_{Artist of the Week} 14 Qs for Guillermo Silva-Marin

When was your first singing lesson (and with whom)?
Charles Yonginer in Columbia, South Carolina gave me my first voice lessons while I was a recruit in the USA Army. Within six months, he wanted me to audition for the South Carolina Opera Company. Unfortunately, I deserted from the Army and fortunately came to Canada.

Top 3 favourite composers?
Bach, Mozart and Verdi struck me like pretty darn attractive guys.

Which opera role do you want to be singing right now?
I’ve run the gamut of possible roles from baritones to tenors as my rebellious vocal chords would have it, first singing over 40 performances of Figaro in Rossini’s The Barber of Seville on a COC Tour, Papa Germont in Verdi’s La traviata and then skip/jump to craziness as Tonio in Donizetti’s The Daughter of the Regiment and to a true favourite, Nemorino in Donizetti’s Elixir of Love, because he was cute, gullible, and accessible to bel canto.

Who is a singer you admire that is currently working?
Diplomatically, I admire all singers today, especially the ones who work hard and take seriously the axiom “loving the arts in them than loving themselves in the arts.” It’s a tough trek to success on stage and maintain a career. Working harder is even better.

Who is a singer you admired from the past?
Maria Callas is a favourite because she was audacious, careless, daring and vulnerable in spite of the bad publicity. She simply fulfilled the needs of those in pursuit of scandal.

What’s the strangest/funniest thing that has happened to you on stage?
Experiences on stage must include one of my COC tours in the 1980s when the cast of La bohème rushed to the unknown theatre, somewhere in the mid-west USA, dressed, made-up, and rushed to the stage for Act One just to find out that our painted floor mat covering the Marcello/Rodolfo garret had inflated about half a foot above the stage floor, all due to the theatre’s ventilation system. Rodolfo and I, walked as if over puffy clouds, sometimes lifting our legs up while waiting for Colline and Schaunard’s reactions and restrained laughter.

What is one surprising thing that you have learned in becoming an opera singer?
I soon came to realized that North Americans are usually taller than Puerto Ricans. Hiding behind tall baritones did not work for me. I was always found out and called forward to the front of the stage. Being 5’6” tall proved to be an advantage. I wound up placed in precarious, if not, truly dangerous locations: on top of barrels, hanging from branches, straddling tall muscular baritone shoulders and the like that led to casting opportunities once stage directors and Herman Geigel-Torel boss at COC, found I could act and “ham away” shamelessly.

What was the first opera you ever saw?
Puerto Rico had two opera companies while I studied at the Rio Piedras main University campus. However, I found that the university library had about five operas I could listen to during hours I should have spent on physics or chemistry. My imagination was fertile and yes, I saw Brittain’s Peter Grimes and Verdi’s Il trovatore by burning the needle to the vinyl far too often. When I actually saw these operas for the first time in Canada, years later, they were as familiar as pillows on my bed.

What’s your ancestry?
Opera was a strange thing at home. Nothing could have been farther from our traditional music of danzas, salsa, boleros and the influential and ever encroachment of the American sounds coming from Neil Sedaka, Frank Sinatra, Doris Day and Della Reese. I can’t say how bizarre was my incursion into opera but I was never criticized by mother, father and siblings. I was simply a strange boy.

What’s your favourite movie?
I love movies but shy away from those that use handheld camera technique. Economics set me up to attend movies because as a youth, I could attend with 10 cents and ten Coca-Cola caps. The big hits were favoured: My Fair Lady, Ben Hur, The Sound of Music, West Side Story, you get the drift. 

What’s the luckiest thing that has ever happened to you?
I was hired to cover for tenor Michele Strano and perform two out of eight shows of Franz Lehar’s The Land of Smile at Bayview Playhouse in in 1984. I should have kept my mouth shut but, always eager to interfere in matters concerning productions, I offered to help. The show went well, and the Ontario Multicultural Theatre Association requested an interview. I was offered the position of artistic director and, knowing that it was going to interfere with my singing career, I accepted. I knew little about operetta but that was not going to stop me if I could promote engagements of friends and artists more talented than I. Lucky yes, and forty years later, still lucky.

What is the best advice you have ever been given?
Since transferring my attention from singing on stage to working backstage I have learned a few things that hampered, if not slowed-down career advancement for many of my colleagues. I learned soon enough that offering unsolicited advice was detrimental to my health. I am a big admirer of Konstantin Stanislavskyi and cherish his 40 odd years’ journey in the theatre. I have been paid for my advice and even in such circumstances, I know that professional and personal counsel are truly different from each other given the high sensitivity of artists in need and artist’s perceived limitations. When in doubt, don’t offer unsolicited advice.

The music industry is tough, and filled with rejection. How do you cope? Does it get easier?
I can honestly say that rejection has played little part in my career as a singer and as a producer, though I admit, there have been some. My interests have been diverse and somewhat eclectic. My singing career was promising but my eye roved far too often. I think this kept me sane and away from regrets. Wearing blinkers or blinders might help an artist focus on a given goal. Realistic expectations might eventually clash with achievements. Time to look elsewhere as many have done. My main goal was to sing at the Met and Scaramuccio in Strauss’ Ariadne auf Naxos came along. That goal was reached but did not keep me from foolish and exciting projects. I found satisfaction as head of TOT, Opera in Concert and Summer Opera Lyric Theatre. My advice? Go where you are needed. You’ll be young forever.

What does it mean to be brave with music?
Back to Maria Callas. To dare is to be audacious and to be audacious is to be brave. Music, opera and the stage demand audacity. You can fear and yet not be debilitated by it. Music, opera and theatre are challenging platforms of your choice. The “go for it” approach leads to success and even if failure shares the spot on a given moment, be audacious. The next moment will help opera be relevant and important to us all.