An Honor to be Nominated. No, Really.

We have the great privilege of going to LA for the GRAMMYs this weekend!  The Volpone recording nomination (one of 5 in the category of Best Opera Recording) meant that Wolf Trap, as the record label, was able to get a few tickets for the ceremonies.  (GRAMMYs are for artists on the recording, and even though we commissioned and premiered this work, then produced and distributed it on our label, we’re sort of just hangers-on:))  So we’re going to go and celebrate.  We’re not particularly good at strutting our stuff (we tend to fly under the radar and plug along), but we shall try!

I’ve always thought that the words “It was just an honor to be nominated” were 1) a way of being gracious when you won or 2) an attempt at not feeling bad because you lost.  But I am here before you now to witness that it is possible to say it and mean it.

I am proud to bursting of our little company and our maiden voyage in the recording world.  And I think that it’s amazing – almost inconceivable, actually – that we did it so well on a wing, a prayer, and very little money.  But at the same time, I don’t think there’s even a remote chance that we will win.  (In case you don’t already know, I am the Queen of Low Expectations.  It’s a way of life and a title I bear proudly.)

Yes, we did good.  But to believe that we bested the LSO, or Ian Bostridge & Nathan Gunn, or Valery Gergiev, or the Hague Philharmonic etc etc, well, that’s more hubris than I can typically muster. 

But see, the thing is that it really doesn’t matter. The recognition that comes from this nomination will pay off in so many ways, and I intend to celebrate that.  I want to go to LA and be so proud that someone somewhere thought we belonged with the big boys.  I want to celebrate that we didn’t give up on the idiotically rocky road to completion of this project.  There shall be people-watching and beach-walking and general jubilation.

So there.

January is WTOC Alumni Month

Oh, and just in case you were wondering, 2 of the other 4 nominees in our category feature Wolf Trap alumni (Nathan Gunn, Billy Budd; Charles Workman, Marco Polo)!