It was 7:25 p.m., and curtain was at 7:30. I hurried around backstage, making sure my props were in place and finding what I needed for Mimì’s first entrance. Suddenly, one of the stagehands approached me. He said some people were asking for the tickets I had left for them, but the ticket people couldn’t find the tickets. The stagehand said the last name was Wood.
I racked my brain for about 30 seconds before it suddenly dawned on me.
“Tell them the tickets are under CJ Williamson!”
The stagehand relayed the message via his headset, and a few seconds later, gave me a smile that everything was OK. I chuckled to myself at the mix-up, and then, as the first notes of the overture wafted backstage, my mind turned back to La bohème.
Several hours later, with street clothes donned and wig removed, I checked my cell phone messages to hear that unmistakable voice: “Hi, Sara. This is C—J—” she said, carefully emphasizing each initial, “who forgot her name tonight. I thought I was Carla Wood!” Then came that signature laugh.
We dedicate this issue to the unforgettable life of Carla Wood, aka CJ Williamson, cut short after a brave battle with cancer. Carla had known other battles in her life, from battling abuse, to battling other health problems, to battling charlatans trying to take advantage of singers. She fought her brain tumor with the same characteristic tenacity she brought to those other battles: asking questions, gathering information, preparing well for what was to come—and most of all, making everyone who came to see her laugh.
I first met CJ the same way so many others did, via e-mail. I had applied for a job with the magazine as assistant editor, and we corresponded via e-mail, discussing the position and eventually setting up an interview. CJ asked if I could come in for the interview on a Friday afternoon, and I responded that the morning would work better, as I was tied up in the afternoon. She wrote back: “I don’t know what kind of person goes around tying you up, but if you want to come in around 11, that would be good for me. I won’t tie you up.”
There I was, trying to be very professional in my efforts to get the job, and she was already cracking jokes and putting me at ease. I soon learned that this was vintage CJ, and the very thing that made people feel like they knew her, even if they’d never met her.
Most people never got the opportunity to meet CJ Williamson face-to-face. They saw her name in each issue of Classical Singer, read her monthly editorials and other articles, corresponded via e-mail, and spoke on the phone with CJ Williamson, but rarely put a face with the name. In fact, many often wondered if CJ was a man or woman.
Carla Wood was the name most people associated with the face, the name she used for all non-magazine roles from singer, to wife, to mother, to church choir director. Carla was born Carla Jean Williamson and took her husband’s last name when she married David Wood. When Dave and Carla began The New York Opera Newsletter in 1988, Carla’s manager at the time suggested that she use a different name for her role with the magazine, and thus C (for Carla) J (for Jean) Williamson (her maiden name) was born.
Carla/CJ’s two names represented very different roles in her life, but she was always the same person, whether acting as Carla or CJ. Her sensitivity, kindness, spontaneity, depth of emotion, and inspiring work ethic made her great as a singer, and in turn, these same traits led her to create the “Newsletter” and later, Classical Singer magazine.
The sincerity she brought to her various roles also came out in the magazine. CS has always had a conversational style, discussing everything that affects the singer’s world, from the very personal to the very professional. It is only fitting, as we pay tribute to the life of Carla Wood, that the style should continue, and thus we feature her life through the eyes of the person who knew her best: her husband. In addition, those who worked with her, both as a singer and/or an editor, share recollections of this amazing woman.
Because of the immense contributions she made as both CJ Williamson and Carla Wood, both names have come to represent compassion, love, dedication, heart, soul, beauty, fun, laughter … I could go on and on. Carla/CJ embodied these attributes, and her legacy will live on for a long time to come. I will count myself forever blessed to have known and been inspired by her.
