Results...

I didn't win the competition. :-(      I was really sad about this one because it would have been so amazing to have had the experience of both singing AND playing piano with the San Francisco Conservatory Orchestra.    But, you win some, you lose more.  That's the way it always is.   Hopefully I'll have the chance to sing my "Quatre Chansons de Ronsard" by Darius Milhaud with another orchestra someday.

I am grateful for the experience, though.  I really learned a lot, and I felt more expressive and like a better performer onstage as a singer than I have ever felt before in my life.  I am starting to learn how to use my body, my arms, my face, to really express while I sing.  I am starting to be able to be an actress while I stand alone onstage, imagining an entire scene before me and pretending that I actually see it.  I am starting to feel much more at home as a singer.

And you know what?  I really love it.   I love singing for people.     People here are always asking me why I "switched" from piano to voice.  But I didn't switch.  I do both.  I love both.  I sing. I play the piano.  I don't play the piano as much as I would like to these days, but I still am a pianist and I want to perform more!!   I want to sing more, I want to play more.  I want to write more.   I want to go more places, and make more music.

Off to practice...