The name Juilliard is weighted with history and prestige. The school’s reputation, its location in Lincoln Center at the heart of New York City’s cultural community, and its links with professionals from the Met, New York City Opera and other respected performing arts organizations make it a draw for serious young singers from around the world. Even though the most recent graduate school ranking (U.S. News & World Report, 1998) listed the Juilliard School as number two in the nation for voice and opera, second only to Indiana University’s School of Music, many would choose a degree from this venerable institution first, if only for the connections.
Of course, big names and a fancy reputation do not an education make. So, how does Julliard measure up in the areas that really count—voice training, coaching, diction, languages, acting, and (the true test of a worthy institution) performance opportunities?
“Juilliard offers dec-ades of experience not only in the vocal discipline, but also in performance opportunities, recitals and opera productions, as well as an overall structured and comprehensive education,” says faculty member Daniel Ferro, who has been teaching voice at the School for 30 years. “For a singer to be accepted into Juilliard and then to complete the requirements of the program is a great accomplishment. It prepares the singer to build on a solid foundation for the future.”
Indeed, many well-known opera singers did build their foundations at Juilliard, among them Simon Estes, Renée Fleming, Anthony Griffey, Leontyne Price, Neil Shicoff and Shirley Verrett. Ferro has taught many who went on to impressive careers as singers or as teachers in major universities and conservatories throughout the world. “Two singers from my studio who are currently having outstanding success are Carolyn Sebron—who made her debut in Aida at the Verona Arena, Italy, this past summer—and Robert Dean Smith, who made his debut at Bayreuth, Germany. He is currently a leading tenor in Bayreuth and in Europe, and will be at the San Francisco Opera this fall,” says Ferro.
The success of its graduates may explain why—despite higher tuitions (with books, supplies and personal expenses, the 2001-2002 year will cost from $28-$30,000) and fewer mainstage performing opportunities than rival institutions—Juilliard never wants for applicants. The Department of Vocal Arts, which was founded in l994 and oversees all opera training, maintains a total enrollment of about 90 students each school year, including undergraduates, graduates and postgraduates.
Soprano Sari Gruber, whose career has taken off since she grad-uated in 1998, gives Juilliard its due. “Some programs coddle their students and then it’s a big shock when they hit the real world,” she says. “Juilliard prepares you for what the professional world is like.”
The two programs that provide singers with the best career-building tools are the postgraduate Artist’s Diploma (AD) programs in Performance and in Opera. The latter, called Juilliard Opera Center or JOC, is the crème de la crème in vocal training at Juilliard, offering 12 to 14 advanced students per year the opportunity to prepare for professional performance. Participants in this tuition-free program receive a monthly stipend along with intensive training in opera, lieder, art song, diction, movement, acting, stagecraft, scene study, languages and even make-up application. Like all Juilliard students, they also receive personal coachings for performance projects.
The icing on this already delectable cake is the faculty. Students have the opportunity to work with professionals like Artistic Director Frank Corsaro, who has been on staff at Juilliard since 1987 and has been professionally connected to New York City Opera since 1958. For Gruber, who participated in JOC from 1995 to 1998, the experience was pivotal in her development as an artist. “Working with Frank Corsaro and resident conductor Randy Behr was amazing,” she says. “They were also working on the outside and you were expected to live up to their high standards. That raised the bar for all of us and, ultimately, made it less scary to go out into the real world.”
Corsaro is just one of many on the voice faculty who work with performing arts organizations in conjunction with their teaching. Vocal seminar teacher Mary Lou Falcone, for example, serves as a PR specialist for New York Philharmonic, the Avery Fisher Artists program, and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, among others. Faculty member Gary Wedow serves as chorus master for New York City Opera and Santa Fe Opera. And the list goes on.
“The strengths of the opera program at Juilliard include not only our voice faculty, but also our coaching and acting staff, and our diction and vocal literature faculty,” says Vocal Arts Chair Cynthia Hoffmann. “Our collaboration makes real growth possible, because of a team we can focus on the areas a student needs to develop artist- ically, dramatically, musically, linguistically and vocally. Our aim is to help create a well-rounded and complete performer.”
In addition to accomplished faculty, the School frequently offers masterclasses with renowned visiting vocal artists such as Marilyn Horne, Alfredo Kraus, Luciano Pavarotti, Leontyne Price and Renata Scotto.
Third-year undergraduate student Susanna Phillips finds the level of instruction and the overall creative environment at the School stimulating. “You take a class with someone like [pianist] Brian Zeger, and have him sit down and talk to you and treat you like a professional. Then you realize that this guy has played concerts all over the world with renowned artists, yet he’s very accessible,” she says. “There are so many people around here of the same caliber. It’s weird to be walking around and see Itzhak Perlman sitting on a bench or walking by.”
Clearly, Juilliard has much to commend it to singers who want excellent training and exposure. But the program has not always been strong in vocal arts. It has undergone a process of evolution that continues to this day. Ferro explains: “I was a student at Juilliard in the 1940s and … the school is much more demanding [now]. First of all, the musical and vocal requirements are much higher. Secondly, there are many more courses including broader aspects of opera, drama, language, and vocal literature, etc. The emphasis is not only to train the singer technically and musically, but also to provide a well-rounded education.”
Hoffmann agrees that the program has improved even during her tenure, which began in 1991. “Some of the recent changes have come about through discussions among members of the Vocal Affairs and Vocal Arts Executive Committees, but also through discussions and suggestions from the students as well,” she says.
The results of such collaborations include the recent creation of the two-year AD in Performance, more performance opportunities for all students, and enhanced curricula in various areas. “In the fall of 2002, we will be adding a class in Oratorio. And a ‘Traditions of Singing through Language’ class was added this fall because we felt that young singers just beginning their training needed to know more about the artists from the past who have shaped their art form,” says Hoffman. “At this time we don’t have a class in vocal pedagogy, but it has been discussed as a possibility for the future.”
Instrumental in making suggestions for positive change, and a liaison between students and faculty, is Beth Foreman, Administrative Director of Vocal Arts. Her mission is to open doors for those who are serious about performing. “We are committed to making a lot of opportunities available to the most number of students, and these students are of such high quality that it’s fairly easy to give everyone a chance,” she says. Foreman admits, however, that some go through the undergraduate or Master’s program and come out with very little performance to show for it. “One thing that might knock a person out altogether is if they’re not in good academic standing. Or it might be that the audition was not strong and someone else’s was. In that case, a professional result will prevail.”
Still, all in all, she feels that the system is fair and that anyone who really wants it can stay busy performing. Student Susanna Phillips agrees. “Every once in a while there’s a perception of unfairness, but if you want to do something, you can,” she says. “There are things going on all over the place—songbooks, liederabends [collaborations between singers and pianists], spirituals, scenes, recitals. If you don’t get a meaty role in an opera, you’ll get a great scene.”
Even undergrads have the chance to test their mettle before an audience in the current program. “Last year we did two productions, Marriage of Figaro and Albert Herring, in black box, and we also did two full productions for undergraduates, Dido and Aeneus and Copland’s The Tender Land,” says Hoffman. “This year we will go back to one black box and one full production. Undergrads also have scene study and performance.”
Honors Recitals, of which there are three in any given year, provide great exposure to singers at all levels of study. The big one is an evening recital in Alice Tully Hall. Singers are selected to audition for this recital by nomination, and are then chosen by an outside panel of judges. Usually five or six are chosen and each singer prepares 15-20 minutes of music to be accompanied by a collaborative pianist from the School. The two other recitals—one in fall for undergraduates and one in spring for graduates—comprise the ‘Wednesdays at One’ series in Alice Tully Hall.
And then there are the Master Classes with celebrated artists like Leontyne Price and Luciano Pavarotti, which can be either public (the annual Marilyn Horne Foundation classes) or for students and teachers only. “We feel it’s a good idea to have a balance between the public classes and those that are more private, where singers can work on their craft in a more intimate environment,” Hoffman explains.
In addition, Juilliard often casts non-participating students in JOC projects if there’s a role open and there are no singers in the program with the right voice type. “Students are not confined in terms of casting,” says Foreman, “Though we always want to give a person graduating from a program the first opportunity for a role, provided it is vocally appropriate.”
Separate from the other Vocal Arts programs and geared to serious singers, Juilliard Opera Center has given participants the chance to perform in some of the most beloved works in opera over the years, including La Cenerentola, Le Nozze di Figaro, Don Giovanni, Cosi Fan Tutte, The Love of Three Oranges, Dialogue of the Carmelites, Tosca, La Traviata and Don Pasquale. And in 1997, its Hansel and Gretel was presented on ‘Live from Lincoln Center’, a first for a conservatory production.
Gruber played Gretel in that acclaimed production. “I was very lucky,” she says, “but the turning point for me was playing Susannah in The Marriage of Figaro. For the first time I realized that I could make the character and music one and the same. Later, when I did the role at New York City Opera, I was ready to step into it with full understanding of the character.”
In fact, several singers (including Gruber) have performed with area opera companies while still students at Juilliard. According to Beth Foreman, though there’s no official connection between the School and New York City Opera or the Met, both houses attend Juilliard Vocal Arts recitals, opera productions, workshops and master classes on a fairly regular basis. “Because Juilliard students perform at Lincoln Center—in the Juilliard Theater, Avery Fisher Hall, Alice Tully Hall, and so forth—our singers are often seen and heard in performance by the representatives of all the Lincoln Center performing venues, and this in turn creates wonderful opportunities for … the development of their future careers,” she says.
Since future careers are what most young singers have in mind, any advantage they can attain in grad school is met with enthusiasm. Contacts with professionals, fully-staged productions, small roles with a professional company, abundant coachings and diction lessons, exposure to the inexpressibly rich environment at Lincoln Center—any one of these things is enough to make a wannabe star salivate, and Juilliard has it all. Still, Ferro advises that students keep their own ambition in check lest it prove to be a bane.
“The experience of singing in an evening of song or even in chorus is all something that will affect their lives later on. But for most singers, a professional career comes later in the 20s, 30s or even 40s,” he says. “Those who are graduating at age 21 or 23 are not ready to face the real world. Graduating is just the beginning of something a singer has to continue for years.”
