I've got talent button

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Four seasons now, I've watched America's Got Talent and have cheered with the best and booed or at least rolled on the floor booing the worst, of what this show portrayed as the raw best of American acts. As an opera singer, I've shunned participating myself claiming that it would cheapen my respectability amongst legitimate opera professionals and thus was not something that I should do. However, in the last couple of seasons "opera" singers have appeared and even won the title of the most talented act in America along with a million dollars and a Vegas contract. And yes, I've sat in front of the TV and critiqued their woefully lacking technique and the hype surrounding them, but you know, they've actually inspired me...

I have two mothers. One gave birth to me and the other raised me. But what ties these two women, besides their niece/aunt kinship, is the fact that both of them had singing dreams that never came true. Life was not in favor of such things for them. My birth mother, nerves and subsequent mental illness derailed her. The mother who raised me (my great-aunt biologically) lived in a time when this wasn't as likely for her race. And although a chosen few inspirators made it through, Leontyne Price, Grace Bumbry, Marian Anderson, Shirley Verette, etc. she chose the road to feed her young family. And that's why I was born. I was born to link together the unheard voices of these women, to bring them to the stage with thrice the impact.

In my quest towards honing my voice for the opera house, there's been a burning desire within to give my voice, compounded with my mothers, a unique path. And I want people to view opera as more than just a big woman making her ascent in a long blonde wig and horns. How human its stories, how tangible its drama, how real its beauty. It's not just for a social class or race, it's for humanity.

In the tab next to the one where I'm writing this, I've got the AGT audition pre-registration site up. Tomorrow, I'm going to make a 2-3 minute video telling a little of my story and singing Io son l'umile ancella. Lastly, I'll click on the "I've got talen" button to submit...

...and hopefully, in some months, I'll be reporting that, "I'm going to Vegas!"

Question of the day:

What's your story and when are you going to start telling it?