To recap slightly for anyone reading for the first time. I’m a Soprano, with a suitcase and a rucksack with no fixed abode, travelling round seeing where I end up (desired destination America). I’ve got a contract at the Opera in Monte Carlo for a month (not such a bad place to start). 

I’ve been in Monaco now for the last 9 days and it feels much longer, like I’ve been here for weeks. Just slotted in easily to my life of sun, sea, baguettes, cheese and cheap wine (oh, and opera too). I’m staying in a place called Beaulieu Sur Mer with another singer called Claire who I studied with at The Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama years ago, so it’s great to share a place together. We could hardly get up the steps to our apartment tonight we were laughing so hard at something someone had said to us on the bus, so some good English banter is flowing. It takes about 20 minutes to get to Monaco and the drive is stunning. Every day I get on the bus hoping there’s a seat next to the window so I can sit there and just look at the coastline as we go along. I’ve only managed it once so far.

It’s been really sunny the last few days and just to see the sun sparkling on the water and the blue of the sea is just so therapeutic. It’s ‘pinch yourself’ stuff.  I keep going to the opera early to practise and have language coaching’s with other chorus members (utilise the native speakers around me), and the other day I had a few hours spare so thought I’d go and explore Monaco and found a little beach with no one on. I just sat for about an hour on a rock just listening to the sea, reading my book and just enjoying the peace and quiet. It felt like heaven.

I’ve been thinking how to describe Monaco itself. On the one hand it’s got a wow factor (very beautiful), and the yachts are standing in the port looking glam.

People are walking around looking well dressed and wealthy; all the shops are designer apart from Zara and Benetton; you pass Maserati’s and Lamborghini’s outside the Casino (the opera house is at the back of the casino) and the other day I was at the zebra crossing waiting to cross and a Lamborghini just stopped to let me cross. I was like ‘it’s just weird (wtf) seeing a Lamborghini stopping at the crossing and not a normal car’. You go in the underground parking and its Bentleys and Rolls Royces, and there are so many high rise apartments and new ones being built in the mountain. I can honestly say some of them don’t look nice at all (not out of place on a council estate. Gosh, can’t believe I actually said that), and rents for a small apartment start at 4000 euros per month. I still didn’t know what to think of it and I was chatting to another English person in the chorus today and she said ‘yeah, this bit of the opera is like Monaco, rich but fake’, and I thought that’s exactly how it is, ‘Rich but Fake’.

There’s a group of 8 of us who have been drafted in to bolster the chorus to help with the English. My agent mate Adrian has been working with the chorus here on their English (Peter Grimes has loads for the chorus), and he suggested that they get some native singers in, so that’s how I made it here.  It’s mostly Italian people and the chorus master is Italian too. They are a really friendly bunch of people who want us to feel welcome, and it’s a novelty to be surrounded by people speaking Italian all around us. Lots of culture differences. I found Enzo who has been helping me with my Italian for my arias for any future auditions, so I’ve been going in every day early to work for a few hours before my rehearsals start to work on them.

I’m working on a character called Fiordiligi from ‘Cosi Fan Tutte’ and on Mimi from ‘La Boheme’. It’s a whole different thing working with a native speaker on it. Today I think I said the word ‘sgelo’ about 50 times and still didn’t get it right. I’ve booked in with Thierry for my French session next week on my Faust aria. I said I would get something recorded for the agent in America (who hasn’t done anything so far). One day last week I was telling my friend in Canada how amazing it was here and I think it’s great and then 3 hours later I called him in tears saying ‘what am I doing?’

There’s always an undercurrent of anxiety in me about this whole ‘America’ thing. If I knew I didn’t need a visa I would be there already and would have found a job doing whatever to get me going, but I’m going there with nothing and have no idea of how opportunities will come along. There’s always this tension in my tummy that I need to be doing something, and I’m working and working and organising stuff and sometimes I’m just tired of the continual striving and constant working. Sometimes I wish I just could sit back for a while and not care so much (I deleted myself swearing at this point). I’m really working hard on my search for wherever it is I am going with this……it never stops, but I need to find balance too. Not push. I did my Kyle Gray angel cards this morning and they said ‘stop forcing things, find balance and let things happen in their natural way’. Thanks angels but not easy either.

It was our first day on stage yesterday in production rehearsals. We’d done all the music calls. The conductor is great. A really nice guy. The others in the chorus are great too. Opera is always a show of egos and there’s a lot of massaging of egos that goes on (I tend to really hate that about the job). We are all sensitive and insecure and need to somehow get attention in some way, and I have to say at times we are nightmares and there are always few big ones flying around, which is certainly the case on this job too. Just how it is. The theatre is tiny but very ornate and like a royal box within itself. It’s like being in a palace.

It seats 500 which is small for a theatre, and the stage is small too so it’s hard to find some space and to do a good job without feeling cramped. Some of the British extras are not on stage in the first half so they miss a whole chunk because there’s not enough room on the stage, and if they were on instead of a full timer it would cause uproar, so politics plays a part too. All part of the job, I’m afraid, and it’s not been as much fun these last few days. The director speaks mostly in Italian to everyone and we have no idea what’s being said so in that respect it’s really hard. We just don’t know what he wants from us, so I don’t know how he expects us to follow really. The banter is good which I am loving. It’s really good to have some colleagues again and have a bit of a social life. I had virtually no social life in London and for this month I’ve got people to talk to and have food with. We all sat up late eating bread and cheese and drinking wine for Rachel’s birthday.

I woke up to the most amazing view from my window overlooking Menton and the sea. It doesn’t get better than that really.

It’s dinner in Nice tomorrow night after work (got someone from the chorus to recommend a place) and Sunday I’m going to go and explore St. Jean Cap Ferrat I think. I love walking and just moving and it does clear my head and like I say, the coastline is stunning. I think you could be having the worst day and see that and it’s medicine for the soul. I am truly grateful to be having this experience. My life in England feels like a million miles away. We are all just pinching ourselves really. We walk out of the artists entrance to the opera and the sea is right there.

I sit reading my book in the sun once a day, just enjoying it on my face. Really uplifting (rushing to stand outside on every break), and my love affair with baguette is in full force. The boulangerie is round the corner so every morning I’m drooling over my daily baguette and proudly carrying it home like a French person under my arm. I’m probably becoming part cheese too, and we are walking home with bottles of wine for 2,50 laughing at it being so cheap and actually tasting alright too (wine snobs we aren’t). Got to enjoy it all whilst I have it (partly wishing I could stay much longer)…….. I’m starting to waffle on now so I’ll leave you all and shut up…….Monaco Part 2 coming shortly. My Canadian friend told me it’s -30 over there. I’m like ‘errrrrr just sat in the sun here’……….. For more info about me and what I’m doing, go to my website at www.iamnicolamills.com

Thanks, and enjoy your weekend.

Nicola xx