Two accomplices to great vocal music tend to go unsung. One, the accompanist, may at least be seen and heard, and astute audience members appreciate the pianist’s contribution to the singer’s performance. The other, the repetiteur, is entirely invisible–but without his or her knowledge of how languages are to be sung (which often differs from the way they’re spoken), of musical styles and phrasing, and of the whole history of vocal music and its performance, the singer would not sound nearly so impressive. After the voice teacher, who trains the voice physically, a good vocal coach is a singer’s primary need: the repetiteur goes over every note, measure, and syllable of what’s to be performed, in what may seem at times nit-picking of the first degree. But the result is a performance that is the best it can be, from overall interpretation to the dotted eighth notes. The repetiteur is an artist, and Gwen Halstead is one of the best.
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Halstead, short, motherly, and ginger-haired, might not resemble the Great Musician, but behind the slightly fluttery manner, big glasses, and a tendency to call everyone “dear” lurks one of the sharpest intellects in Chicago music. Since moving to the Chicago area from her native Melbourne, Australia, in 1976, she has established herself as a concert pianist, accompanist–and outstanding vocal coach. And, proving that a prophet need not be without honor in her own country, Halstead has just spent the month of January contributing to the Australian Bicentenary celebration, imported to play in a Sydney recital.
When Halstead married at 23 and moved to England, she worked at the Royal College of Music and played for opera classes for three years. On the couple’s return to Melbourne, virtually every Australian musical organization of note put her on its payroll, among them the Elizabethan Trust, forerunner of the prestigious Australian Opera (whose present home in Sydney she describes as “that building with the sails”). When Joan Sutherland and her conductor husband, Richard Bonynge (arguably Australia’s best-known musical exports) organized a national touring company after Sutherland’s first big triumphs at Covent Garden, Halstead worked as their repetiteur.
Once she gets over the jet lag from her most recent working trip to Australia, she’ll begin working with the soloists of Chicago Opera Theater’s 1988 season. And a wide variety of Chicago-area artists and would-be artists, with her help, will wring every last drop of meaning and musicality out of the vocal literature they bring to her. She is known for imposing her artistic vision on all but the dullest of vocalists. “I find I can get anyone to do anything if I use humor,” she observes. “And I’m absolutely besotted with singers.”
