I haven't blogged for nearly 3 weeks, despite being in one of the world's most beautiful cities, and doing a job that many would give their eye teeth for.
The truth is that I've found going back to being 'Number 2' professionally quite difficult. I haven't been very creative over the last few years. Partly because I've needed to take work that pays, partly because the creative work I had been doing had hit an impasse, and partly because the dreaded 'mid-life crisis' made me seriously doubt my own abilities.
Last month in Bolzano I got the taste for it again and hit my stride. Even though it wasn't my own production but a revival, I was able to put a lot of myself into it and, more importantly, was in charge of the whole process. Once again I learnt the lesson that my instincts are good, that my way of working with people is productive and positive, and that this is what I'm really good at. Once again, because I keep learning the same lesson on every job I do.
Taking a step back and being in the supportive role has been difficult. The supportive role is vitally important and, the older I get the better I become at providing the support that is vitally needed. It is an important role but one which, with the demise of experienced staff-producers in the UK, has become little appreciated and not one that many aspire to.
The supportive role is one which, in many ways, suits my skills and talents. I am, by nature, empathetic. I have a wide range of experience and have multiple skills. I work well with people; can be diplomatic, encouraging, instinctive, and a diffuser of tension. So why when I can do this well isn't this enough for me?
I have always felt something of an outsider. I was drawn at an early age to music and loved being involved in practical music making both as a double-bass player and as a singer. I had little talent and even less application, but was very lucky in the chances I had and so worked at a high level. But I still felt an outsider.
It was only when I started directing that I felt at home, though bizarrely it is a lonely profession in many ways. But everything I had done before suddenly made sense. Do you remember when you were young - you had an idea of who you would be and what you would be like when you grow up? I found that person when I started directing. And each time I direct, I find that person again. It's quite an addictive drug. So not being that person for weeks, months, years on end is painful. Literally painful.
So Prague – stunningly beautiful city, lovely people, wonderful opera, great colleagues, everything perfect......and I'm struggling. Struggling to find myself. So this has to be it! A change is needed. I've taken work as Assistant/Associate for next year because the jobs offered are with people I hugely respect and who appreciate what I can offer. There also may be revivals thereafter which I will have more input into. But after that, I think it has to be my own work or I must search for another way to be fulfilled – to find myself. Because life is too short not to spend it being you.
A picture of the first quarter of our dug and planted allotment – because that made me feel good!
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