If Facebook is any standard, Jacobs School of Music graduate student Jamie Barton is already an established celebrity. There are not only one but two groups in her honor: “Jamie Barton is the most popular girl on Facebook,” which claims she has more wall posts and Facebook gifts than anyone, and the noticeably less-flattering “Jamie Barton steals my lunch money,” which accuses Barton of nothing less than being a “bully who kicks puppies and scares freshmen with wedgies and wet willies.” \nBarton seems to be taking the allegations in stride.\n“I think it’s hilarious,” she said with a laugh over lunch at Lennie’s last weekend. Then again, she has plenty of reason to stay positive these days. \nIt has been a busy but rewarding semester for Barton. She’s been to Indianapolis, to New York, Houston and back and has plenty of stories to tell.\nThe Met\nAs a district-level winner of the Metropolitan Opera’s national auditions, Barton traveled to Butler University in January to compete for a spot at the semifinal round in New York City. \nHow did it go? \nShe won first place and will leave for New York on Thursday.\nOnce in the city, Barton will take the stage on Sunday, March 25, before a distinguished panel of judges who will decide whether or not to promote her to the final round.\n“The semis take place at the Met, so I can at least say I sang on the Met stage,” she said.\nIf she is chosen to sing in the final round, Barton will have a week of coaching with Met musicians in preparation for the final competition on April 1, which will also take place on the Met stage, this time with an orchestra.\nBut the opportunity to be coached by world-class musicians isn’t the only perk Barton will have to look forward to if she advances.\n“I got $6,000 from the regional competition, so I decided I wanted to drop a significant amount of cash for a dress,” Barton said. “I found a couture designer in Texas and this dress which is amazing. … I hope, hope, hope, hope, hope I get to wear it at the finals!”\nAfter the final round, the competition judges will award up to five grand prizes of $15,000 each. And though winners are not promised a place on the Met’s roster, past winners, such as Renee Fleming, Jessye Norman and Deborah Voigt have since become some of opera’s most celebrated personalities.
Carnegie Hall\nAlmost as soon as Barton returned from Butler, she was on her way to New York to participate in the Marilyn Horne Foundation’s annual festival at Carnegie Hall, “The Song Continues…” Now in its 13th year, the festival offers a series of both recitals and master classes as part of the foundation’s mission to “encourage, support and preserve the art of the vocal recital.”\nIU nominated Barton to attend the master class and while there she met with prominent singers. \n“I got to meet some amazing people, like Barbara Cook, who is a fiery, fiery woman.”\nBarton also got to spend time with legendary Strauss soprano Evelyn Lear.\n“After (Lear’s) master class, she invited me and some friends of mine up to her hotel room,” Barton said. “So I got to sit around for an hour and half and talk about her friends from the old days of singing. … Of course, her friends from back in the day are, like, (famous German-born singer) Christa Ludwig.”\nBarton, who had prepared “Urlicht” from Gustav Mahler’s second symphony (“The Resurrection”), was assigned to Horne’s master class and said the experience left a deep impression on her.\n“It was amazing,” she said. “When I got up to sing, she stopped the whole thing to tell the audience how this song meant a lot to her because her brother had died in a plane crash, and every night for a month after that she would walk around with this symphony on her headset and purge her emotions.”\nAdding to the atmosphere of the evening was Barton’s discovery that the class had been dedicated to the late Chris Carducci, one of five IU music students who also died in a plane crash in April 2006.\n“(Chris) had done her masterclass two years ago,” said Barton. “Afterwards, (Horne) pulled me aside and was very sweet. … It was very emotional.”
Houston\nTo cap off her whirlwind trilogy of musical competition, Barton traveled to Texas to take part in the annual Eleanor McCollum Competition for Young Singers, organized by the Houston Grand Opera.\nMore than 500 vocalists apply each year for the competition, according to the HGO’s Web site\n“Seventeen were chosen for the semifinals, and I got to be one of them,” Barton said.\nOver three days of heavy vocal coaching and competition in what Barton colorfully described as a “pageant atmosphere,” Barton was declared the third-prize winner, giving her the chance to shake hands with mezzo-soprano idol Frederica von Stade, who was both judging and emceeing the final round of competition.\nBarton also had time to enjoy the cultural environment Houston had to offer.\n“I got to see Sam Ramey’s last ‘Faust’ ever,” she said. Barton also got to see Joyce DiDonato, another judge in the final competition, playing the title role in Rossini’s “Cenerentola.”\nThough Barton did not win the top prize, she said she is more than satisfied with the experience.\n“The competition was ridiculously fierce,” she said, “and what they have offered me is a place in their studio, which as a young artist program. … I’m very, very happy (with how things turned out).”
Looking to the future\nSo what’s next for Jamie Barton? \n“Well, I’ll be finishing the coursework for my master’s degree,” she said, “and this summer I’ll be making my operatic debut in ‘La Traviata’ at St. Louis Opera Theater.”\nBarton will also return to the Tanglewood Festival in the Berkshires, where she hopes to perform William Bolcom’s “The Whitman Triptych,” which, as fortune would have it, was composed for Marilyn Horne. Horne, for her part, has invited Barton to make her New York recital debut this fall.\n“It’ll be sometime around October,” she said. “They’re still working on a venue.”
