Home? Ask opera singers where "home" is, and they'll almost always pause before they answer. The truth is that for most working singers these days, home is where the part is. It's considered quite normal - though, perhaps, inadvisable - to be rehearsing on the west coast of the US, nip back to Europe for a couple of days to sing in a concert, head back to the US, and, the following week, traipse off somewhere else to do something completely different. To the casual observer it's a way of life which could be summarised as "jet-set gypsy"; an exotic combination of glamour and pressure, its practical details shrouded in mystery.
How, for example, do they get into it in the first place? For the Moldavian soprano Lada Biriucov, who will sing the title role in Tchaikovsky's Orleanskaya Deva at this year's Wexford Festival, that's an easy one. "I started as a cellist," she says. "I even won some competitions as a cellist - and it was quite a surprise to everybody when I changed, at quite a late age, to singing."
In Lada's case the "late age" was the ripe old vintage of 22; for the English soprano Alison Buchanan, the conversion took place rather earlier, when she was 11. "My family aren't particularly into classical music and I don't remember being exposed to it from an early age; but for some reason I was fascinated by the instruments," says Buchanan, who, along with the role of Bess in this year's Opera Scenes production of Gershwin's Porgy and Bess, will appear as one of the cigar-rolling damsels in the Zandonai opera, Conchita. At school, she took up - and promptly gave up - one instrument after another. "Then one day we were in a class singing part songs, and it was very boring, so I decided I would disrupt the class by pretending to be an opera singer. And I was very successful!" So successful that the teacher invited her to take singing lessons. "Around that time, I also joined the choir of an Anglican church near our house. The men in the choir, who were masters at the local boys' school, would take me to King's College Cambridge for the ceremony of carols at Christmas, and take me to concerts and things; and that really opened my mind."
Timing, says the Maltese tenor Josef Calleja, is everything as far as a career in opera is concerned. "I think the major factor in my career was that I met with the right teacher at the right time. My teacher is Paul Asciak, who sang with Callas and all the top singers at Covent Garden and La Scala. He's 77 now - although he looks 50, I dunno, maybe he has a deal with time himself or something."
Calleja, who was highly praised - and rewarded with the inaugural John Small Bursary - for his role in the 1998 Wexford production of Zandonai's I Cavalieri di Ekebu, has returned this year to sing the lead role in Adolphe Adam's Si J'Etais Roi. But his teacher's role was crucial, he says, in helping him to turn down the offers of work which flooded in when, at the age of 16, he was one of the youngest ever prize-winners at the Belvedere competition in Vienna. As important as work is, he maintains, it's just as important to rest up between performances and between roles. "You just have to turn down the offers," he says. "I was lucky because I had a family who could give me a place to sleep - and breakfast." True to his beliefs, Calleja took three months off this summer. "I love fishing. I have a boat back in Malta, and I spent the summer swimming, snorkelling and fishing."
The dilemma of being offered the right role at the wrong time is every young singer's nightmare, says Alison Buchanan - as is the business of trying to control the flow of work. "On the one hand you don't want to take it up because it will almost certainly harm your voice - but on the other hand, if you don't take it up, you don't know if you'll be offered it again. I find it's feast or famine, which is probably not the case for everybody - but you have to be very careful, and try to space it out depending on the size of the role and how much travelling is involved."
Careers, of course, come in all shapes and sizes, as the Irish soprano Fiona O'Reilly would be the first to agree. She trod the "promising young soprano" path for a while, then got married, acquired three young children, and drifted away from performing. For the past two years she has been studying at University College, Cork - and now, with a Public Relations Diploma clutched firmly in her fist, she is back with a bang, singing the role of the Countess in the forthcoming Opera Scenes production of The Marriage of Figaro. "I feel I'm starting a new point in my life," she says. "I couldn't walk away from singing, but I had sort of let it go, for a while. When 2000 came in I said to my husband; `nobody's going to come and pick me out - I have to get up and do this thing for myself'."
Not only did O'Reilly audition successfully for Wexford, she also decided to make a CD of nostalgic songs - including the song she was asked to sing at Jack Lynch's funeral last October - which will be on sale in November. Although she is funding the CD herself, she is remarkably calm about its prospects in a precarious market. "Having children helps keep your feet on the ground," she says. "If the CD takes off, it takes off. If it doesn't . . ." She shrugs. Having children and juggling roles in opera, however, is no picnic. She will be tied up at Wexford, for instance, for some seven weeks. How does she manage it? "My parents," is the prompt answer. "My mother just said: `Go, do it - I'll look after them'. And my husband has been tremendously supportive."
Relationships, not to mention any sort of normal lifestyle, are often beyond the reach of a busy singer. "A lot of the time when you go somewhere they put you in a nice hotel - and that's pretty much all you see of the place, really," says Alison Buchanan. "I've been to lots of places I haven't seen. And travelling can be very lonely. But you learn a few tricks, like bringing pictures with you to personalise the ubiquitous hotel rooms you find yourself in."
On the other hand, meeting other musicians in the heightened atmosphere of a performance situation can be intensely - well, stimulating. "I went to Oregon for five days to do a chamber music festival two years ago. And I saw this guy on the bus - a violinist - and I said to myself, `that looks like the kind of man I would marry'. We had two false starts; by the third day we were inseparable; by the fourth day we were tentatively mentioning marriage. We got married last month."
As far as Lada Biriucov is concerned, one of the trickiest things about being an opera singer is what to do after the show. "I can't sleep, I can't eat," she says. "Some people are drinking alcohol but I don't drink alcohol, ever. Other singers can enjoy a meal after the performance - not me. After Butterfly, I went to bed at five or six in the morning." What does she actually do in those midnight hours? "I'm watching TV. Last night I watched a very scandalous American programme on television. Jerry . . . Jerry . . . Springer, that's it. What a disgusting programme. Disgusting!"
With her beautifully modulated speaking voice, enormous eyes and thoughtful manner, Biriucov already seems the very model of a singing superstar. Ask her what she's aiming for, though, and her reply is surprising. "I have a simple dream," she says. "I'd love to have my family travelling with me - just to have support. After the performance I'd like to see some real dear face, to have someone to sit and talk to. Or just sit and have a big hug." It obviously distresses her that despite the successes she has already enjoyed - her debut was in Tosca with the Halle Orchestra under Kent Nagano, no less - her parents have never seen her on stage. "My parents are not so young; they are living in Moldova. I should organise all these things, visas and everything, but in every single case, either my mum didn't feel well or my father couldn't come, and I want them to travel together. Of course it's difficult for everybody, but for me it's . . . you can imagine."
What about the tenor Josef Calleja - does he reckon he's on the fast track to superstardom? "As long as I can make a living out of singing I'll be happy," he says. "And yes, I'll be sticking to a light tenor repertoire - say, from Boheme downwards; Barbiere, lots of Donizetti, some Bellini." So there's no Othello in there struggling to get out? He flings back his head and laughs - a huge, spontaneous, generous laugh. "Oh, no. I would sing it once. That would be all. I know what you're thinking . . . he says this, and next year he'll be singing Andrea Chenier. But I won't. Really. This is what I want to do for the next 30 years - and if I start to do the heavy stuff, I'll be finished."
