This past week I was lucky enough to be a quarter-finalist at the American Traditions Competition in Savannah, GA. I have friends who have done this competition before, and they all had the same things to say about how wonderful and nurturing and inspiring an environment it is. You know when I hear a bunch of people say something like that, a little part of me says "Yeah, right. I'm sure it's sooooo wonderful." Well, I'm here to say, it really is what everyone before me said it was.

First, the competition. I sang in the first group of quarter-finalists. I started with my Johnny Mercer song, Charade, from the movie of the same name (and a GREAT movie, especially if you are home sick from school). Then I sang Kala Kalla from Eric Whitacre's Five Hebrew Love Songs and finished out with The Trees on the Mountains from Susannah. I felt great about my singing, and immediately went out to watch the rest of the competitors. I have to say, I was blown away by the competition. Everyone was so involved in their singing, and there was a whole lot of incredible technique up on that stage. By the end of the two days of quarter-final auditions, I felt like I would love to go on to the next round, but I wouldn't be surprised if I didn't, based on the amount of talent and artistry I saw. As it turns out, I didn't make it to the next round. But that didn't mean my experience at the competition was over.

Once I knew I wasn't going on, I corralled some friends to go out for a drink. We had been on such good singer behavior the past couple of months, we definitely earned a night out. We went down to Riverstreet in Savannah and found a place doing karaoke. My friend Kate sang one of her competition songs at karaoke and got a standing ovation. I butchered a Christina Aguilera song and enjoyed every second of it. That's the great thing about karaoke: everyone's a winner :)

The rest of the week was divided between watching the next rounds of the auditions, eating delicious food, much of it Southern, and meeting and connecting with incredible musicians. The judges for the contest were top notch, and we had the opportunity to speak with them one on one for comments. It was so inspiring, as well as a little overwhelming. When I finished talking to the judges I thought, "Great, so you just need to work harder. Waaaaiiiit a minute...I thought I was working hard!". But it was more inspiring that anything else, and I definitely feel like I have a new plan of action in my career based on my experiences in Savannah.

I was incredibly lucky to be able to sing in a masterclass for Liz Callaway, the voice of Anastasia (one of my favorite movies!) and Amanda McBroom, who wrote the incredibly famous song "The Rose" among many others. I performed Much More from The Fantasticks for them, and Liz basically said it was nice but the same as every other performance. Just for the record, I don't sing a lot of musical theatre, so I was pretty excited just to have nailed a "same as everyone else" performance! She talked me through a few things, and then asked me to do it slower, darker, and completely different. One of the things that Amanda McBroom had mentioned to me in my one on one with her was not to be safe, so I decided just to go for it. It was incredible! Both artists seemed pleased with the difference, and I felt all of a sudden like I had all of this freedom to break out of the box of how I've heard others perform songs.

The two biggest highlights of the week were performing for two schools with several other singers, and the judges concert. The school shows were early and in horrible class rooms like they always are, but we got to sing with the incredible Joel Martin, director of the competition, amazing musician, and all around fabulous guy. That alone was worth it. But as our treat for getting up early to go sing at schools, we got to go to the sound checks of Liz and Amanda for their concert that night. It was really interesting to watch them, so different in many ways, as they did sound check and interacted with Joel. They were both so gracious to us "kids", asking our opinions on where they stood and how the sound was. Then, that night, they had their concert. I've never had so many emotions wanting to burst out of me at one time in my life. They were so incredible. From the jokes they told between numbers, to the songs they chose, to the way they paced the music, and of course their voices, it was absolutely amazing. I left with a new found appreciation for what I want to do artistically in my life, but also for who I want to be as a person.

My week in Savannah was truly a life changing experience. Hopefully I'll be back on this blog soon to tell you about my new life!!!!

A few days ago I received a Facebook message from an old high school friend of mine regarding extras needed for a movie set. The request was specifically for violinists and required that performers be free all day Monday and Tuesday. I almost deleted it thinking, "I've cancelled so many lessons lately my students will kill me if I reschedule AGAIN!" But I couldn't stop thinking about what a great opportunity it would be, and just how cool it would be to be in a movie with the likes of Dolly Parton and Queen Latifah. So I sent in my picture and info. And a couple days later embarked on one of the most amazing days of my life.

Our call time was 6:30 am in Peachtree City. I got up about 4:30 to get ready and headed down to the Fred Amphitheater. I didn't have much of an idea of what to expect. I knew we were extras and we needed our violins and I'd been sent some music to learn.

After a little driving around I found the right parking lot and took a shuttle to the set. A lady in the front seat introduced herself as Sarah and got all excited that I was part of the band. (I had to get used to the band part....they all referred to us as the band).

We got to the set and I was introduced to Gene who was essentially our "handler" for the day. I got taken to wardrobe where they approved my outfit and then I got sent to the extras tent for hair and makeup.

There were 2000 extras called for this shoot so you can only imagine all the chaos in that tent! I went to wait for hair and makeup and got to go immediately since I was in the band :) Bothe the hair lady and the makeup lady were so incredibly nice. And I think I finally figured out how to use a flat iron after watching the hair lady. (it is really embarrassing that I call her the hair lady. As it turns out she has a name. A really beautiful, unique name I had never heard before and now cannot for the life of me remember.) The makeup lady was Nico.

Then I met up with the other violinists. All 3 of them. This is when it started to hit me how cool this was going to be. There were only four of us?! We were directed over to the breakfast tent. As we walked in I passed this man who looked really familiar. I am the queen of knowing people but not quite remembering how I know them so I figured I had worked with him somewhere before. I gave him a friendly "hey" and he responded in an equally friendly manner. After he passed me I realized that he was not familiar because we had worked together. He was familiar because I have seen him on about 4,261 episodes of Law and Order:CI. It was Courtney B. Vance. Cool.....

I had already eaten breakfast so I just made a juice concoction from the buffet of freshly squeezed juice. I opted for celery, cucumber, watermelon, and kale. It was incredible.

Then we got sent to out green room. Yea, that's right. We didn't have to hang out in the chaotic tent, we had a building backstage that had real bathrooms and air conditioning and couches. There we met the other band members. There was one more local guy, Steve, who was gonna do the guitar business and the rest of the band was Kirk Franklin's band. They were all super nice and funny. Which is good since we were just starting out on a looooong day :)

We finally for directed over to the stage to begin shooting. There on the stage were 4 chairs up on a platform in clear view. Oh yeah.....this was gonna be a good day!

We got situated on stage as the extras filed into the audience. There were so many people there. As the extras came in, the director came out and introduced himself and let us know if we needed anything at all to not hesitate to ask. (Later in the day, he was true to his words as he helped us take care of a music blowing away in the wind issue). We did a rehearsal with the dancers and one of the production guys told the audience what they would be doing. And then Kirk Franklin got up there. A lot of folks in the audience went crazy for him (I'll be honest, I went a little crazy, but more subtly since I was sitting in front of 2000 people. I love his song, My Everything, and he is pretty cool to watch). THen we did our first real take with him. It was so cool! They said, "production up" (that means they're taping you this time) and then they did the slate business (you know where they clap together that little board?) and then action. And the crowd (as they were directed to) went WILD. Then Kirk Franklin makes his entrance by bursting through a paper wall, and they went WILDER. All the while I was up there playing along to this really kicking song. It was so invigorating! I have sung in front of a lot of people before, but this is different. All of that noise and energy.....I could definitely get used to that!

We did a bunch of different takes with the cameras in that position, and then it was time for the cameras to move to a different spot. Which meant that it was time for us to go to Craft Services. They had all sorts of snacks and drinks for us there. And there was this really nummy feta and tomato concoction that I'm going to have to recreate for my next party. Delicious. We just hung out and chatted and tried not to eat everything in sight. And then we were called back for another shot.

The day went on this way: Play really awesome music, hang out with really fun musicians, meet tons of incredibly nice people, and take breaks with delicious food.

A few hours into the day Queen Latifah came out and shot a scene in the back of the amphitheater (behind the audience) and she made a gracious speech to the extras and everyone there. It was pretty interesting to get to watch the pros work. And it was cool to see how nice she was to everyone up there.

Then came lunch. Ummmmm....I hate to talk about food all day, but seriously. I had baked chicken, broccoli and kale medley, squash-sweet potato-beet medley, ceasar salad, and fresh fruit and I didn't even begin to make a dent in the selection they had. They also had an insane dessert table (I had one little brownie) and of course more fresh veggie options. Angele and I had delicious spinach smoothies (again...I'm gonna recreate that one at home). Also eating just a few tables away was Courtney B. Vance again.

After lunch we went back to hair and make up to get touched up (my hair held amazingly well!) and then it was time for our closeups. We had to play through the piece a couple of times with the cameras literally a foot away from us. And those cameras are HUGE! It was mildly intimidating, but way more fun than anything else. And of course our music took that opportunity to attempt to fly away several more times. We got very creative in how we got it to stay put, including using a luna bar (still wrapped) someone found on the floor to putting our scrolls on the music as we were playing. Angele and Jonathan had it much harder since they were in front, but we all had our share of issues. Hopefully we looked like we were having fun and not like we were panicking!

The end of the day was the hardest part. We had to do several little pickups for the closeups of Kirk Franklin (clearly the most important part). But it was hard because we were in the background and probably weren't seen but still had to put tons of energy into it and not start looking tired. By this point many of the extras had been sent home and so there wasn't as much to keep you going on the stage. You just had to pretend that 2000 people were cheering.

One of the coolest parts was watching the cameraman who worked the steady cam. The thing looked like it weighed a tone and he had the harness that he could hook the camera on and off of really quickly so he didn't have to carry it while they were standing around waiting for things. He was amazing. And it's so worth it, because those shots are often the coolest ones in scenes like this one.

All in all, it was a once in a lifetime, amazing experience. I got to watch the director checking all three cameras backstage and pointing things out and working with the actors. I got to see how many people really go into making a film like this happen. Tons of people that you never think of. All of the people handing out water in between takes, and passing out sun block to the thousands of extras sitting in the sun for 10 hours. Bringing little pieces of tape to the fiddlers who's music keeps flying away. It was so amazingly organized, professional, friendly, and fun. It was a perfect experience.

At the end of the day, when we were on our second or maybe third to last take, just as the blister from my shoes was starting to bug me for real, and my legs started getting really hot in my heavy black pants and I thought I wasn't sure if I could play this song one more time, it hit me: I'm on a movie set. I'm going to be in a movie. Even if I'm not a star, I felt like one. Every person there treated me like I was a star and vitally important to the success of the movie. They treated me like everyone should be treated. I finished the day with a huge smile on my face.