to you - I mean, it wasn't a choice, it just happened to you - and you talked of learning from the teacher that you had come off your support and you weren't even aware that you'd done that (I guess it was compensatory behavior of some kind) and you said, "Well, once I learned that, it came back". Was it really that simple? What did it feel like when that happened to you?

Christine Goerke: Strangely, it really was that simple. I know it sounds like it wouldn't be. It's not that simple to make sure that you're connecting to your support all the time. But once I did reconnect to it, it really was that simple. And then it's always an issue of understanding the size of the instrument and making space for it. I talk a lot about - this is so singer-talk - point or focus and space in the back and finding the amount of space you need for your instrument without letting your sound fall backwards and still having the focus in the front, that is all connected to your support. So what I now do that I understand all of this, is I play percentages and it helps me to be healthy when there's a huge orchestra. Support always has to be connected. But if there's a gigantic orchestra and it's bity text, I can tilt more this way and use more point, which doesn't use more voice, it just makes it more pointy, which cuts more. If I need less point and I wanna change a color, I can lean back a little bit further and I'm still not working harder here or here (indicates diaphragm and throat) it just changes the sound. I learned about that after I reconnected to the support. But in fact, the big sentence was, "You can't go up without going down". Everything this way (indicates downward). Everything has to be anchored in order to go up. And I did a lot of things. I was making very strange faces, I was pushing on walls, I moved pianos. We do weird things in lessons, people, but it worked, because it helped me engage. For those of you who are not singers, try pushing on a wall and feel what muscles you use. I promise you, you'll know exactly where we're supporting from, or if you just bend your knees a little bit, you'll feel how low you have to support. You also may need the trip to the ladies, but that's how low we have to support. But once I figured that out, it really all came at me very quickly. And then it was an issue of changing repertoire and learning this new repertoire for me and something that was wonderful - and I credit Diana Soviero for this - that woman won't let me sing a lick of German repertoire without thinking about Bel Canto technique. And the thing is, Wagner was one of the biggest fans of the Bel Canto repertoire. You cannot possibly sing this repertoire without line. You'll kill yourself. So I'm very lucky to have that lady in my life who's just kicking me anytime I give it a shot.

Audience Member #3:

You have a legendary sense of humor, and there are times on stage, I've heard, when people play jokes on each other, have little jokes going on. And maybe one story?

Christine Goerke: I don't know what you're talking about, I would totally never do that to Ruth Ann Swenson. So, somebody mistakenly gave me the opportunity to be Musetta, swear to God. I made Mimì look so good. And poor thing, Ruth Ann Swenson was singing her first Mimì and out I come with a muff - come on, you would too. So I'm like, "Here you go". And she's like, "Oh jeez". Every night I put something else in it. There was a hard boiled egg. There was a hot dog; I had a sausage. You know those weird things that you go like this and they are with filled with water? That was in there one night; that was a winner.

Marc A. Scorca: And she's dying...

Christine Goerke: Oh yeah. And I was like, "I'm gonna go sell these earrings; you enjoy that". That was one of the more tame ones, and I'm not telling you any more.

Marc A. Scorca: That is wonderful. Well, it is so refreshing to speak with a great artist, vocalist of the year. Thank you so much for being with us tonight.

Christine Goerke: Thank you so much.