Dear Erda,
Did you ever have to lie about your age in your career? Do you think it is wise for a singer to do so? I’d rather be honest than a young liar, but I’d also rather be singing than temping.
SS
Dear SS,
No one has ever asked my age in an audition. Applications for competitions and YAPs [Young Artist Program] sometimes required my age, but I didn’t feel a need to equivocate. “Don’t ask, don’t tell” is my current policy. If someone asked me my age in an audition now, I would probably smile sweetly and say one of the following, depending on how big a deal I felt like making of it:
“Old enough to drink, vote, drive, and sing a Fricka that will fry your eyeballs. The rest is all negotiable.”
“I’m exactly the same age as _____.” (Fill in the name of the character you’re auditioning to play)!
“In opera years, I’m 29, and you know that’s as old as opera singers ever get.”
“How old do you want me to be?”
There is no good answer to the question of age when posed in an audition or on an application. There can be only one reason to ask someone’s age: So that people who aren’t the right age (whatever that is) can be excluded. And no answer you give, however witty, is going to satisfy someone who only wants singers under 30 in their competition/YAP/ production or who has legitimate concerns about a young singer being able to handle a vocally demanding role usually done by the more experienced. Furthermore, your refusal to answer, no matter how charming, comes across as an indication that you have something to hide.
That said, I myself prefer charming evasion to outright lying. People make exceptions to their own rules all the time, and the key to getting hired is usually singing well, looking right for the part, and entertaining your audience. There are quite a number of successful singers who started late, whose raised kids before careers, or whose careers didn’t take off until they were well past their twenties: Sopranos Lauren Flanagan and Hildegard Behrens, tenors Ian Bostridge and Marcelo Alvarez, and mezzo Josepha Geyer to name a few. Clearly, these artists had something more important than mere youth to offer prospective audiences.
Also, do what you can to make age a non-issue: in addition to being a fabulous singer/actor/entertainer, make sure you look as young as you can manage. Take care of your skin and hair, keep your body healthy, dress stylishly and youthfully. Convince potential employers that you’re up to the task, and they may let the age issue pass.
Sometimes, sadly, you can’t even get your foot far enough in the door to let your little light shine unless you’re waving the proper credentials from Father Time. In that case, you have to figure out how far you’re willing to go to get your chance.
In my book, lying about your age is not very ethical, but it’s also not much in way of a sin. First, your age is really nobody’s business. Second, all that really ought to matter is whether you can do the job. Third, there’s nothing to show that older singers or late starters lag behind younger folks in anything but perhaps a little energy, or that they aren’t capable of developing highly successful careers; or that certain young singers can indeed handle carefully chosen mature roles without damaging themselves.
On a purely practical level, lying about your age may give you a chance that you otherwise wouldn’t get. Also, it’s an entrenched part of this business, so much so that it’s a joke (“Well, in real life I’m 35, but in opera years I’m 28”). If you want to compete and you think your age is an issue, you might have to lie to get what you want.
I started to write that it’s a lie that hurts no one, but that’s not really the case: younger singers must compete with older, more experienced ones, and if the thirty- and forty-somethings are out there successfully passing themselves off as 25-year-olds, it could make it very hard for some youngsters to get into the business. Then, when they’re 30 and 40, they’ll be out there repeating the cycle! People figure that once you’re past the magic age of 32, you’ve had your chance and now it’s the turn for younger singers. That’s a pretty small, and in some cases, pretty unrealistic window of opportunity.
None of this addresses the issue of whether lying about your age is wise. It’s not a simple lie, after all: it requires a great deal of maintenance and maybe even some backup. You have to be very careful about what you say and to whom. You can’t tell people when you graduated from college or what year you did such-and-such YAP. If you are asked for proof, you’re either going to have to fess up or produce fake documents, which in some if not all cases is illegal.
I once won a competition and then spent the evening cheering up the runner-up, who might have received a nice prize, but was disqualified when they asked to see her driver’s license and discovered that she had shaved off several years. The kicker was, the committee told her they would have awarded the prize anyway — they liked her so much — if she’d only told the truth. Of course, they could have just as easily disqualified her for being too old. Personally, I think they should have taken that as an indication of how dumb it is to have age requirements.
Still, we have to deal with the reality that exists, and age discrimination is there. It really comes down to what’s going to work for you. Are you charming enough to evade the question? Can you pull off lying as long as they don’t ask for proof? Do you have the chutzpah to handle it calmly if you’re caught? Or can you see yourself backing up your lie with fake ID?
Only you can weigh these choices and consequences against your desire for a singing career. Only you can decide how big an issue age is, or may become, for you.
Finally, I urge you to consider carefully why you think you need to lie about your age, and make sure you’re not using possible age discrimination as an excuse for other areas in which you may be lacking. This is part of the rigorous self-examination to which singers must regularly subject themselves, and harsh as it may seem, it’s essential to success, not only as a singer but as a human being. Do you feel you need to turn the clock back because you’ve been trying for several years and not making headway? Is it because you believe everybody else is doing it and you need to compete? Or do you think that your age is the only thing that is keeping you from being hired?
Regardless of what you decide, know that lying about your age is not something to undertake casually. Is it ethical? Not really, but it’s also not horrible. Is it necessary? Sometimes, under some circumstances, for some people. Is it wise? Only if you don’t get caught.
