Stand Up Straight and Sing!

by Jessye Norman

  One of the things that gives me joy is the sheer look of flowers. When one considers the many hundreds of books written on the subject and the number of gardens everywhere, it is clear that a love of flowers is universal. I am drawn particularly to orchids. I had no idea of the thousands of varieties of this flower until I visited an exhibition in Tokyo some years ago. Some orchids grow only in Africa, others only in Malaysia, others only in the Amazon, and so forth.

  With this knowledge now under my belt and with my love for this flower only increased, you can imagine that I was floored when the French National Museum of Natural Sciences and the National Botanical Garden invited me to be present at a ceremony at which an orchid would be named for me. My reaction upon hearing this amazing news was stunned gratitude.

  On a beautiful, sunny morning, we found ourselves in the warm and humid home of the orchid garden of the National Botanical Gardens of France, which is in Versailles. Live music played quietly and everyone spoke in lowered tones, which somehow seemed to fit this atmosphere completely. I was transported.

  It was there that I would learn that an orchid grower in the South of France had given seven years to the development of this perfectly gorgeous Phalaenopsis: a beautiful ivory flower with a tinge of light purple at its head. I was presented with a specimen in the loveliest of ceremonies, with poetry from one of my all-time favorites, Paul Verlaine.

  A specimen of this plant can now be found in the New York Botanical Garden in the Bronx, in the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory.

  Amid such beauty, the spirit floats, soars a bit, and rests again in complete joy. Flowers make their own music.

  I listen to a good deal of instrumental classical music and jazz and allow it to calm me and lift my spirits, and on occasion to teach me. There is great value in listening to such giants as Ellington and Fitzgerald, Monk, Coltrane, and Vaughan, among countless others. The phrasing, the wonderful use of blue notes, the pleasure that seems to spring from an Ella Fitzgerald CD, serve to nourish the spirit. By contrast, I seldom listen to opera, as it is nearly impossible to listen and not sing along. This is not relaxing as it is nearly impossible to simply listen and not jump in to sing a phrase or two.

  I derive great pleasure, though, still and forever, from my work. I am so grateful and so very happy that my voice and I are enjoying a fine relationship at this time of life, a time when our voices are subject to the same vagaries as the rest of our bodies.

  Living changes the voice, and it can be in a positive way. Life changes the way we think about a song, or an aria, or an entire operatic role. Living gives us more information.

  I had the experience recently of working with a conductor who, in preparing for our performance, listened to a recording that I had made twenty years ago.

  It took me a moment to explain that “love” is one thing at age thirty-five or forty, but it is a different thing, perhaps a more urgent wish, at age sixty—and that my singing of this song has changed with me. Life had intervened and taught me much more about love and longing.

  My conductor understood and we had a beautiful time together.

  THE EXPERIENCE OF LIVING can be wonderful in the insight we are able to offer those of fewer years. I am so grateful to have been blessed with a group of women a generation and more ahead of me in years, on whom I rely for wisdom. My aunt Louise is about to celebrate eighty-seven years, with the brightness and keen-minded sense of life and living that have only expanded with her years. She still has one of the very best collections of hats around, and wears them, with her jewelry and high-heeled shoes! She does not fret about things over which she has no control. One seldom sees a frown in that wonderful face.

  I would like to be an Aunt Louise.

  My pal Christine, in her twinsets, pleated skirts, pearls and all, is another one to emulate.

  She is so circumspect in the way she carries herself that if the word damn passes her lips, as it did when we spoke recently, the world practically rocks. She stated that when you have managed to reach a certain age, you do not give a damn what others think about what you feel, say, or do. I have come to some conclusions about life, she said, and I am comfortable in speaking to those conclusions. Why suffer fools if you do not have to do so? she asks. Why do anything that you do not really wish to do, if it is not going to cause harm to another person? I embrace these sentiments.

  From my own ancestry, there are stories of strong and wise women. I saw a photograph of my great-grandmother once, which is odd enough, considering where she lived and when she lived. Somehow, in its early decades, the art of photography found its way to Georgia, to her little corner of the world. She lived to be nearly ninety years old. I remember looking at her face and then back at my mother’s, searching for evidence that the two were kindred. My mother explained how an African American woman living deep in the backwoods of Georgia at the turn of the century, in the midst of the danger that came with simply being African American, could not only live to see ninety years, but look as beautiful as my great-grandmother did in that picture. For one, she had a very healthy lifestyle. She spent a lot of time outdoors, much of it exercising. Except no one really called it exercise. She walked the hillside, carrying water, searching for berries, moving with great ease as she worked the land. My great-grandmother washed her face with red clay, too, which, when I was very young, seemed very odd. But of course, we all know now that you can buy such products in small bottles these days for great sums in our fancier stores. The water my great-grandmother used with that clay was also free of pollutants and acid rain: pure. No doubt, as people in the country in those days tended to get up with the sun and go to bed at sunset, she had gotten plenty of rest and, living on a farm, the blessing of an abundance of vegetables and fruit. All these things I am rather sure contributed to her looking simply terrific in that photograph, which, in fact, had been taken near the end of her life. She lived a wholesome lifestyle free of the vices that consume all too many.

  The same is true of my grandmother, who was beautiful, strong, and independent well into her many years on this earth—well after her twelve children were adults and had left the farm to forge their own lives. There was a considerable amount of time and effort poured into trying to convince Grandmother to leave the farm and move in with someone who would be responsible for taking care of her. My uncle Floyd, whose farmland was contiguous to hers, thought he would be successful in convincing her to leave the farm and live with him, as she would not have been leaving familiar surroundings. But Grandmother would have none of this. Now well into her eighties, she made it clear that this farm was her home. She had lived there happily with Granddaddy and all those children, working their own land in grace. She remained there to live out her years.

  WHILE I MAKE MYSELF comfortable on a daily basis with the passing of time, I would not mind fewer bits of correspondence from the AARP. Those envelopes with the big red letters that appear as if by magic on such a regular basis can put a damper on your thought of using that new blue eye shadow! When that correspondence began arriving, I thought surely there must have been some mistake. Some days, I still think someone must have made a clerical error somewhere along the line.

  This brings me to the subject of love, friendships, families: life. The sensations of romantic love make us think there must be extra air to breathe—that the world has righted itself on its axis and that the sun shines only for us. I live in love and in passion practically every moment. Still, it is simultaneously amusing and perplexing that because I have not married or had children, casual, and may I say insensitive, observers relate that I cannot possibly have a “full life” since my life most probably does not resemble theirs. It is a most false assumption. The truth is that life is full to overflowing, satisfying, generous, and most assuredly blessed. Those with whom I share my personal life know this well. We celebrate it. And if we find that in order to keep our relationship safe, we must keep ourselves and the way we feel for one another out of the view of the curious, then so be
it. Friendships of all kinds are to be cherished and nourished—wrapped in limitless love that glows and grows from that deepest part of knowing that the ones we love walk into a special room in our hearts and minds and sit there with us, content, independent of outside influences, sure that there is nowhere else they would rather be. I like that. It is private. It is personal. May it ever be so.

  Of course, when the questions come, sometimes I cannot resist having a little fun. I love the look on the faces of strangers who cannot resist their curiosity in asking me, “Do you have children?” To which I will reply, “Yes, I have ninety-six this year!” I am naughty enough that I enjoy watching their reactions as they process this response. Sometimes I will ease their confusion by stating, “You see, I have a school of the arts for middle school children.”

  In my youth I learned from my own godparents that it is not necessary to give birth to children in order to have them happily and firmly in your life. They had no children of their own, but lavished their care on the children in their circle. I do the same. It just happens that all of my siblings have produced boy children, so with ten nephews I have had the distinct privilege of being surrounded by tricycles and finding half-eaten jelly sandwiches stuck, somehow, to the back of my jacket. Those who know me well caution others that they should not inquire of my family unless they are sitting comfortably, as there will be a long response! I have always adored these children, and now that they are all adults, most with their own children, it is heartwarming indeed that we have lost none of our naturalness and comfort with one another. I love spending time with them in deep, meaningful conversation that is as inspiring as their earliest offerings were charming and adorable. How could I not feel a special warmth from three little boys, about five, seven, and nine, who wished to take me to lunch with the money they saved up, at a restaurant they said they were sure I’d like because, as they so proudly pointed out, “It has pictures of the food on the menu”? How could I not adore the delicious demeanor of these children when they attended their first Detroit Tigers game? My nephews were raised around a lot of celebrated musical artists, so they were accustomed to enjoying live performances by these friends of their parents as well as my own, of course. At this Tigers game, they were sure that they understood how the “audience” is meant to respond. Imagine, then, when, at the baseball game, they found the crowd yelling their approval at something that happened on the baseball diamond, and, as they knew no better, the three of them rose to their little feet to yell, “Bravo!” Priceless.

  Who would not find these now adults simply wonderful in taking some of their vacation time of late to travel to New York to try to usher their Aunt J into the twenty-first century, with all the newest technology available, and providing a bit of a tutorial prior to their departure? When one thinks of all the other things that could occupy the time of beautiful, marvelously educated, sophisticated young men, how can I not love them fully and deeply?

  Love, ease, joy, friendship—they all grow with the years and plant their roots around me with the sure and always-present power of enduring devotion. I love my men friends. Every single one.

  Marriage proposals come in all shapes and sizes, don’t they? From “Why don’t we marry?” to “I think we would make a great team,” to a drive into the French countryside on a glorious summer’s afternoon for lunch that seems too magnificent in its deliciousness to be real, followed in the most leisurely fashion by the presentation of a family crest from Louis XIV, and the most romantic of poetry. Resistance is presented its greatest challenge yet.

  The thought of being titled oh so enticing, and with the beauty of that very special day still so alive in my spirit, I rejoice in knowing that I am sensible enough to be thrilled at “the invitation to this particular dance of life,” while at the same time aware of that little streak of Carmen in me—that bird in flight, that freedom that I so cherish.

  THE STRONG SPIRITS of the great women in my own family inspire me. My mother remains the central heroine of my life. The inexorable risings and settings of the sun become a topic not of intellectual discourse, but a part of my own reality. They set the example for me, these ancestral women, by making it clear that the passing of the decades can be a beautiful part of life. But it is surely not for the faint of heart. Aside from the fact of losing those who have offered long-term friendship, love, and companionship, one’s own body can present a plethora of health-related concerns. Even with the acknowledgment of such considerations and changes, we are wise to remain independent in mind and spirit as we strengthen even further those wonderful “ties that bind”—the support that true love and devotion offer us.

  A close friend, one who is reaching for age ninety and still travels the world, full of interest in absolutely everything, said to me recently that she looks in the mirror sometimes and wonders, Who is that old lady?, as it surely cannot be her, with her fabulous attire and an interesting companion waiting to take her arm. She is one of the very lucky ones. She says she has treated her health always with the respect and care that it deserves. I feel as well now as I did in my forties, she says, as she sweeps out of the door for another evening in her magnificent life.

  Still, here in our youth-obsessed world, where popular culture swallows its starlets whole and discards them long before they can blow out the candles on their thirtieth birthday cakes, society would seem to wish only to have the next youthful loveliness to admire. Why not be grateful for those indications of life and living that find themselves on our faces? The wrinkles and lines make a statement of the good and then the not so good that make up our experiences to date.

  Besides, what folly it is to dismiss all that comes with these experiences, with living; we should be grateful for every moment. I draw strength and guidance from thinking of the experiences of those who preceded me in this profession. Those ancestral monuments to courage and determination enabled me to consider how I could allow my audiences to know that I realized fully that 1995 was a special year for remembering some of the most shocking displays of inhumanity: fifty years since the end of World War II and the Holocaust that defined that war, that defamation to the soul of the world.

  I had programmed the Maurice Ravel setting of a version of the Kaddish in various places prior to 1995, but decided that this would be my statement. I would sing it in all recitals that year and would not need to say more.

  Kaddish

  ***

  Yitgaddal v’yitkaddash sh’meh rabba. May His great name be magnified and sanctified.

  B’alma div’ra chiruteh, In the world which He created, according to His will,

  v’yamlich malchuteh, may He establish His kingdom

  b’chayechon uv’yomechon during our life and during our days

  uv’chayeh d’chol bet Yisrael, and during the life of all the house of Israel,

  baagala uvizman kariv. even speedily and soon.

  V’imru: Amen. And let us say: Amen.

  Y’heh sh’meh rabba m’vorach Let His great Name be blessed

  l’alam ul’almeh almaya. forever and to all eternity.

  Yitbarach, v’yishtabbach v’yitpaar, Blessed, praised and glorified,

  v’yitromam, v’yitnasseh v’yithaddar, exalted, extolled and honored,

  v’yitalleh v’yithalal, magnified and lauded,

  sh’meh d’kud’sha b’rich hu, be the Name of the Holy One,

  l’ela min kol birchata v’shirata, though He be high above all the blessings and hymns,

  tushb’chata v’nech’mata, praises and consolations,

  daamiran b’alma. which are uttered in the world.

  V’imru Amen And let us say: Amen.

  My recital-performance tour that year would take me back to Japan to cities familiar to me, as well as some that I had not visited on previous occasions. One such city would be Hiroshima.

  I wondered if it was even appropriate that an American should perform in such a year in Hiroshima. I had the opportunity to seek the advice of President Clin
ton regarding my plans to travel and sing there, just in case there could be any concern from my own government in this regard. Perhaps I was worrying too much.

  The presenter was certain that this was precisely what he wished. It would turn out that the presenter had been born just days prior to August 6, 1945, the day Hiroshima became the first city in history to be leveled by an atomic bomb, an American atomic bomb; the city of Nagasaki followed three days later. I would learn from the presenter that his life had been saved because he was yet in hospital on that awful day. He wished the two of us to make this music together in 1995. He joked that unlike him, I had waited until the war’s conclusion, even in the Pacific, to make my appearance on earth, and he felt that our lives were somehow connected.

  I am not able to describe fully how deeply I took his kindness, the forgiveness to my country that was apparent in all he said, as well as his stated hope of forgiveness for the act of December 7, 1941: Pearl Harbor. This gentle, caring spirit, this muse who took, he stated, the greatest of pleasure in watching Hiroshima’s rebirth. There are no trees there that are more than sixty-eight years old; he and everything coming from the earth in his hometown are the same age. Miraculous. Gigantic amounts of replanting have taken place, and the city looks fresh and vibrant and green.

  My pianist and I arrived on the stage to a beautiful welcome by the audience and proceeded to offer our program. And almost immediately, I spotted something that I can see as clearly today as I could that beautiful early evening in Hiroshima. In the very first row sat a very young girl of no more than five or six years, dressed from head to toe in red, white, and blue. Her beautiful dress with its full skirt was ivory, and all of her accessories were red or blue or both. I was happy that I had already begun the first song and that my professionalism would take me through until the end, as the vision of this little girl in that time and place was something never to be imagined and surely always to be remembered.