I could use many adjectives to describe my good friend and former voice student, Texas soprano Mary Jane Johnson, but five that top the list are talented, passionate, honest, practical, and maternal. I cannot think of a better person to be featured in this family-oriented interview, because Mary Jane has been extremely successful at balancing her operatic career and her family life. She has charted her course, pursued her dreams, and always generously shared with younger singers the wisdom of her experience.
Tell us about your upbringing and what led you to singing and classical music in the first place.
Is everybody telling the truth about their birth date? You know how singers are!
OK, I was born [Mary Jane Rose] on March 22, 1950, in Pampa, Texas, to Rex and Maxine Rose, who were both wonderful singers in their own right. My father’s mother had her master’s degree in music and was organist for the Baptist church, so I grew up with lots of music around me.
Both my parents loved to dance and party and sing, and one of my happiest childhood memories is of New Year’s Eves, when they would come to pick me up at my maternal grandmother’s house at exactly five of midnight. Along with their two best friends, they would sing Irish songs to my Irish grandmother, Mary, for whom I am named. My mother had a drama degree from Texas Tech University, and she wanted to go on the road as an actress, but my father said, “It’s me, or your career,” so she chose him.
When did you start singing?
I started singing in the Baptist church youth choirs. My elementary school music teacher taught me piano in those early years. In ninth grade, my choral teacher asked me to sing a solo for the school assembly. Up till then, no one had ever made a big deal out of my voice, but I sang this solo and just took to it like a duck to water. In high school, I was in All-State Chorus two years, and went on to attend Texas Tech University on a music scholarship. I went to Tech because of the wonderful choral director, Gene Kenney, and of course, you were my voice teacher during my first three undergraduate years. I graduated from Tech with a bachelor’s degree in music education, and I expected to teach choral music, just like all my role models.
Did you wait until your career was established before you married?
No. David [Johnson] played basketball for Tech. His roommate, who was from Pampa [Texas], got us together, and we got married at the end of our junior year. As you know, you left Tech at the end of that same year, so I studied with John Gillas during my senior year. I was asked to be soloist for the big ceremony honoring all the Tech seniors and also invited to perform with the Lubbock Symphony, so I began to think that maybe I did have some talent after all.
When did you and David decide it was time to enlarge your family?
We graduated from Texas Tech and moved to Amarillo, where David went to work for Phillips Petroleum. I applied for a junior high choir job and didn’t get it, so I decided to open a private voice studio, and soon I had jillions of students! Then the choir job came open again, and they asked me to take it, but I said no, because I was learning so much about my own voice through teaching others.
Thank God I didn’t get that choir job, because that would have changed everything! I always tell the superintendent who didn’t hire me that even though I was furious with him at the time, he probably is the reason I had my singing career. Sometimes disappointments turn out to be the best thing that could have happened.
Next, David was transferred to Abilene, Texas, and I got a job teaching voice at McMurry College there. I started studying with Colleen Blondeau, who taught voice at Abilene Christian University. After two-and-a-half years, we got transferred back to Amarillo, and since we had been trying unsuccessfully for several years to start a family, we put in papers to adopt a child.
I decided I needed to get a master’s degree if I was really going to get serious about my singing, so I enrolled at West Texas A&M University in nearby Canyon, Texas. I studied voice with Jerry Doan, and he’s the one who switched me from mezzo-soprano to soprano repertory.
Before I finished my master’s degree, Jerry was offered his current position as head of the Vocal Division at Arizona State University, so he sent me to work with Harold Heiberg at the University of North Texas in Denton. I would drive to Denton once a month, study with Harold all weekend, and drive home on Sunday. And right in the middle of all that, our first child came! She was 7 days old, and we named her Taylor.
I stopped going to Denton for a couple of months; then I started again, making shorter trips, driving down one day and back the next. Taylor stayed at home with David, and of course, we had my mother and dad, only 50 miles away in Pampa, who were happy for any excuse to see their granddaughter!
How long did you coach with Harold?
A year and a half. (I finished my master’s degree in 1978.) And one day he said, “Why don’t you enter the Metropolitan Opera Auditions?” It was the last year I could have entered, because I was 29 years old. So I entered—and I won! At the time, I was singing dramatic coloratura repertory—Handel’s “Tornami vagheggiar” (Alcina) and Mozart’s “Ach, ich liebte” (Die Entführung aus dem Serail). I won the first round in El Paso, and Blanche Thebom was the judge.
At the next round, in San Antonio, the judges were Theodore Upman and Richard Gaddis, and both men really did like me. Upman said, “This girl is ready to go on the stage right now!” So I won in Texas, and I went to New York and competed the following March.
In New York, there were 21 of us, and 10 or 11 went on to the finals. I did not go on, but I didn’t really care, because I had never been in anything like that in my life, and I was just thrilled to be there. I was teaching at that time, and I had taken two students with me. I thought this would be a wonderful learning opportunity for them—and they have never forgotten it!
David and my mother kept Taylor, and I stayed on in New York for a few days to get my bearings. All I knew was that I was born to be on stage!
After the competition, I came home and started making plans. Taylor was nearly 3 years old in the fall of 1980, when I went to the bank, borrowed money, and moved her and me to New York for a year. I had a place to stay, because a dancer friend from Texas was going on tour for a year, and she let me have her place on the West Side. It was perfect, because she had a big Steinway piano, and I could study and practice there.
I would take Taylor to a Montessori School from 9 to 3, and I would hit the streets running. I had anywhere from three to four language coachings a week and took three voice lessons a week. I wanted an Italianate approach to singing, and I tried two other voice teachers before settling on Loretta Corelli, the wife of Franco Corelli. I set a goal for myself that if I didn’t get management at the end of that year, I would go back home. As it turned out, I did stay in New York a second season, so I was able to study with Corelli for two years.
On the way to New York, I had stopped off in Illinois to coach with John Wustman, who was Luciano Pavarotti’s accompanist. At that time, they were getting ready to hold the first Luciano Pavarotti Competition, and you had to have a sponsor to enter. John had heard me sing earlier—in a master class in Texas—and liked my singing, so he sponsored Susan Dunn and me in the competition, and we were both among the winners.
I seem to recall that Pavarotti cited you in his book “Grandissimo Pavarotti” as one of his favorites among the contestants in that first competition.
Yes, he did. So, at the end of my first year in New York, I went to Philadelphia to sing in the competition, but before I left New York, I went around and sang for different agents, and ended up with Columbia Artists under the management of Betsy Crittenden. Betsy was my agent for 15 years, and we are still very close friends. After Betsy, I went with Herbert Breslin, because he was doing some publicity for me, and I stayed with him for three years. Now I am with John Miller at Pinnacle Arts in New York.
When did you adopt your second child?
After we adopted Taylor, we waited about four years before trying to adopt a second child. Taylor was 6-and-a-half years old before we got our son, Greer.
What has been the most difficult part of balancing a family and a career?
The most difficult part is separation. I remember the first time I went to New York, before my career took off… I was going up to study. I went up two weeks ahead of time to get established and find a school for Taylor, and David was going to bring her up in two weeks. I guess I just suffered from this horrible separation anxiety, because I went into my apartment, and I couldn’t quit crying for about two days, just because I was away from the family.
I was starting a new life, and did I really want to do it?
I remember going to John Wustman’s studio en route, and of course, I was grieving deeply, and he had a sign up on the wall in his studio that read, “No pain, no gain.” I nearly burst out crying right then, and that has stuck in my mind all these years.
What was the most difficult part for David?
Communication is a challenge, and we handled it with a lot of phone calls. Our phone bills were astronomical! The hardest part about leaving your children is walking out that door, and we made a practice of saying goodbye at home and not letting the children take me to the airport. We never acted like my leaving was a big deal. They always knew I would be gone a couple of weeks, and then we’d be together again. Because David had to work, I took the kids with me until they really got buried in school.
What was the most joyful part of balancing family and career? Do you recall any significant “family times” that involved your career as a singer?
One of the most wonderful times we had was when I sang Salomé in Sidney, Australia. It was summertime here, so we took the whole family. Taylor was in high school, and Greer was in elementary school. I was there about three weeks by myself; then David and the kids came over, and we traveled all over Australia together for a month.
I want to make it clear that there were wonderful times, and there were also terrible times. I lost my father when I was singing in England. I flew over, and he had an aneurysm and died, and I had to fly back on the same plane I flew over on. In 1996, when I was singing in Australia, my mother died, so I had to fly home and back to Australia within five days. I always felt guilty because I wasn’t at home when either of my parents died, so I’ve had to work through all that.
How much traveling did your career require?
I always made sure I did a gig and came home for a month to six weeks before going out again. That was when my career was very heavy, and Betsy (Crittenden) was great about helping me organize it that way. I was always at home for Christmas, except once when I was in New York and once in London, and those two times we brought everybody to me.
If you took the children with you on a trip, how long would they be out of school?
Once I sang in England for a period of two-and-a-half months, and I took them with me. We had them in private schools specifically for that reason—to be able to take them. We took their schoolwork with us, but when we got to England, I enrolled them in school there, so they had the opportunity to go to a rural English school.
We lived on a sheep farm, and they got to watch the lambs being born, and they just had a ball! They had some totally new experiences that they would never have had otherwise.
We would usually take a grandparent with us on these trips. At one point for about three years, when my traveling was at its peak, we had a nanny, an older woman named Jean who was about 6-foot-3, and we all looked like a traveling basketball team! When we hired her, Jean had never been on an airplane! But she loved the kids, she loved traveling, and we had wonderful times together.
The most important thing is we didn’t fret over how we would manage things. We realized we couldn’t be apart more than three weeks. There were probably only two occasions in my career when it went to four weeks, just because it was not feasible to take the children, but we generally just planned things a day at a time.
Wasn’t all this traveling for you and the family a financial burden? How did you manage it?
When you have a career like this, and you have to pay for all these plane tickets, and you have to rent a larger place to stay so there will be space for everybody, you don’t make any money! You just break even.
Would you say that always putting your family first kept your career from being as full-blown as it might have been? And if that’s the case, was it worth it?
Yes, and yes. In the end, you have to look back and be happy with what you did. I could have taken a different route, but I just chose to balance it this way. And I think that decision is the reason my life is still balanced today.
Every parent is proud of his or her children. What are you the proudest of with your two?
David and I are both very sports-minded, and we have really pushed our kids in the area of sports. We never talked about my career very much at home. We centered all our family activities around things we would do with the children. Taylor played volleyball and soccer, and Greer played mainly football.
The proudest I am of the children is that they have matured so beautifully, handling my being gone so much. Of course, there have been problems along the way. For instance, our daughter went off to school, came back, and loaned her car to her boyfriend, who had a wreck in it and was killed, so we have lived through that horrible tragedy.
Taylor was 19 and had a year of hell, and I stayed home most of that year. I cancelled performances in order to be here to support her.
She went into the work force for about four years, and now I am very happy that she has decided to go back to school full time and get her teaching degree. She is doing very well in school, and has a 3.5 average. I am very proud of the fact that she has pulled herself up from the bottom and is doing beautifully.
Our son, Greer, suffered a bad football injury, where he tore his ACL [“anterior cruciate ligament,” a tendon in the knee] and had to recover for a year, and I was very glad to be home more during that period, too. But he has come back from that and is in junior college, and will go on to school to be an architect.
We have had all the problems you can have with teenaged kids, and it doesn’t seem to matter what you do—you’re going to live through those times. As David says, “This, too, shall pass.”
Am I remembering correctly that you took your current teaching job at Amarillo College in order to be home with Greer during his last years of high school?
Actually, first I had a position as Artist-in-Residence at Texas Tech University. I went down there four or five times a year and worked in all the voice studios, and I am very proud that several of the students I worked with there are now out having careers. Then I took a teaching job at West Texas University, but was pleased when my old pre-career job opened up at Amarillo College, because it is closer to my home. I took that job on purpose so I could be here for Greer’s junior and senior years of high school.
Also, my career is slowing down, and the jobs are fewer and fewer. Right before 9/11, I sang Elektra in Israel, and we took Greer with us there. That was a highlight of our time together as a family.
Since 9/11, I have decided that I just do not want to be in Europe anymore, and most of my career was in Europe. I have tried to revive my regional career again, but it’s very difficult, because the young people are coming up, and it’s their turn. I need to step aside and let them do it. But occasionally there will be something they can’t do that I can, so I will go in and do it—like The Flying Dutchman I did recently with the Atlanta Opera.
Is there a secret to your success in balancing career and family?
The secret of my success is my fabulous husband! No doubt about it, there isn’t anybody in the world like him.
What would you say have been the highlights of your career?
I have sung all over the world with every major company, but the highlights were being able to sing the repertory I sang with my wonderful colleagues. Being the first non-Czech to sing a Czech opera (The Makropolous Case) in the Czech Republic’s National Theatre. Singing a Russian opera (Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk) in Paris and at La Scala. Elektra in Israel.
A special highlight came the second time I sang Puccini’s La Fanciulla del West at La Scala. When I first started studying this role early in my career, I studied it with Pavarotti’s coach, Antonio Tonini, one of the coaches at La Scala. He was the first person who ever taught me a role, and I first sang Fanciulla in Leeds, England, in 1985.
I performed Fanciulla three times at La Scala, and the second time was 10 or 12 years after I had worked with and last seen Tonini. At the end of the performance, as I took my bows, I heard this wild screaming from the top public box above the stage. I looked up to see Tonini and his wife yelling at the top of their lungs, “Brava! Brava!” Seeing him there, I started crying and couldn’t stop. It was the first time he had ever shown approval of me, and I knew that his screaming and hollering meant that I was doing it right!
Another highlight was making my own CD in 1999. I hired an orchestra in Prague, and we had a four-day recording session. I have donated all the proceeds to music scholarships for young singers.
If you had it to do over again, would you do anything differently?
I never look backward. I’ve always made my choices on the basis of the roles I wanted to do. If it was a choice of two roles, I chose the one I loved or the new challenge I wanted to try. The repertory I’ve done has been good for me, but I’ve gotten a lot of criticism for it.
Pavarotti always wanted me to do the repertory that Joan Sutherland was singing, but it didn’t make any sense for me to do that repertory while she was still singing. No one was going to choose me over her, so I chose more dramatic repertory.
I had a chance to sing Tosca with Luciano, but he wouldn’t do it, because he didn’t think I should sing the role, and of course, I lost the job, not him. But I always did what I thought was right for me, and I still do.
Do you have any advice for young singers?
I was a singer who had my personal life together before I started my career, which is very unusual. I was incredibly grounded and had a husband that I worshipped and adored, and together we were determined to do everything and anything to make it work. After I had taught for a while, I realized I really did want a singing career.
David always said, “I don’t want you to be 50 years old and talk about how you could’ve done this and you could’ve done that. If you’re gonna do it, just do it!” And he was a very secure male.
I look at young people and just want them to be happy first. I did it that way, and we have survived it, and our children have survived it, even though it has been very, very difficult.
How do you feel about your voice now, at age 54?
I have always been very vocally and physically healthy. I think I sound better than I’ve ever sounded, and others say the same. It’s interesting and frustrating when your career is getting slower and you’re not getting as much work, yet you are singing at your best. You have so much more inside you, and you’ve lived so many lives through the characters you’ve played.
That’s why I love this heavy repertory, and these wonderful characters I get to become on stage. I have the depth to do them now as they should be interpreted. I’m really proud of the fact that I still sing so well. I don’t want to brag on myself, but that’s just part of it, and I’m sure that many other singers have felt the same way. I think people know when it’s time to stop, too. I’m looking forward to singing a Verdi Requiem, a Beethoven Ninth Symphony, and a Dutchman in the coming year.
So what direction do you see yourself taking at this point in your life?
I am considering several options. I could take an artist position at a university and teach a small number of very talented students, but I would have to commute a long distance. I can continue teaching here at Amarillo College and be able to live at home. Santa Fe Opera has brought me in every summer since 2000 to teach the Apprentice Program, and I have loved that. I think it might be fun to run my own opera company, but it’s hard to get people to take me seriously in that area, since I’m “just an opera singer.”
We are building a new Performing Arts Theatre here in Amarillo, and I have been raising money for them, proving that I can be a developer. We’ve raised 23-and-a-half million dollars so far.
I am stretching myself out and trying new things. Now I just have to figure out what I want to do, make a decision, and go for it!
References
Mayer, Martin, and Fitzgerald, Gerald. 1986. Grandissimo Pavarotti. Garden City, NY: Doubleday & Co., Inc.: 158-161.
Scenes and Arias by Mary Jane Johnson. CD available at www.maryjanejohnson.com
