Janine Charles-Farray: In The Spotlight

By James Dupraj

Contralto soloist, Janine Charles-Farray, swept the stage at TT’s 2018 Music Festival. Her spoils included the Marie Dupres Memorial trophy for success in the Ladies Oratoria Class, the Havelock Nelson Cup for Ladies Operatic Aria, the Dr George Nelson H Wattley Memorial Trophy for most outstanding Operatic Aria, the Soroptimists International of San Fernando trophy for Contralto Solo, and the TTMFA Oratorio trophy for most outstanding Oratorio.

“Singing and performing is a side of my personality and my life that I have left in its natural state – spontaneous, fun, and unpredictable,” said Charles-Farray of her long-standing interest in singing and performing. A long-time member of the celebrated Lydians Choir, she was trained and encouraged to perform by the revered Pat Bishop, one of TT’s legendary musical directors.

Singing “for fun” is a philosophy that Charles-Farray has stuck to religiously for the last three decades. A lover of soulful classics, she began singing in primary school where her love for singing flourished through experimentation with popular music genres such as R&B and Pop, as well as vintage ballads and religious music. This love for music would follow her into secondary school where she sang in the Bishop Anstey High School’s choir throughout her tenure, continuously developing her voice. She also enjoyed playing steelpan, cuatro, and African drums at her church, along with acting in several plays put on by her church’s youth group. Suffice it to say, the arts and performance were never lost on her.

After joining the Lydians at 13 years old, Charles-Farray began entering the Music Festival expanding her range as a Contralto voice. Under the direction and mentorship of Pat Bishop, Charles-Farray expanded her repertoire to include classical music, negro spirituals, and gospel through which she further honed her voice. Of her class as a Contralto singer, she explained, “It’s the lowest female singing voice and I am told, the rarest.” She listed examples of non-classical singers such as Tracy Chapman, Toni Braxton, and Cher as Contralto voices, but lamented, “In opera unfortunately, very few roles are written specifically for Contraltos.”

While she sometimes wishes she could sing higher notes with confidence, she professes that she enjoys the richness of her lower timbre and can proudly sing lower than many of the Tenor gentlemen in the Lydians.

“The resonance [of my voice] is simply a joy, although there are few songs where I can really let my lower register soar free. I am still looking. Hopefully I’ll find a great programme of music to present in time for my long-overdue vocal recital in 2019,” she said of the challenges of finding a wide repertoire of songs where her unique voice can shine.

The operatic role she sung at this year’s Music Festival was Ulrica, a witch summoning the Lord of the Abyss to do her bidding. As she noted, by winning the championship she may have set a record for the first Contralto voice to win in that specific category. She is also hopeful that original compositions may be perfect choices to display the range of her voice, and she has been experimenting with original composed pieces such as Carl Anthony Hines’ Habanera Del Mar and Michael Hudlin’s Contralto solo composed for his Gloria début in 2016 at NAPA (South).

Of her mentorship under Pat Bishop, Charles-Farray says it was Bishop’s unique approach to building and managing a choir that got her to join the Lydians initially. She described the choir as a publicly-accessible musical community; there are no auditions to join and so one night she showed up to a Lydians rehearsal and never left. She’s sat on the choir’s board and is now part of the management team as its communications officer, incorporating another of her life’s passions: the promotion and propagation of TT’s unique local storytellers, talent, and heritage.

“My first major production with the Lydians was the Verdi Requiem - by heart! - a feat for a newly developing voice, but I did it,” she recalled of Bishop’s bravery in embracing teenagers to sing in the chorus of major works alongside the likes of principal soloists Edward Cumberbatch and the late Jenny Archer. “It was a mind-opening experience.”

Years later, Bishop decided Charles-Farray’s voice was ready to be tested again, and in typical fashion “pelted me straight into the deep end with a solo from Handel’s Messiah, 'O Thou That Tellest Good Tidings to Zion'" - not just to sing but to open the show at that year’s Christmas concert.

“Pat was really brave because to my panicked, 21-year-old mind, I ‘buss’ every night and was sure she would never let me solo in life again,” she laughed fondly at the memory. In hindsight, she realises that Bishop had a knack for seeing beyond a soloist’s self-imposed limitations. “This is the drive that pushes me onward and encourages me to continue to test my limitations both vocally and performance-wise. [Pat’s] training techniques - sometimes unorthodox but effective - live on in the soloists she trained before she died.”

While she reiterated that performing is something she does in her spare time and for the joy it brings her, she also believes that any time spent onstage should be a memorable experience for the audience. “That often means stepping outside of yourself to fully embrace the role you are about to play; the audience is much more sensitive to inauthentic mimicry than you might think,” she elaborated.

She still has bouts of nerves leading up to performances, but she said once on stage these simply evaporate and she’s ready to deliver. “At the Music Festival, I was aware of the adjudicators and the requirements of accuracy to score, text, and genre,” she said, “but I was hyper-aware of the audience and my mission was to ensure that I gave of my best to them and that my performance was something that could be enjoyed not just for its accuracy but for its own entertainment value.”

She highlighted that singing has also aided in other areas of her life, such as patience with self, discipline in preparation, and purpose of performance. The voice isn’t something that can be pushed, and thus discipline is required to rest a strained or hoarse instrument. She also pointed out that performers must dedicate the proper time and technique to warming up properly, discipline to learn the foreign languages in which they sing, and research to be done to get the background of a work or composer, as well as the fortitude to look up singers who have performed the piece before and be inspired and knowledgeable enough to know how to place signature marks and styles.

“The most affirming part of singing is nailing the difficult passage of notes, or realising that you can sustain a long phrase in one breath, doing it better than it has been done before, expressing something new through a familiar work, mastering all the moving parts that go into a performance all at once,” she said of the ways singing and performance continue to enrich her.

Her words of encouragement for would-be singers are, “Don’t be afraid or intimidated to sing.” She advised to join a choir or singing group or church chorus, as these groups build camaraderie and community in singing together, where people from all walks of life sing together, mirroring a diverse society. “There have been many life lessons I have learned in such a safe singing environment, in addition to encouragement and support in spheres outside of singing as well,” she said.

She also highlighted that there are various studies on the positive physical and mental benefits of singing in a choir, and she believes if TT had more music, singing, and investment in the arts, it could help heal some of the country’s angst and mischanneled energy that manifests itself in harmful ways.

She encourages people to indulge in local art and music instead of writing such creations off as second class. “I have come across way too many people, when I play them a favourite song from a local band or send them a YouTube link of the Lydians, they are shocked and delighted that this is the quality of music and music composition coming out of TT,” she said.

“It may sound trite but in all seriousness - support local!