Note-worthy Experiences Music Studio
F E A T U R E
Interview with Monica Daly
F E A T U R E
Interview with Monica Daly
What has been your musical journey?
I have always loved music in all its forms, and it almost feels like I was never not a musician. My mom loves to tell the story that when I was born, the first thing she said while holding me was that I had "pianist fingers." I began playing piano in private lessons and mallet percussion in the school band at around eight years old. In high school, I joined the marching band, learned to play the cello and flute for fun, and eventually pared everything down to focus seriously on solely piano. When considering college, I didn't know what kind of career I wanted yet; I just knew I needed to be a musician. So I went to school for a bachelor's degree in piano performance, aiming to be the best pianist I could be, and hoped I would figure it out along the way!
In my junior year of undergrad, I developed a wonderful collaborative partnership with a friend of mine who needed a pianist for his voice recital. I completely fell in love with accompanying: performing with a friend all but cured my crippling stage fright, and I found the music to be equally as rewarding as solo repertoire. Having always been fascinated by other languages, I now got to explore French, Italian, German, and even occasionally Spanish and Russian through poetry set to music. I also began to thrive on the additional challenges presented by collaborating, like learning to breathe with your singer, or figuring out how to save your partner on the fly when they have a memory slip!
So now, after a master's in collaborative piano, years of teaching piano and music theater, and going back to school for a graduate performance diploma in vocal accompanying, I am a resident artist with Capital University & Opera Columbus and am happily developing a career in music as a vocal coach, church pianist, and teacher.
What is a vocal coach, and how is it different from a voice teacher or an accompanist?
An accompanist can simply be defined as the person who plays the piano part along with an instrumentalist or vocalist. It doesn't mean that they aren't a great pianist on their own, and many accompanists prefer to be called a "collaborator" instead, as they work together with their partner to present a work of music.
A vocal coach is (usually) a pianist who works with singers to help make sure that their musical preparation is correct, that their lyrics are clear, and help them consider interpretation and expression of the text. A vocal coach will hopefully refrain from working on technique with a singer so that it would not conflict with any instruction from their voice teacher.
As well as working with the singer on a single song or aria in a coaching, a vocal coach will often help a singer prepare an entire opera role. For this, the coach needs to act as conductor, director, and everyone else in the cast, by playing the orchestra part on the piano, singing the other voice parts or playing entrances, cueing the singer, and then discussing the character's personality and how this song fits into the plot of the opera. No two coaches are alike -- as we all have strengths, weaknesses, specializations -- so we work with each singer with the tools we have to help them perform their best.
What was your most memorable musical performance?
While I was studying at Peabody, a soprano friend and I were awarded the InterPlay Teaching Artist Grant, where we got to program an audience-interactive lecture recital in the gorgeous hall at the University of Maryland Baltimore County. We selected music told from a woman's perspective (including Lucia di Lamermoor's famous mad scene and Libby Larsen's Try Me, Good King: Last Words of the Wives of Henry VIII) and it led us to explore the history, mental health, love and loss, misogyny, and other themes present in the lives of these characters. It was a huge undertaking to compress into a 45-minute performance, while also needing to incorporate meaningful interactive moments with the audience, so the planning process on top of needing to prepare the actual music made the whole project really challenging!
Since the recital was close to Valentine's Day, one activity we planned was to put Valentine's cards into the programs that the audience received. At intermission, we asked them to write down something personal that came up for them during the performance and submit it in a box we had on the stage. Reading the answers afterwards showed the singer and I all of the unexpected ways we had impacted our audience, and it was truly humbling.
The last activity before the last song was to pass out hand bells to random audience members so that they could improvise a musical conversation via call-and-response. The creativity that our audience members expressed in their "conversations" -- anger, laughter, frustration, sadness -- brightened up the energy in the room after what was admittedly a very heavy recital, and it felt like it supercharged the performance of our final upbeat song. It was truly an incredibly special recital for both of us, and I hope our audience felt the same way.
What is your favorite genre of music to play? To sing? To listen to?
I love to play classical, of course! Romantic era repertoire is my favorite, like Mendelssohn or Chopin. My "comfort piece" that I come back to over and over is the Rachmaninov Cello Sonata, even if I don't have a cellist to play with right now.
I generally listen to indie rock/folk for fun. I'll sing along usually when in the car or while cooking dinner, and have been known to occasionally sing Disney songs in the shower. And though I'm not a trained singer, I find myself singing opera quite a lot for work!
When you’re not performing or teaching, what other hobbies or interests do you have?
As a result of staying home more due to the COVID-19 pandemic, I've been trying out lots of new recipes! I've always loved to cook but with a busy school schedule I would always fall back on the same boring few meals. I have tried cooking at least one new recipe a week this year and it's (mostly!) gone really well.
Lately I've enjoyed morning walks, getting two new books a month from a subscription service, and playing games online with my friends and family since most of them live in different states. I've also wanted a dog for years but couldn't because of school, so now my partner and I are currently studying up on how to be excellent dog parents before getting a new puppy this spring!
Learn more about Monica on her Teacher Page.
I have always loved music in all its forms, and it almost feels like I was never not a musician. My mom loves to tell the story that when I was born, the first thing she said while holding me was that I had "pianist fingers." I began playing piano in private lessons and mallet percussion in the school band at around eight years old. In high school, I joined the marching band, learned to play the cello and flute for fun, and eventually pared everything down to focus seriously on solely piano. When considering college, I didn't know what kind of career I wanted yet; I just knew I needed to be a musician. So I went to school for a bachelor's degree in piano performance, aiming to be the best pianist I could be, and hoped I would figure it out along the way!
In my junior year of undergrad, I developed a wonderful collaborative partnership with a friend of mine who needed a pianist for his voice recital. I completely fell in love with accompanying: performing with a friend all but cured my crippling stage fright, and I found the music to be equally as rewarding as solo repertoire. Having always been fascinated by other languages, I now got to explore French, Italian, German, and even occasionally Spanish and Russian through poetry set to music. I also began to thrive on the additional challenges presented by collaborating, like learning to breathe with your singer, or figuring out how to save your partner on the fly when they have a memory slip!
So now, after a master's in collaborative piano, years of teaching piano and music theater, and going back to school for a graduate performance diploma in vocal accompanying, I am a resident artist with Capital University & Opera Columbus and am happily developing a career in music as a vocal coach, church pianist, and teacher.
What is a vocal coach, and how is it different from a voice teacher or an accompanist?
An accompanist can simply be defined as the person who plays the piano part along with an instrumentalist or vocalist. It doesn't mean that they aren't a great pianist on their own, and many accompanists prefer to be called a "collaborator" instead, as they work together with their partner to present a work of music.
A vocal coach is (usually) a pianist who works with singers to help make sure that their musical preparation is correct, that their lyrics are clear, and help them consider interpretation and expression of the text. A vocal coach will hopefully refrain from working on technique with a singer so that it would not conflict with any instruction from their voice teacher.
As well as working with the singer on a single song or aria in a coaching, a vocal coach will often help a singer prepare an entire opera role. For this, the coach needs to act as conductor, director, and everyone else in the cast, by playing the orchestra part on the piano, singing the other voice parts or playing entrances, cueing the singer, and then discussing the character's personality and how this song fits into the plot of the opera. No two coaches are alike -- as we all have strengths, weaknesses, specializations -- so we work with each singer with the tools we have to help them perform their best.
What was your most memorable musical performance?
While I was studying at Peabody, a soprano friend and I were awarded the InterPlay Teaching Artist Grant, where we got to program an audience-interactive lecture recital in the gorgeous hall at the University of Maryland Baltimore County. We selected music told from a woman's perspective (including Lucia di Lamermoor's famous mad scene and Libby Larsen's Try Me, Good King: Last Words of the Wives of Henry VIII) and it led us to explore the history, mental health, love and loss, misogyny, and other themes present in the lives of these characters. It was a huge undertaking to compress into a 45-minute performance, while also needing to incorporate meaningful interactive moments with the audience, so the planning process on top of needing to prepare the actual music made the whole project really challenging!
Since the recital was close to Valentine's Day, one activity we planned was to put Valentine's cards into the programs that the audience received. At intermission, we asked them to write down something personal that came up for them during the performance and submit it in a box we had on the stage. Reading the answers afterwards showed the singer and I all of the unexpected ways we had impacted our audience, and it was truly humbling.
The last activity before the last song was to pass out hand bells to random audience members so that they could improvise a musical conversation via call-and-response. The creativity that our audience members expressed in their "conversations" -- anger, laughter, frustration, sadness -- brightened up the energy in the room after what was admittedly a very heavy recital, and it felt like it supercharged the performance of our final upbeat song. It was truly an incredibly special recital for both of us, and I hope our audience felt the same way.
What is your favorite genre of music to play? To sing? To listen to?
I love to play classical, of course! Romantic era repertoire is my favorite, like Mendelssohn or Chopin. My "comfort piece" that I come back to over and over is the Rachmaninov Cello Sonata, even if I don't have a cellist to play with right now.
I generally listen to indie rock/folk for fun. I'll sing along usually when in the car or while cooking dinner, and have been known to occasionally sing Disney songs in the shower. And though I'm not a trained singer, I find myself singing opera quite a lot for work!
When you’re not performing or teaching, what other hobbies or interests do you have?
As a result of staying home more due to the COVID-19 pandemic, I've been trying out lots of new recipes! I've always loved to cook but with a busy school schedule I would always fall back on the same boring few meals. I have tried cooking at least one new recipe a week this year and it's (mostly!) gone really well.
Lately I've enjoyed morning walks, getting two new books a month from a subscription service, and playing games online with my friends and family since most of them live in different states. I've also wanted a dog for years but couldn't because of school, so now my partner and I are currently studying up on how to be excellent dog parents before getting a new puppy this spring!
Learn more about Monica on her Teacher Page.