Arts Entrepreneurship Podcast: Making Art Work
#280: Matthew Polenzani (Lyric Tenor) (pt. 1 of 2)
Today we release part one of our interview with renowned lyric tenor, Matthew Polenzani. He performs regularly with the Metropolitan Opera and appears in opera houses around the world such as the Vienna State Opera, Paris Opera, and Teatro Real in Madrid.
Matthew is continuously in demand for concert engagements with the world’s most influential conductors, and with premiere ensembles such as the Berlin Philharmonic, Boston Symphony, Chicago Symphony, Cleveland Orchestra, New York Philharmonic, and the Munich Philharmonic.
Join us for this mini-master class in career development for any aspiring musician! https://matthewpolenzani.com/
Today we release part one of our interview with renowned lyric tenor, Matthew Polenzani. He performs regularly with the Metropolitan Opera and appears in opera houses around the world such as the Vienna State Opera, Paris Opera, and Teatro Real in Madrid.
Matthew is continuously in demand for concert engagements with the world’s most influential conductors, and with premiere ensembles such as the Berlin Philharmonic, Boston Symphony, Chicago Symphony, Cleveland Orchestra, New York Philharmonic, and the Munich Philharmonic.
Join us for this mini-master class in career development for any aspiring musician! https://matthewpolenzani.com/
Welcome to the Arts Entrepreneurship Podcast. Making art work. We highlight how entrepreneurs align their artistry, passion and vision to create and pursue opportunities to capture value in the arts. The views expressed by guests on the Arts Entrepreneurship Podcast are solely their own and do not necessarily represent the views of the podcast or its hosts. The appearance of a guest on the podcast, the venture they represent or reference to any product or service does not imply an endorsement or recommendation by the podcast or its hosts. The content provided is for entertainment and informational purposes only and does not constitute business advice. Here are your hosts Andy Heise and Nick Petrella.
Andy Heise:Hi Arts Entrepreneurship Podcast listeners. My name is Andy Heise and I'm Nick.
Nick Petrella:Petrella. We're excited to have renowned lyric tenor Matthew Polenzani on the podcast. He performs regularly with the Metropolitan Opera and appears in opera houses around the world, such as the Vienna State Opera, paris Opera and Teatro Real in Madrid. Matthew is continuously in demand for concert engagements with the world's most influential conductors and with premier ensembles such as the Berlin Philharmonic, boston Symphony, chicago Symphony, cleveland Orchestra, new York Philharmonic and the Munich Philharmonic. Matthew has many more accolades than we can mention in this brief bio, so we'll have his website in the show notes so you can learn more about him, his lengthy discography and performance schedule. Thanks so much for being with us today, matt. Discography and performance schedule. Thanks so much for being with us today, matt.
Matthew Polenzani:Yeah, glad to be here.
Nick Petrella:We really appreciate you fitting us into your busy schedule, so I know that time is of the essence, so we're going to get cracking here. The listeners just heard me rattle off an exhaustive list of your accomplishments, but I didn't mention anything about your younger career. For the listeners who are looking to embark on careers such as yours, could you please recall what it was like when you finished your schooling and were just starting out?
Matthew Polenzani:Yeah, well, first of all, I got to say that I went to university undergrad, for education, like, I went to be a music teacher. I really wanted to be a high school choral conductor. That's kind of what I was interested in, um, and so it wasn't until after I had it was the summer before my last year that I got the idea that, um, then I met somebody who heard me sing and he said to me oh yeah, you know, you're you. Uh, you, you're there, you're a tenor, and they're always looking for tenors, which you know like, and I've talked about this before. But, um, so then I went to grad school and after that, um, I have to say and this is something that I talk to kids about when I'm giving master classes and things like that Um, when, uh, when I finished grad school, um, I ended up going, moving back home to Chicago and I went to grad school at Yale University.
Matthew Polenzani:So I was on the East Coast and I moved back home to Chicago because there was a voice teacher there who I wanted to study with, and I'd been studying with her, actually, during my last year at Yale, just when I was home, like I had lessons over Thanksgiving and over Christmas, just when I was home, like, I had lessons over Thanksgiving and over Christmas. And then, um, uh, I can't remember, I don't remember if I saw over spring break, but I moved home, um, and I started studying with her. And in the meanwhile, uh, while I was there at home with no real prospects or anything like that, I was just studying with a teacher who I thought could help me. Um, I got an invitation to go. I had auditioned for the Juilliard Opera Center, which is a premier, a premier school for kids who want to become opera singers. Um, and I like, uh, they had had a, they had been wait-listed there and a spot opened up, and so I talked to the teacher who I was studying with about it, and she said well, I think if you could study with this one or this one, it could be interesting for you, otherwise it's probably not worth it. And, uh, and so I called the guy back and and I asked him if I could study with either of those two teachers, and he said no, um, those people are full, you're you're going to have to figure out somebody else to study with. So, um, um, in the end I turned down juliet opera center to stay in chicago where I had I had like two singing gigs in the future and they were short little concert things like run out stuff for opera theater st louis and shoot. I can't remember what the other one was. I I mean, like I was set to work as a legal secretary, like I got that job as a temp through a temp agency and I was in the Young Artist. I was in the finals for the Lyric Opera Chicago Young Artist Program, which didn't mean anything. It just means I had another audition, you know Right.
Matthew Polenzani:So I turned down JOC to study with this teacher who I thought was going to help me get better, who I knew I was growing with. I knew I was getting attaining a new level, was understanding my voice better, understanding how technique worked better, like I. Just I knew that it was worth it. So I went the route of you know, question marks and nothing really in the hopper in order to study with a teacher I thought was making me better, rather than go someplace where I might have a shot at getting a, you know, getting noticed or whatever, but not having any idea who I would study with. And so my message to young singers and when I give masterclasses is always hey, you guys find a teacher. It doesn't matter where you go to school.
Matthew Polenzani:I went to Eastern Illinois university, which I'd love to say it's like a cornfield that they cut a hole out of and put us put a university down in the center of. I mean, like there's no, you know. But it wasn't just me who made it to the Met, by the way, while while I was there, there were two other singers who made it to the Met from my time, you know, like two singers I knew. And so I mean like, getting good, getting your voice, getting your voice put together, is the thing that is the most important thing. If you can sing, you'll get noticed. If you know how to use your voice, you're going to get noticed. And uh and so like, uh, for me it's more about that than almost anything else.
Nick Petrella:Yeah, so so it's. Even though there's a traditional path, it doesn't mean it's the only path.
Matthew Polenzani:Oh yeah, and in fact my path at the Met anyway is in some ways decidedly nontraditional. I mean, like I started, my debut part at the Met was four words long and like almost as short a part as you can have an opera. Two seasons, that was 97, 98. By the 99, 2000 season I was covering which are understudying a main part and I had two scheduled performances and it turned out that the guy, when he came, he arrived, he was sick, he didn't sing any of the rehearsals and in those days at the Met, if you didn't sing the dress rehearsal you didn't sing the opening. So and I had to sing the dress, so I sang the opening and then he tried to sing the second show and he couldn't. So he canceled after the first act and I did all the rest.
Matthew Polenzani:Really, that's what, um, that's really what, what caused the Met to sit up a little bit more? I mean, they knew, they knew I was on my way. But I mean, really I started from the zero and and I went on a very steady upward climb and, um, and there've been plenty of singers who have come to the Met already at heights and and who who have gone up like a, like a like a rocket and come down just as fast. And there's plenty of them in the space of my career, which my Met career, in any event, is 27 years long. So I mean, like this will be well, technically it'll be, it's 26 years. This will be 27 in December, but at any rate, you know, I mean I've been there a long time and I've seen a lot of singers come and I've seen a lot of singers go, and really I attribute that success to having got myself put together before I got there. You know, and the getting put together that happens on its own timeframe, obviously, and everybody comes to it in a different speed.
Matthew Polenzani:But my feeling was that I knew if I could sing, that I could get noticed and if I could build a bedrock of a foundation to sing with, then I wouldn't have a problem later.
Matthew Polenzani:And of course, the other big thing is may as well just add on to that, which is I have not stopped studying and I'm 50, I'm going to be 56 this year. I still see my teacher, I still talk to her about my voice, I still talk to her about what I'm doing. She still hears me, she comes to hear me singing in different places and I meet her by way of Zoom because she's in Tennessee now. She was in the New York City area for for for a lot of years she taught at Westminster Choir College, so I could go down there and see her, or she would come up to New York because she had a bunch of students up here see her, or she would come up to New York because she had a bunch of students up here. So yeah, my studies haven't stopped and I will study until the day I'm done singing, I'm sure.
Nick Petrella:Yeah, and that's a common thread that we hear, isn't it, Andy? From successful people, lifelong students.
Matthew Polenzani:Yeah, I'm grateful actually, that I've still got somebody to go to and, yeah, you know what. I know what I'm doing now, I know how to work my voice, but there's still, as you add repertory, as you add, make more dramatic things, bigger things, higher things, or whatever. I mean like you still got to go back and have the one who knows you, uh, take you through it, you know, and make sure you're not making a mistake, or if I haven't seen her in a little while and like a bad habit could start to develop and she can call me on it. I mean, like there's a lot of you know, there's, there's, there's. We have every reason in the world to continue to study and practically none to quit, you know. So I've definitely hewed towards the. I got to keep going and keep trying to learn.
Nick Petrella:That's great.
Andy Heise:So, as we're talking with you, you currently just wrapped up a performance with the Canadian Opera Company Is that right. Yeah. So how do performances like that come about? Does the Canadian Opera Company say, hey, we're going to do this opera and then go out and find people to fill those roles? Or are they booking you and saying, hey, what would be good to work with you on. Or are you kind of selecting that repertoire together? How does that, how's that whole thing come about?
Matthew Polenzani:Yeah, it's a little bit of both, but mostly what happens is I have an agent and he's worked for me for a long time. Actually, he's been my. He's worked for me for a long time. Actually he's worked for me since 1999. So, and we can talk about that relationship too.
Matthew Polenzani:But, to answer your question, normally what happens is he'll go and he'll have a meeting with a casting director or a general director of a company and they'll say, hey, look, in 2026, we're planning to do Tosca. You know, like, um, um, and we were wondering about Matthew, is he available? Um, and sometimes, like, I've had meetings also, you know, with, uh, with general directors, where they say, hey, look, we're, we love what you're doing. What do you? What's coming up for you? What are you doing? That's new and's new and interesting, what would you like to do here? And I can give them a list of some things that I sing or things that I'm going to be singing.
Matthew Polenzani:But most of the time, you know, like, what happens is in this, like in this particular instance, medea there were, there were four. This was a co-production between four theaters. Okay, so for the Giazzone, that was my character, and the Medea, they wanted to keep those two for all four, wanted to keep those two for all four. So when the initial offer came in, which would have been in Canada, except that the pandemic happened, and then it got slid, and then, I don't know, it didn't work out for Sandra anyway, who was the Medea, sandra Radvanovsky. So we ended up doing it at the Met first and Canada second, and then there was one in, oh no, maybe the. There was, the one in greece happened in the middle, but I think neither of us were available for it. And then next, next season, uh, we'll have it in the last theater, uh, which I think I can't say right now because, uh, technically, they haven't announced it's part of the 25-26 season, not the 24-25 season. So that's how that worked in this case.
Matthew Polenzani:But usually, yeah, my agent will have a meeting. They'll say, hey, this is our repertory we are interested in. You know, is Matthew available for this? We've got these titles. Or they'll say, yeah, well, this is our list. Who can you recommend, you know? And, um, you know, so, um, yeah, and that's been a good that's. That's been a good experience for me and I've been lucky because, uh, I have worked in, you know, you mentioned those three theaters or four theaters or whatever. At the top, I mean, like I've worked in every important theater in the world multiple times and, um, really it's one of the things I'm most proud of about my career.
Matthew Polenzani:There's virtually nowhere that I went where I didn't come back or that didn't invite me back. And there was one theater I could think of. It was the Rossini Festival in Pesaro, where I said to my agent you know, like, of all the places I've ever worked, it's the only place that didn't invite me back. This is really recently and I mean like maybe I might. Places I've ever worked, it's the only place that didn't invite me back. This is really recently. And I mean like with it, like maybe this might've.
Matthew Polenzani:I might have this conversation with him in Canada and um, and he said, no, they invited you back. You just could never go back. And and I didn't know, you know, I just didn't know. But of course he always tells me. Matthew, if I tell you, if I have to tell you every invitation you get, I'd be writing you every single day, and some days I can just look at your calendar and say I know he's not available, you know, so I don't tell you, but anyway, it was nice to know that. So I just assumed that they'd never invited me back. But you know, I thought they wouldn't have invited me back because I'm not really a Rossini singer. I wasn't even when I was there, and when I heard the singers that I heard there, who were all really specialists in that repertoire, I understood that it wasn't the thing I did best.
Nick Petrella:Yeah, yeah, you know I was going to ask this question later, but it makes sense to ask it now. How do you determine which roles you'll take and which you won't?
Matthew Polenzani:Oh, yeah, well, there's a couple things that go into it. Obviously, the voice gets the biggest say. I'm aware of what I should and shouldn't be singing, and of course, I have my teacher, I have my wife and I have my agent. And when offers come in, I've been lucky over the course of my career, because the agents that I have had and that's plural, even though this guy has been working for me since 99, he started only in Italy, um, and then it grew from there. But, um, you know, my, uh, my, my, they're sort of like my team, like I'll just talk with, talk over the offers and the parts. And you know, like it's getting a little easier now because at my age there's not a lot that I would say no to. I mean, either I figured out how to sing or I haven't. You know. And obviously you know your voice is a. Physiologically it's going to stop working at some point. That's just humanity, you know. I mean like I know that, but I'm out.
Matthew Polenzani:My career is almost 30 years long now and, um, it's more than 30 years long if I go back to the first time ever I got paid to be a singer, um, but from the day that I was out of school and being paid just to sing. That's 30 years ago almost so, um. So, you know, like I have I have these people to talk over things with. I'll say to my teacher, hey, what do you think? Or I'll say to my wife, you know, like I have these people to talk over things with. I'll say to my teacher, hey, what do you think? Or I'll say to my wife, you know, because she was a singer, she doesn't sing anymore, but she was and she hears me and I still talk to her about my voice and she still talks to me about what she hears. And you know, and like we'll work through the pros and cons, or if I want to take something on.
Matthew Polenzani:But at this point, and for younger singers, by the way, if this is who you're aiming yourselves at, your circle should be small. I mean like two or three or four people at the most, and they need to be people who largely share your vision, because you're the one who's got to get up and do it. That doesn't mean they can't suggest things to you that don't, that seem like they don't make sense, and of course, I have the right to say no. You know, and over the years I've been especially careful in what I chose and when I chose to do it, and I've been more patient than most. And I probably could have went down the road of more dramatic a few years earlier, maybe five or eight years earlier than I did, but I wouldn't change a thing. I'm really happy about where I'm at and I'm happy about how I've done things in my career and I've tried to be as.
Matthew Polenzani:Usually what I say is like the day I have to stop singing is coming. So, number one, I'd like to be able to choose that day than rather my voice have to choose singing is coming. So, number one, I'd like to be able to choose that day than rather have my voice have to choose it for me. And two, of course, is I'd like to push that day off as far as I can, so that um, so that I can keep doing this. I mean, like there's no question that the education money is not the same as a performance money and um, and which is fine, you know, like, and that's good, and I'm aware that I'm I'm likely to be an educator at some point in my life Um but, uh, but I'm going to try and hold on to the singing as long as I can, For sure.
Andy Heise:Yeah, Uh, your, your website is really well done, Um, and you seem to have a pretty consistent uh presence on Instagram. I'm wondering how do you, um what are some other channels or some other ways that you quote unquote build your brand as an opera singer?
Matthew Polenzani:Yeah, I saw this question in your list, you know, like the things that were possible topics, and you know it's funny. This is the harder question for me to answer, because brand building was not a thing when I started, sure, and in fact, brand building became something important only really about 10 years ago. Sure, 10 years ago I was already established. 20 years ago I was established. So, like, I haven't had to build a brand.
Matthew Polenzani:My use of social media, and largely it's it's it's confined to instagram and facebook and I I, when I remember I post on twitter, but I'm not as good about it, um, because I want to be able to write whatever I want to write, and like twitter has the, you know, your uh, the limit on how many characters you can use, which is fine, um, at any rate. So I'm, I use those things, not not to my own brand, but to make sure that people are. I'm trying to help theaters, basically Trying to draw attention to what I'm doing and where I'm doing it and who I'm doing it with and why it's important for you to come and see it. So for me, it's more about that and, you know, because I have a family, you know, I have colleagues who are especially passionate about, you know, building foundations, or I mean foundations like musical foundations, not, you know, or starting music, I don't know, like a music school or that sort of thing. And uh, but boy, I'm, I'm aware of how much of my time with my children and I have three children, um, who are the oldest one is, uh, he'll be a senior next year. I mean like he's, he's about to leave my household and, um, you know, like I'm aware of how much I've missed with them, and so I, just for me, I, I, I don't want to take a second away from them. Um, if I can help it.
Matthew Polenzani:And, uh, my, my, my presence on Facebook and Insta in particular, I mean like those are the two I use the most. I mean like, um, I'm, I'm, uh, I'm a three or four, I'm a three times a month poster, maybe, or maybe four, you know, or something. I'm not a, you know, so I don't. I know people who love creating content. They're completely into it and, man, I say God bless you and do it to your heart's content. And some of these guys, some of these opera singers, even have 50 or 100,000 followers or more, and hey, that's cool. Again, I'll say God bless you. I think that's awesome. It's just not the route that I've chosen.
Nick Petrella:Takes time to do that too.
Matthew Polenzani:It does. You have to commit to it and you have to be imaginative. You have to love it, which I'm telling you, you, if it didn't exist? I mean like the one I'm. Look, the day my career ends, my social media presence is likely to end too.
Andy Heise:I mean like uh, because I I'm not.
Matthew Polenzani:I'm not into it. Um and uh, you know, I see. I see what it does to my, my kids, and we try hard to keep them away from it, you know. But it's a part of our world now, and so figuring out how to manage it and how to not let it rule you is the big thing you know.
Andy Heise:It sounds like you leverage it for maybe, like you said at the very beginning of this uh, a more broader advocacy for the art form, necessarily, than than you personally absolutely that's.
Matthew Polenzani:That is my yeah, I mean I. I don't think I need much advocating anymore. I mean like I've worked everywhere, um and uh, so like, but I do still, yeah, like I say I, I mean it's. I don't. I understand, like, the power of the like, you know. I mean like if you see something and it's gotten a thousand likes or ten thousand likes or whatever, how many likes these people give. I mean like, I get the. I understand the power, the rush that that, that that creates, um, but it's often, like my wife will see, she's like did you click on any of these notifications? I'm like, uh, uh. You know she's like. Did you see I sent you something? I'm like, uh, like, oh God you know, like hey let me have a look, you know, but uh
Nick Petrella:anyway, we're going to start following you and if we see one photo of you and a dish of ravioli in Verona, we're going to contact you.
Matthew Polenzani:Oh, that's okay. I mean, I will do that sort of thing, but what you won't find you won't see my kids.
Matthew Polenzani:You know I mean, uh, you won't see my kids. And um, again, if you're, if you're down with it, I'm I, I, I don't. I'm not telling you that you shouldn't be doing it, I'm just saying it's not for me and um, you, I will. So I will. I have occasionally shown pictures of me and my wife, but my wife was in the business and knows a lot of the people I know and I'm not exposing her in some way that I would be exposing my kids.
Nick Petrella:So yeah, you know, in your last answer you brought up a really good point. I think audiences, or even musicians starting out, who see artists such as yourself as one-dimensional. So there's people with fascinating lives, full of travel, working with famous conductors and so on, but what they don't see is your rehearsal schedule and how you have to balance your professional activities with your family life.
Matthew Polenzani:How do you?
Nick Petrella:balance that has it changed over the years.
Matthew Polenzani:Well, it's brutal. I mean, let me start with this. I generally spend seven to eight months a year away from the house. So if I'm lucky I'll have. I've been lucky at the Met to have usually two things out of a 20 I don't know On average 23 or 24 season titles, a season house. I've been lucky to usually have two things. Occasionally I've had three things. Um, it's just sort of dependent on how how things worked out or if somebody canceled I had to step in. Most of the time it's either one or two. So, and the reason we live here in new york is because, like, it means I can work at home and I've been lucky to work at the met every year since 1997. I have not missed a season, even the pandemic season. I was able to do one of the run out things, you know, the concerts that we did, that we did from Europe. So you know, I try hard to keep.
Matthew Polenzani:And over the years of our marriage we set a rule for ourselves when we first got married, which was basically that we wouldn't spend more than six weeks apart, and we have pretty much kept to that.
Matthew Polenzani:Maybe twice in our entire marriage We've had to, we've we've gone past that amount once was because she was pregnant and she had to go home and I had a. I had a like a seven week gig afterwards and it was in Europe and like she was, she was seven months pregnant and she couldn't. I had a like a seven week gig afterwards and, um, it was in Europe and like she was, she was seven months pregnant and she couldn't. You know, like there's doctor's notes and all these things you can get, but I don't know. We prefer not to take chances. So she went home and there wasn't. My wife says that there's another time, though it's funny, I don't remember what it is, but she's sure. So I would say there's been twice. At any rate, what that has meant over the years is sometimes, when I had a four day break in Europe, I went home, which was hard because it would mean that I have 36 to 48 hours at most in the house.
Matthew Polenzani:But I went home because I didn't want there to be that big gap and this is what I'll say about it, and I'll say this to be that big gap, and this is what I'll say about it, and I'll say this to young singers too. You know, when you're apart from each other, what happens is you change. You change as a human being. The changes are microscopic over short periods of time, but over a six-week period, or an eight-week period, or a 10-week or a 12-week, et cetera, those microscopic changes start to become slightly bigger. And what happens is you come home and you're different than you were when you left. You're still largely the same human, but you've been an I for two months or three months.
Matthew Polenzani:The we part of your world was somewhere else and not less important, but less present. And so you start to think, hey, do you want to go out? Do you want to go out and eat something? You go out and eat. You want to see a movie, want to get together with your castmates, want to go play golf or do whatever. That's all an I decision. Mates want to do, go play golf or do whatever, that's all an I decision here in my house with my wife and my children. There's only we decisions in this house, you know. And so, like, what happens is when you, when you're apart for long periods of time, all those little things that happen to you, they change you, and so when you come back together, you're a little bit different than the people you were when you left each other.
Matthew Polenzani:And so my wife and I also figured out early on, like I don't mean we were married a few years at this point um, I think we were still living in our first apartment, um, and like we were, we were both into going into the city for concerts or something. She was doing something somewhere and I was somewhere else and she, uh, we've gotten a big fight over. I don't remember what it's about, but it was something small and my wife and I aren't fighters. We fight very rarely Um and uh. And you know, like she said, geez, matt, like I had only been home a couple of days. She's like we have got to be more graceful with each other over the first week or 10 days after you get home and get to know each other again and remember why we are in love and why we love each other.
Matthew Polenzani:Um, and so then and we both had to adjust her, who's making every decision where our children are, regarding our children, where they're going and what they're doing and who they're doing it with, and me, who's been doing me decisions? You know, like those, those two entities have to come back together and they have to become a we again, and so we just had to be ultra graceful with each other. Things that would never piss you off, ever if you were. You know, when you're together because you're just together, um, all of a sudden become something bigger. You know, um, and they're not big, but they just feel big because you've been the way you've been running. Your life is different. Now the we has changed, you know so, um, so, like getting back to your I went far afield from your question. But getting back to your question is I try really hard to make it home as much as I can, and even when I was in toronto just now in the rehearsal process, I was able to come home for three days In between the shows.
Matthew Polenzani:I came home twice in between the shows.
Matthew Polenzani:I mean, like I try and maximize my time here and try and see as much as I can, while I'm here, make every baseball game or every concert or every swim meet or every basketball game or whatever. I try and make sure that I see all those things that are present in my kids' lives. And yeah, sometimes it's tough because rehearsal periods can be long, especially if you're doing a new production. That might be five or six weeks of only rehearsal, where it's tough to get away. If you're lucky, like I was lucky in Toronto, I was able to get away, and sometimes it works out in different theaters.
Matthew Polenzani:Or if you're not working so far away if I'm working in Chicago or if I'm working in anywhere that's less than, say, three hours, say Houston maybe or something like that you know that I try to get home. I'm in DC or in Boston, no-transcript. My whole career, both of our careers, and cause she sang for the first eight years of our marriage Um and uh. Sometimes it meant, yeah, flying to, you know, cleveland or whatever for 48 hours or 24 hours just to get a visit in and make sure you touch base with each other, even when it's not really convenient, you know, um, so yeah.
Andy Heise:Yeah.
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