Parisian of the Month: Elisa Doughty

Elisa Doughty is an American opera singer - soprano- living in Paris since 2000 and has performed all over Europe. Her newest show "I Wish You Love", a departure from her usual classic music, is a cabaret show celebrating the great American songwriters and composers including George Gershwin, Harold Arlen, Rodgers and Hart, Stephen Sondheim, Leonard Bernstein and Kurt Weill, interspersed with telling her story in French.  I was lucky enough to see a preview performance last Saturday and it was sensational. If you are in Paris on March 26 & 27, or live here, don't miss this fabulous show. Details are after the interview.

Where were you born and where did you grow up?

I was born in Winchester, Massachusetts and grew up in Wakefield, about ten miles north of Boston.  

What made you decide to become an opera singer? 

I always wanted to be on stage. When I was a little girl, my father played in a top 40 cover band and my siblings and I often spent the afternoon at the nightclub while the band rehearsed. We knew all the words to the songs on the radio at an early age! My original dream of being a rock star morphed into wanting to be an opera singer when my grandparents took me to see the movie “Amadeus” when I was in the 7th grade. I was entranced by the costumes, the orchestra, acting on stage, and especially the emotion of the music.

What were some of your early music influences growing up?

My parents listened to rock and pop music so I loved The Beatles, Crosby Stills and Nash, Joni Mitchell and Stevie Wonder. I discovered jazz in high school and became a huge Pat Metheny fan. We spent summer vacations with our grandparents and they listened to classical music and took me to my first opera.

Where did you train?I got my bachelor’s degree in music and French from Wellesley College. They have a wonderful, nurturing music department there. I received my master’s degree in voice performance from Boston University. I also studied for two years at the Conservatoire National de Région in Boulogne-Billancourt.

When and why did you move to Paris?

I moved to Paris in September 2000. I had spent my junior year of college in Aix-en-Provence and fell immediately in love with France and French culture. I knew I wanted to live in Paris for a few years at some point in my life. After receiving my master’s degree and freelancing for a couple of years, I was ready for a change, and so I just picked up and moved, hoping to develop my singing career in France . I had no job, no visa and knew two people!     

Tell me us about your new cabaret show “I Wish you Love”?

“I Wish You Love” is a return to music that feels so familiar to me despite it being repertoire that I’ve never sung professionally – Rodgers & Hart, Harold Arlen, Leonard Bernstein, Stephen Sondheim and more. The show is a musical journey through a single woman’s experience with love – the questioning, the doubts, the hopes, the realizations, etc.  I think there’s a bit of a “Sex and the City” feel to it. I have a wonderful trio of jazz musicians and terrific stage director/writer and choreographer.   

What three pieces of music would choose if you were on a desert island?

I hate this question. Just three pieces? One classical: Bach’s Christmas Oratorio; One jazz: Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong “Can’t We Be Friends”; and one Pop: Stevie Wonder “For Once in My Life”.  

What have been some of your favorite singing roles and most memorable performances?

I love Adina in Donizetti’s “L’elisir d’amore”, Susanna in “Le nozze di Figaro” and Nannetta in “Falstaff”.   Also Pamina, Anne Trulove, Miss Wordsworth in Britten’s “Albert Herring”…

As for memorable performances, I had the opportunity to sing Frasquita in “Carmen” at the Stade de France a few years ago.  There were 70,000 people in the audience. I felt like a rock star. I made my début in Paris as Pamina in “The Magic Flute” in a production with the Cirque Alexis Gruss and made my entrance on a horse and walked through fire jugglers in the final scene. I recently sang an aria from “La Traviata” for a big “Arts de la Rue” festival while standing on a locomotive that had just (accidentally) caught fire before an audience of 5,000 people. I guess I am drawn to performing opera in unexpected or spectacular settings that attract new audiences. 

Who is the one person living or dead you would love to sing for and what venue would you choose?

I would love to sing Mozart for Mozart at the Vienna Statsoper. How completely thrilling it would be to know exactly how he wanted his music performed and what other thoughts he had on characterization that we’ve missed. 

What do you prefer about Paris?

I love the appreciation of beauty in everyday life in Paris : the architecture, the flowers, the food, the art, the attention to detail. I love that after almost ten years here there are still plenty of streets, squares and neighborhoods I’ve yet to discover. I love that being an artist is recognized as a real and essential métier in Paris. I love the pace of life here. I feel there are many people here that are enjoying life now rather than trying to get to some day when they’ll enjoy it.  I love that I can ride my bike everywhere.  And I really love how the French talk at length about food during pretty much every meal!

I Wish You Love 

March 26 & 27 -9PM

Theatre du Tambour Royal

Passage Piver, 11th arr.

Metro: Goncourt or Belleville

Reservations: [email protected]

website: http://elisadoughty.free.fr

Coming soon: Eye Prefer New York Tours

New! Eye Prefer Paris Cooking Classes
I am happy to announce the launch of Eye Prefer Paris Cooking Classes. Come take an ethnic culinary journey with me and chef and caterer Charlotte Puckette, co-author of the bestseller The Ethnic Paris Cookbook (with Olivia Kiang-Snaije). First we will shop at a Paris green-market for the freshest ingredients and then return to Charlotte’s professional kitchen near the Eiffel Tower to cook a three-course lunch. After, we will indulge in the delicious feast we prepared along with hand-selected wines.

Cost: 185 euros per person (about $240)
Time: 9:30AM- 2PM (approximately 4 1/2 hours)
Location: We will meet by a metro station close to the market
Class days: Tuesday,Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday
Minimum of 2 students, maximum 6 students.

Click here to sign up for the next class or for more info.

I am pleased as punch to announce the launch of Eye Prefer Paris Tours, which are 3-hour walking tours I will personally be leading. The Eye Prefer Paris Tour includes many of the places I have written about such as small museums & galleries, restaurants, cafes & food markets, secret addresses, fashion & home boutiques, parks, and much more.

Tours cost 195 euros for up to 3 people, and 65 euros for each additional person. I look forward to meeting you on my tours and it will be my pleasure and delight to show you my insiders Paris.
Check it out at www.eyepreferparistours.com

Comments

[Cheryl]

Good Morning Richard, Thanks for this lovely interview. Please tell Elisa that her comment "I love that being an artist is recognized as a real and essential métier in Paris. " truly struck home for me (and perhaps your other creative readers) and made me want to be there with you all even more. I would have loved hearing her show. xox - Cheryl

[Larry]

Would have loved to been there to hear her.

[Maureen]

Thank you .....sweet, charming, brave young
woman..

[Helen]

Oh Richard! What a lovely interview! And what a thrill to wake up to you and Elisa there in Paris at that darling little place. Sigh! It's all too good to be true! You're just a genius and you captured Elisa and her "story" with the spirit of Paris. How I wish I could be there for her Cabaret!

[Sandra]

Thanks for this lovely piece on a fellow opera singer. I hope to see her show and perhaps, have the pleasure of meeting you there.

[Herman]

Wonderful story and interview, Richard. Sorry I'll miss Elisa's performance. Any chance she'll be performing in Paris in May?

Her response to your question, "What do you prefer about Paris?" is absolutely on target. It's what has kept me returning to Paris since my first major exhibition there in 1976.

[Joseph]

Great interview!

[Dioegens]

I really enjoyed this.