Madness at the MET

Written in 2021, and prompted by a letter from a friend I found in the voice box. This story is about my time at the Metropolitan Opera and how I ended up in a pile of dirt in 2010.

If it’s true that we create our own reality, I'm not sure where the seed was sown that led to me ending up in a pile of dirt on the Metropolitan Opera stage.

The evening of magic had occurred the previous week when I went on for Diana Damrau in La Fille du Regiment. (You can read that nail-biter here.)

I was riding an extremely radiant and adrenaline-pumping high. Everywhere I went inside the MET, people congratulated me. I had conquered the beast, met some fearful artistic challenges, and saved the day. I felt that my talents and iron-clad nerves of steel had been proven and that I was now on top. (If you’re short on time for that blog, I went on at the last minute for Diana Damrau in La Fille du Regiment.)

I had started to let go of the shame that had occurred when I was nearly fired in Thaïs. I even had some wild thoughts of having solidified my place among the untouchables. To me, untouchables are those who rarely, if ever, get any feedback from music staff, are treated with dignity, and are given some creative license over their process and performance. They aren't easily fireable and can get away with most anything, even not showing up for rehearsals for long periods of time.

Within a week of my jump-in for Diana Damrau, I started covering Natalie Dessay in a new production of Hamlet. It was a stellar cast, full of singers I admired when coming up through graduate school and young artist ranks. It would be the first time in 113 years that the MET had produced this opera. Excitement and anticipation abounded!

The lovely, kind and superbly talented Jennifer Larmore was Gertrude, and the iconic bass James Morris was Claudius. They were legends, and I would get to hang out with them for weeks. Simon Keenlyside was making his debut as Hamlet in NYC, and with all of his success in Europe, everyone was eager to watch him work and see what all the fuss was about.

The production was created and directed by Patrice Caurier and Moshe Leiser, and moving forward, they will be known as the French directors. The conductor was Louis Langreé.

I received notice two days before the rehearsals were to start that Natalie would not be arriving at the start of the rehearsal process and that I was to be ready to take her place in the staging rehearsals if needed. I was immediately given coachings every day with the French coach to continue to polish diction and the style of the opera and, as we do in the classical music realm, try to perfect it to the nth degree.

I had been ready for months, but it felt reassuring to be given all this attention because I felt I would most likely get to sing and participate in the process at some point, especially now that I was trusted and had proven I could handle high-stress situations like nearly being fired and going on at the last minute.

On the first day of rehearsals, the cast gathered, as is customary, in the bowels of the Met, C-stage as it’s known, to have a meet and greet, hear concept developments from the directors, and possibly start work on the music. It was a day much like the first day of Thaïs, where I was in awe of the careers around me and elated to be among such an extraordinary group of singers. I was delighted to be with my fellow Georgian, Jennifer Larmore. We had previously met, and I was comforted to have her positivity and warmth in the room.

There was a music rehearsal, but the Ophelia music was skipped since Natalie wasn't there. During duets or larger ensembles, I was not asked to sing. I sat there prepared, on edge, and very eager to please should I be needed.

Stagings began the next day, and there was no word when Natalie would arrive. I was called again to rehearsal to watch, but the staging for Ophelia was done by one of the French directors walking the part, and the coach from the piano spoke/sang the Ophelia part. I sat in the corner and wrote in the staging.

Stagings went on like this for a week or so. I attended, watched, and took notes. I remained outwardly positive, and even though it was starting to hurt my feelings not to be invited to participate in a job I was hired to do, I was stoic. I didn’t ask any questions because there was an air of angst about, an unsaid worry among the power ranks, and it seemed that the last thing they needed was a hungry soprano begging for performance meat.

One day I was allowed to participate in the trio with James Morris and Jennifer Larmore, and I got to be the Ophelia body in the chorus staging. The conductor and the director gave me zero feedback. They worked with Jenny and Mr. Morris, but it was as if I wasn’t even there. I was nonplussed and kept going through the motions like everyone in this musical world had been taught to do. Smile, do good work, and keep going.

After two weeks, we were told that Natalie would arrive in another week. At that point, there was talk bubbling through the MET about what was going on with her.

As I mentioned in my blog about covering Diana, I also covered Natalie in 2006 in Paris when she was reportedly recovering from vocal distress. She sang every single one of those 11 performances in Paris of Lucia di Lammermoor. Still, talk in chat rooms and the MET cafeteria had never subsided on her vocal health status.

She was one of my opera idols. I was worried for her, and in the back of my mind kept going through all of the possible scenarios.

I was also looking forward to seeing her work again. She is the most riveting actress, and the way she moves on stage is profound. She is a master at body language and painting pictures with movement, like a dancer, yes, but completely motivated by what the gesture needs vocally first, which was a huge part of her vocal technique and what made her so unique. It’s like her voice was an extension of a limb. She embodied her entire instrument with compelling force and freedom.

I had coachings with Pierre Vallet, a trusty French coach, nearly daily, but even with all of this preparation and trust I had built with the company, the Ophelia part was still being walked through by the French directors. I was asked to walk through entrances when there would be no singing. Otherwise, I sat with my score, staying quietly in my place.

I waited.

More time passed, and the date of her arrival kept being put off.

After so much time, it started to get awkward. I was embarrassed that I was there but not being used. Not only that, but the directors didn't even acknowledge my presence in the room, and if they passed me in the hall, I was met with awkward glances and simple curt hellos. Were they avoiding me, I wondered?

Of course, I tried to pass it off as a cultural difference. The French people aren’t known for warmth and openness in the first few meetings. I learned this when I was in Paris and would walk into a store and exclaim, “Bonjour!” only to be met with looks bordering on annoyance and complete horror. My southern exuberance seemed to be considered stupidity or fakery, and I sensed the same may have been happening here.

The Met cafeteria line held its own foreboding awkwardness while I mingled with other cast members from other operas. I felt eyes go to me and then glance away. People I knew would ask about the latest situation, and I started to take my lunch out of the building to avoid any interactions because I, the one who should have had an answer, knew absolutely nothing.

But I kept coaching, doing my yoga for some inward peace, and trying not to overreact.

This was a new production for the MET. It had started, I believe, in Barcelona and moved to other cities in Europe, but it was new to this house and was being adjusted to suit the vast MET stage. There was extra time on the main stage for rehearsals before the final dress week.

The rehearsal moved to the main stage, and Natalie still was not there. You could sense the panic starting to really show within the music and production staff. Everyone knew that if she showed at that point, a lot of extra time would be added to get her ready and to have the rest of the cast adjusted to her being placed into the show. Even though she had performed this production before, adjustments were being made for the LIVE in HD production from the previous stagings.

On the first day of mainstage stagings on the set, a month after we started stagings, I sat with my score underneath the iconic chandeliers of the MET auditorium. Suddenly, without warning, Simon Keenlyside had a complete meltdown and shouted, "Can I please not do this scene with a 6-foot tall man and no one singing the Ophelia part? Can Leah please come up here? She knows it, for God's sake!"

There was immediately scrambling in the ranks, and I was asked to come to the stage. More rumbling occurred, and it was decided that instead of walking the part, I would stand on the proscenium and sing from the side.

Which I did.

Without blinking, I stood on the edge of the stage and sang the part of Ophelia.

I immediately felt like a young artist again. That vision of myself that had started to emerge only a few weeks ago after taking the place of Diana, of becoming an untouchable, had slowly, over the weeks, started to vanish. There, on the side of the stage, I started to feel myself losing a bit of my ground.

What was so bad about me? Why were the directors so against working with me? What was so wrong with having me help out? Had they heard I was almost fired? Did they listen to my performance on Sirius radio and hate it? What was going on? Why am I trying so hard for so little? Was there something wrong no one was telling me about?

For the past week, the glances had increased. The cold shoulder and complete dismissal from the directors avoidance had started to penetrate my doubts.

I immersed myself in my yoga practice. I spent time with friends and tried to keep my sanity as best as possible. I had no idea what was happening, and every day I walked into the MET, I didn't know if I would have to sing the entire role that day or if I would just sit and stare and take notes. It was an emotional yo-yo. But I stood strong and remained steady. I was going to show them.

Again.

At the end of the staging that day, it was finally revealed that Natalie would not be coming. She had canceled the run of the show.

She was the star and the reason the production was brought to the MET in the first place. I was sad for her because I knew she had made a difficult decision and that her reason must have been hard, and many of us were devastated for her. She was a singer I looked up to, and even though we were not friends, so to speak, I was a cheerleader for her in my heart. I had grown up on her recordings. Whatever was happening, I wanted her to be well.

Music staff alerted me to be on call, and that decisions were being made about what would happen next.

I walked out of the MET door into a brisk NY evening and walked towards my yoga class on 65th Street. I was still in the dark, and I needed to move my body, a ritual that had started to become my safe place.

Before reaching the yoga studio door, my management called to tell me the news. It was decided that I would take over the final dress week, starting with the room orchestra rehearsal in two days. Then I would do the final three run-throughs, including the final dress rehearsal with an invited audience.

I would not be taking over the production.

They would bring in Marlis Peterson from Europe, who had sung in this production before and was set to sing LuLu later in the season. They wanted to promote her upcoming debut.

She wouldn't be able to arrive until a day before opening night, but the MET would fly the French coach to Europe to teach her the production in French since she had only done it in German.

My management told me that the MET was considering giving me the final two performances but would decide in the coming days.

I was on fire. I bounced down the street.

Before I could take two more steps to the door, my phone rang again. It was the MET rehearsal department.

I answered.

"Hi, Leah. It's Peter Gelb," I heard a voice say.

I darted into a doorway off of 65th Street to hear better.

"Yes!" I blurted.

He began explaining what would happen in the coming days, everything I had heard from my manager. He asked if there was anything I needed. True to likable polished southern politeness and the Western European classical music training that told me how to wear every other sized shoe but my own, I exclaimed, "Not a thing! I'm so prepared. I'm ready to do whatever you need, whatever it takes."

“Great,” he said. “We look forward to working with you.”

The first thing to do was to get me up to speed on the stage direction by physically doing the staging. I would spend a Saturday afternoon in staging rehearsals to learn the rest of the opera. All of the solo Ophelia moments had been skipped over for weeks. It was a mystery to everyone. I would also be learning the iconic mad scene staging.

For those unfamiliar with mad scenes, it's a part of opera where the ingenue loses her senses and sings a 20-minute tour de force all alone on stage, complete with trills, chromatic passages, and high notes aplenty. There are many famous ones in opera, and the Ophelia mad scene is among the most difficult and exhilarating things to behold. I had worked on this aria since my days at Indiana University and felt comfortable with the music, but I had never staged it before.

I was excited to finally be given an opportunity to stage this with the directors. They were really well known in Europe, and I was eager to make a relationship in hopes I would continue my career in European houses. I wanted to make this show work for them and was elated to save the day, so to speak. It spoke to the good girl inside me, my American can-do-ness, and especially my savior complex.

We had six hours on the schedule on Saturday in the C-level stage. When I arrived, there was an assistant stage director, a pianist, and a television with a DVD player on a roll-away cart.

I looked around. There was no one else there.

There were a few props, flowers that I would throw about in the mad scene, some furniture, and a wadded-up blanket I would use as my mad scene hallucinated pregnant belly.

I realized I was foolish.

I wasn't going to learn the staging from the directors. No, I was learning it alongside the Assistant Director with stage notes and a video from the production made in Spain by the Gran Teatro del Liceu.

My stomach lurched, and my breath was short. My feelings of unworthiness deepened, and I felt like the kid not being chosen for the team. I was willing to help and put myself in a vulnerable and difficult place, and the directors wouldn't even spend two hours with me. I was nothing to them.

But what could I do at this moment? I couldn't quit. I couldn't demand anything different. I'd risk too much. What power did I have? Was I the only one in NYC who could sing Ophelia? So much time had been wasted, and being a team player, I set any needs I had aside and pressed on for the good of the whole.

I spent the day learning the entire staging for the opera with the help of the Assistant Director and music staff pianist. We watched the video and tried to capture the previous week's intentions and motivation for the movement.

The work of these two staff members was daunting. They are faced with taking copious notes in the stagings so that they can place a singer into a show at the last minute if needed. And in this case, they were handed notes from a previous production with drawings of the set with instructions on when and where I was supposed to go on stage. Often what we saw on the video was not what had been rehearsed in the room. But we made the most of it and had a great afternoon. I felt supported, and we all worked well together.

Our biggest feat was putting bones into the famous Ophelia mad scene.

Ophelia is all alone on stage with a sofa, an imaginary fetus, and flowers that she throws all over the stage as she imagines her marriage to Hamlet and her future child. She falls deeper and deeper into madness as she realizes it isn’t going to happen and eventually kills herself in this production with a knife, stabbing at various times on her chest. There would be fake blood and a knife that, when pressed, would leak blood everywhere. We had no idea when I would get to work with the knife and blood.

Without working directly with the directors, it's always hard to know the intent behind the movement. Assistant stage directors do a good job at capturing motivation for movement, but there is often something lost, and when you can't ask questions to the ones who created it, you are left to your own devices. I was fine with that. It wasn't my first mad scene, nor was it the first time I had had to make sense of someone else's staging.

After that long day of rehearsal, I went to grab a bite to eat. I called a few friends and went home to rest. The next day was a Sunday, and the Met was closed for production work, so we had the day off. I used the late afternoon to go to the C-level stage and walk through the entire opera.

Alone, I ran things repeatedly in my mind and in front of the mirrors to better understand the pacing and how I wanted to shape my movement and intention. I left there feeling good about what I remembered and was getting quite excited about getting to work the next day.

I still had no individual contact with the directors or the conductor. I would work out details with conductor Louis Langré in the sitzprobe on Wednesday. And while I felt dismissed and unworthy of their attention, I somehow managed to stuff it back in my mind because I was going to show them I was capable and could do this role.

I would show them, and then they would give me the final two performances. It was really hard, but that's stage life, right?

That evening, I was very tired. I went to bed early and tried to stay calm and centered. The next day we would run the first two acts on stage with costumes and piano. It would be my first time doing any of the movements and singing with the cast outside of those few ensemble parts weeks ago. I needed to rest.

I woke in the middle of the night with a fever. It was an achy, hot fever that made me tremble. Soon I began to vomit until I could barely stand.

Was it food poisoning? A virus?

Damn. I just lay there and wept. It was the middle of the night and no one to call.

Early the next morning, I texted the pianist who had been with me all day Saturday. She, too, had a stomach illness. We decided it was a virus that was recently going around the MET.

There was nothing I could do. I would have to cancel. I couldn't keep anything down and could barely walk from my room to the bathroom.

I was devastated.

I was so ready and was finally getting my moment to prove myself, and now I had to stay home and try to get better and fast. I didn't have the energy to walk up and down the stairs in my building. I was staying in a brownstone on the upper west side and on the fourth floor. Luckily, my manager's assistant dropped off broth and water with electrolytes. I couldn't eat. Nothing was staying down. I was really sick and full of immense stress.

After 24 hours, I started to be able to keep down broth, and my fever had vanished. But I was so tired and weak. I also was super worried that vomiting had made my vocal folds swell.

I canceled again the next day. My manager informed me that some people thought I was pulling a stunt to get back at the directors for mistreating me during the rehearsal process and that I wasn’t really sick. Some were calling me brave and bold and were impressed by my ability to checkmate like that. I was shocked at these suggestions. Who has the energy to live their lives like that? I thought.

On the second afternoon of my illness, I received flowers. The card read, "From Peter and your Met Family, hope you're better soon." It dawned on me that perhaps they too thought I needed some encouragement and kindness.

Wow, I thought. Here I was, just trying to help the production succeed, and all along, I had more power than I really knew. Or did I? Did I just look scared and camped away in my apartment?

By the time I was able to return to rehearsals, we had only two days left. One day was an orchestra dress, and the last day was the final dress. I received word that the final dress would no longer be opened to an invited audience due to all the troubles. I had already invited some close friends, and in a rare act of neediness, I asked that I be allowed to have 5-6 friends in the audience. I was going to need to know there was kindness nearby.

On the first day back from my illness, I tried to enter the MET without being seen. I came early and went directly to my dressing room. I don’t remember much about that day. I don’t remember getting dressed or having my make-up put on, who talked with me, or even what I did afterward. I’m amazed at how the brain will protect us from difficult memories. But I do have a few distinct memories that are front and center.

The costume for Ophelia in the opening scenes was a white ball gown with an enormous hoop skirt. It was wider than the span of my arms by half a foot. It struck quite a presence on stage, and there was a lot of distance to cover. If you walk too quickly in a hoop skirt without the proper squat-like quality to your legs, you'll swing it all over the place. No stranger to a hoop skirt, there wasn’t a problem for me, and I even walked easily through the door frame on set.

When I came off stage for the break, I was met by the French directors, who exclaimed how beautifully I walked in my costume and how elegant I was on stage. They were in shock that I could manage it, it seemed.

I was in shock that they were speaking to me.

I surprised myself by channeling my best Joan Crawford from Mommie Dearest and said, “It’s not my first time at the rodeo.” I left out the “Don’t fuck with me, fellas” part, but it was loud in my inner voice as I trucked back out on stage.

The scene with Hamlet is less elegant.

Singing with Simon Keenlyside was effortless and supportive, and he seemed relieved to have an actual body on stage. One mishap took place, though, which still makes me cringe.

During the love scene, when I am consoling him in my lap and singing the duet, I placed my hand on top of Simon's ear. It must have stayed there too long because he removed my hand before I realized what I had done, and I could sense his understandable frustration. But we managed to keep the staging from looking like hand salad, and I stood up in my dress without having it knock him off the stage.

We only got through two acts of the opera that day. The rest would have to wait until the final dress rehearsal, including the mad scene.

The details of the final dress are less blurry but still have considerable gaps. I don’t have any memories of coming to the MET that day. I do remember texting with friends who were attending. Knowing that I had some support in the audience was a tremendous gift.

Cameras were everywhere. They were using the dress rehearsal to set cameras for the LIVE in HD broadcast that would take place mid-run.

I nailed all my entrances that day. Timing entrances to music, when you’ve never walked into the space, is difficult to master in one take. I walked well in my dress again, attempting to make every move as Natalie Dessay-like as I could. I sang my music accurately and precisely and felt very confident in French diction since I had been working so diligently with the music staff for over a month.

I had received word that the French directors didn’t like my “ah” vowel. So, I tried my best to brighten it up, even though I wasn’t quite sure when they had even heard me sing.

For some reason, I wasn't nervous. I was just doing a job in my mind to the best of my ability, and I compartmentalized any personal emotion. Beat by beat, step by step, I arrived at the movement and the music, like the repetitions of a sun salutation, breath by breath and no looking back.

When I got to the mad scene, I was free. I found a comfortable place on the sofa per the stage direction and sang the opening lines allowing my body to sink and be supported in a supine position. I gave in to the urge to push or protect.

Ophelia's disappointment and rejection became my own. Her anger too. All these emotions were readily available, and as I descended into her heartbreaking madness, I remember thinking, “Is this worth it? Is this what you want to see? My heart breaking right here before you all?”

But I wanted those final two performances and kept telling myself it was worth it.

I created stillness on the stage and allowed my voice to describe the madness through chromaticism and haunting pianissimi high notes.

I stood, allowing the bundle of rags tied to my waist to be revealed, representing Ophelia’s unborn imagined baby. I managed to let the veil on my head cascade across the stage as I walked without jerking my head and released it at the right moment.

“Just like the video,” I thought.

I played. I gathered and tossed flowers. I reached the high e-natural and let it soar out of my body, including with it all of the anxiety and excruciating anticipation of the last few weeks. I allowed all of it to blend with Ophelia's sorrow and mental illness.

I was exhausted but undefeated. As I stabbed at my chest and wrists, I delighted at the fake blood that flowed as I showed it to the music and production staff in the front rows.

“See? Is that enough?” I thought.

When that final note rang, I was mollified and grateful.

The haunting arpeggiated chords of the harp, coupled with the humming of the gorgeous MET chorus, soothed me as I entered Ophelia's final madness and suicide.

I had done my job.

Again.

But there was more.

I had to be placed on the gurney for the final cemetery scene where Hamlet and Laertes die. It’s Shakespeare, and this would be like what you would expect, everyone dead on stage at the end.

I would be lying in state on the MET stage. We had never made it to this in rehearsal, although I had been told someone would grab me and take me backstage where I needed to go and that Hamlet would lift me off the gurney at some point, and I would lie there until curtain calls which we may or may not do depending on the needs of the LIVE in HD crew. Just go with it, I was told.

I was taken by stage management to the gurney, where they placed a white cloth over my body and face. As I rode out on stage and heard the gorgeous singing of the MET chorus, I was overwhelmed with the beauty. My exhaustion and total relief overcame me. I relished in the sounds, allowing those beautiful vocal vibrations to transport me, bringing my nervous system back closer to myself.

Tears began to flow out of my eyes.

I could hear the low, sonorous vibrations of James Morris and couldn't believe where I was. I had come so far. A girl from a very small town with no background in classical music and no exposure to this life. To have studied videos and recordings of James Morris and Jennifer Larmore and to now have been on stage with them making art. I felt so honored, and even at that moment that was so excruciating and hard, I was full of gratitude. It truly is one of my favorite memories of being on stage. It was like a veil to another world had opened, and I had a front-row seat.

That’s what music can do, I thought.

Suddenly it ended, and Hamlet cried out, "MORT!” I was brought back to fight or flight, realizing I was still in performance. My stomach lurched, and my body tensed. Without knowing what the music queue was, all of a sudden, Simon Keenleyside lifted me up from my shoulders and cradled me hard in his arms. And then, to my surprise, he deadlifted me off the gurney, carried me five steps, and placed me down.

I slowly realized I wasn't on an even surface. It was cold.

My feet were higher than my head. I felt my hand touching a familiar substance. I realized I was lying in a pile of dirt on the MET stage—a grave.

I breathed in the scent.

I felt my body unravel into the coolness, and I giggled.

Oh, the irony, I thought. How operatic in scale!

I believe I even smiled as I lay there playing dead. My exhaustion, dehydration, lack of nourishment, and the adrenaline leaving my body sank me further into the pile as I merged with the sudden feeling of home and a familiar substance.

I savored the comfort of the smell of that earth and deeply enjoyed it.

Dirt. Organic matter.

The paradox of possibility at its core.

Potential.

Dirt was home to me. It was birth and death. I was reminded of where I came from and who I was.

All of this went through my mind. And I was delighted inside, as if I had been given a gift because I knew I could stand up and be proud of what I had done.

I wanted to do the final two performances and felt moved by this ending and position. “I will bloom out of this!” I thought.

Applause started. Curtain calls.

I don't remember if I took a proper curtain call that day. But I remember that when someone gestured to me, the Met chorus and orchestra applauded me. In my mind, they stood up.

My friends were in the audience. I had survived. I felt seen by my peers and relieved it was over.

The directors greeted me backstage and thanked me. Not like a “thank you, we couldn't have done it without you,” but a thank you tainted with "where have you been this whole time?"

I even heard them comment something like, “We had no idea” or “We wish we’d known.”

By the time I finished getting undressed, thanking everyone for their help, and quietly leaving the MET, it had been announced on Parterre Box, a gossip column about opera, that the final two performances would go to another soprano. Peter Gelb had announced to the press that they would bring in a Canadian soprano who would make her debut in the final two performances as Ophelia.

My manager called to tell me the news. He said he could do nothing about it and wanted me to know that the MET was so very pleased with my work and help. The new soprano would be flown in in the coming days to learn the staging, and I would remain a cover for her and Marlis Peterson.

I packed my bag and left the city. I hunkered down in the basement of my friend's house in New Jersey, where we binged Six Feet Under and ordered take-out food. (I know, quite operatic.)

My body was in shock. I broke out in hives. I slept.

For the next month, I only went back into the city on the evenings I had to cover, and I didn't go inside the MET except to receive my cover paycheck from the front desk.

One day, I ran into a stagehand while trying to make it out of the MET without seeing anyone. He stopped me. He said, "I want you to know we are all very sorry about how you were treated. It's going around about what happened, and we don't like it. You've always been great and fun backstage. We love working with you and are sorry you've been treated this way."

My heart nearly leaped out of my chest. My throat caught a little as I tried to thank him. I've never forgotten that moment. It was the most seen I'd ever felt in my time at the MET. I'm sure this man had seen it all, working there every day and being in charge of all of the set changes and comings and goings of people.

The months following were very hard. I started to doubt every instinct in my singing and no longer believed anyone when they complimented me. When I arrived to sing Violetta with Opera Company of Philadelphia a month later, I was paranoid that everyone was listening to every note I sang and talking behind my back. So, I marked most of those rehearsals for fear of being replaced.

This incident followed me around for years.

My new manager had to explain what had happened to companies wanting to hire me. We would often get comments like, "Is Leah singing well? What happened that the MET didn't want to use her as Ophelia? We must hear her again in an audition before we can commit to a contract."

The trouble was that we didn't have an explanation.

We had nothing to say about why the MET hired two sopranos and kept me as the cover. But we knew it made me look less than, unworthy, and flawed when just weeks before, I had been on the largest sky-rocket of my life going on for Diana Damrau as Fille.

I wish I had some advice about navigating a world that operates this way.

Ophelia from a 2016 production with Opera Birmingham.

The fundamental missing part of the equation is communication in every aspect and level of the opera industry, from collegiate and young artist programs to high-echelon places like the MET.

Somewhere along the way, both directly and indirectly, we are taught that our careers are made by the approval of others. You don’t get to ask for things. You get to dream and hope, but you’ll risk losing it all if you demand too much.

I could have requested a meeting with the administration and the directors to discuss their needs at the end of the first week. Or could I? Would it have been granted? Indirectly, I was working with the music staff and assumed my readiness and abilities were being trickled up the chain of command.

I could have called my AGMA union representative and asked for assistance. At what point should this have happened?

I could have asked for more direct support and clarification from my manager. But managers manage a lot of singers, and making any disturbances in the force can risk too many careers.

These types of interactions require tremendous energy and clarity, and I was trying to deliver a stellar performance in a new role. I didn’t have the bandwidth to go to bat like that, too.

Putting means of communication and respect into the contract seems unnecessary. But what should singers do in this instance? What rights do covers have, and how do we remain open to create if we arrive with fists clenched, ready for a fight?

If I could go back and do it all over, I would never have taken any cover contracts. I’d like for singers to understand that without clarity in your contract, you should know you will most likely be the absolute last choice, and if given enough time, they will try to get a star or someone 'up and coming' to fill your place. The idea of going on for someone and launching your career into stardom like Scotto going on for Callas is gone. At places like the MET, when you step into their roster as a cover, you no longer have the status of a singer they will promote or even care about.

I urge singers to map out their careers and stick to their instincts on how they want to build them. Even if covering for some big name feels like an advancement and honor, and your manager wants to fill your calendar with covers, keep in mind that unless there is something in your contract that states what performances you'll receive if the mainstage artist cannot perform, do not assume you'll be the next string.

As I continued to sing, I tried to move on from this. I had some great support at the time with a solid teacher, therapist, and great friends. However, a nagging voice was always inside that said, "You're just not enough. You were never meant to be there. See, no one really likes your singing. Fix those notes, and change these! Work harder."

It’s important to note these voices were not the voices I started out with in my career.

When I made the MET semi-finals in 2004, I remember walking into the backstage area and really feeling in my bones that I belonged there. I stood in the orchestra section one afternoon while the house was empty and looked around and knew I was meant to be there and would one day stand on that stage and be paid to sing. I had no feelings of not being enough.

But you can get worn down in this industry.

So, four years passed and in 2014, I was asked to come back to cover Diana Damrau in La Sonnambula. I wasn’t the first person they asked, for sure. The season had already been announced. I was asked in September, and the cover was in February. They even prefaced it when they called, “We know this is a long shot. Leah will most likely not want to do this, but she’s done this role, and would she?”

I agreed to come.

I know, I know. WHAT?!

I agreed because I needed to walk into that place and be ready to stand up for myself.

I had all kinds of grandiose thoughts about being mistreated and how I would walk out of the building after a tirade full of expletives and gestures. I’d probably even post some viral content on the internet. I was ready for it.

But it never came.

Everything went according to plan. It was a smooth and undramatic rehearsal process.

The only thing memorable was that Diana skipped out early in the sitzprobe, giving me a chance to sing “Ah! Non credea” and “Ah! Non giunge” (the highlight of the opera) with the MET orchestra.

I don’t know if she left out of kindness or out of hoping I’d fail, but either way, I rocked it that day and felt confident. At the end of the aria, I felt like throwing my hands in the air and looking around the room, musing, “Remember me?!”

Coming back was important.

I had blossomed out of that pile of dirt, and although I never got to shout and set things straight, I knew in my bones I was on my own side and would never go back to looking outward for approval or to allowing the lack of communication with administrators to dominate my process.

Instead, while still being collaborative, I check in often with my own creative impulses. I ask a lot of questions to management and administrators, and before saying yes to everything, I check in with my core values and attempt to respond with a whole heart from a place that honors both my team player attitude and my ability to take care of myself.

May you learn to do the same without all the madness.