John Carden joined the Department of Theatre & Film in the fall 2022 semester as our Assistant Professor of Musical Theatre. John comes to us by way of New York — among other places, national and international — with a background in both opera and musical theatre, the latter of which he performs, composes, and teaches.
John Carden joined the Department of Theatre & Film in the fall 2022 semester as our Assistant Professor of Musical Theatre. John comes to us by way of New York — among other places, national and international — with a background in both opera and musical theatre, the latter of which he both performs, composes, and teaches.
John will also be directing our big spring musical, LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS, which will take place April 21-23.
For more information about John and his illustrious career, please see his bio on our website: http://theatreandfilm.olemiss.edu/JohnCarden.html
The Department of Theatre & Film is grateful for its patrons and corporate sponsors. As a department we are committed to the high quality instruction that our students receive. Investing in the students’ education and these quality productions helps us move toward our common goal of graduating successful, creative adults who are lifelong learners. If you are interested in contributing to these efforts, please visit: https://umfoundation.givingfuel.com/theatreandfilm
From The Department of Theater and Film at the University of Mississippi. This is Stage & Screen.
Katherine Stewart
Hello, hello and welcome back to Stage & Screen. I'm your host, Katherine Stewart and my guest. Today is John Carden. John is our new assistant professor of musical theater, and he comes to us from New York with an illustrious background that includes performing the Metropolitan Opera. We are so happy to have him, and I think you'll enjoy our conversation. To stick around. Hi John, thank you so much for visiting with me today. I'm really. Excited to talk with you.
John Carden
It's my pleasure. How are you doing Catherine?
Katherine Stewart
Yeah, I'm I'm doing great. I'm doing great. Thank you so much. So just to get us started. I would love if you could tell us a little bit about your background. Kind of who you are, where you're from, what you've been doing. Up until you got to Mississippi.
John Carden
OK, well I I grew up in a in a musical household. My mother and my grandmother are. They were both music teachers and my mother still actually teaching to this day. And so I was raised in that. And that sort of led me down. The road to where I am today and I I was always interested in musical theater, but I took slight detour. I when I was about 17, I told my mother. That I wanted to. Move into the study of musical theatre, but at that time there weren't really any programs in America that. Were designed for musical theatre, so you could sort of go two different routes. You could go towards an acting program or you could go towards a music program. So I decided to go down the road of majoring in voice and what happened. Was I ended up, sort of. Being able to sing opera and I went down the opera Rd for many years. Had a career in opera. And then later on I started to cross over to the dark side and went into musical theater. So that's where I am today.
Katherine Stewart
Yeah, wonderful, but I would love to hear more about your career in opera. I mean you've had. A phenomenal career. What are some of your career highlights?
John Carden
Well, I was. I was very lucky and I I felt very. I feel very blessed when I was coming out of the North Carolina School of the Performing Arts where I went to to undergrad. I auditioned for the Metropolitan Opera and I sang for James Levine in a house audition and was offered a contract to take on a principal role in Julius Caesar at the mat, and I was a counter tenor at that time and I was. Lucky to be one of the first of four countertenors to sing at the mat. And that's that's how I sort of ended up going down this this different Rd because I really I really had at that time thought I would. I would go in another direction. I would come to New York and maybe start auditioning for musicals, but because I sort of discovered that I had this ability to sing. And I I went down this other road and and I'm glad I did. It was, I loved it. Watch it opera is theater opera is, you know, same sort of thing. It's a little bit of a heightened realm where maybe the voice is celebrated and sort of focused on, whereas in other forms of theater it might just be the spoken word that's focused on musical theater. It's a little bit of everything that's focused on. So I was I was very lucky and that that led me to a career that took me from New York. To Amsterdam, where I lived in Europe for a. Number of years and worked professionally throughout Europe and then I returned to the United States, and I continued my career working internationally. But I also settled down an area where I could have a family and. And a little bit of a life outside of a big city. And I can singing opera until 2006. And then I at that time was also starting to starting to write musicals and compose musicals, which I do as well. And that led me to head back to New York and to enroll in Graduate School at New York University. And I got my MFA in musical theater writing in 2013, and I did that for two reasons. One reason was because I had a a sense that I might want to start heading in the direction of of teaching. I already felt like I was pretty comfortable with all things related. To the voice. But I was composing and I thought, well, I'll I'll get this sort of specialized MFA and, and while I was at NYU, I was asked to come on the faculty in the new studio on Broadway and to Teach Voice there. So I started working with musical theater. Actors there and I was there until I discovered the University of Mississippi and applied for the job here. And well, Long story short, here I am.
Katherine Stewart
Yeah yeah, here you are. And we're. So grateful to have. You what? What are some of the differences between opera and musical theater just in your mind?
John Carden
You know, I I I speak with the the with our actors. Here are young artists that I really look at. I look at singing and I love. Musical theater and opera. As sort of you have a set of of paint brushes. OK, and I always look at every piece of music. That you perform. UM, as a painting. You use the same. You use this set of brushes. To create the. Work and I would say that singing is the the way that the mechanism works is the same, but the size of the brush might be different. When you when you look at what you're you're going to perform, the type, the type of music you're going. To perform, so it's it's. There's musical theater people have an idea what musical theater is, what the sound is, so that might be a different set of brushes that you use versus what opera sounds like. But there are so many different styles of opera. If you look at certain forms of early music early Baroque. You would find that the sound is is very clear and smooth and not unlike our contemporary musical theater. Today when you look at the early Golden Age musical theater, you would say that it isn't too far away from its cousin, operetta you know and. It really depends. I think a lot of times on The Voice of the composer. What the composer, the story they're trying to tell, and I always say to everyone. I say it's you sing the way you sing the music as demanded by the character. So as a composer, when I compose music, I people will say what style of music do you compose and I always have sort of looked at the character and I say, well, what type of music would this character sing? And so, as a singer, when you're approaching the character, sometimes you can say well, who is this character and how would they sing? And that's up for for a wide array of interpretation, and I think it's really exciting to see what different artists do with the characters that that they step into. And I always say to our students here, I say. You don't have to remanufacture what you've seen and heard before from a recording. Really, it may be more interesting if you come from within. And you create the character that you that you feel that is truthful and honest to you and to that character.
Katherine Stewart
Yeah, so so Speaking of our students, what have you been teaching this past semester and what will you be teaching next semester?
John Carden
So I've been teaching musical theater performance and also a class another class that is basically where we're working on the musical theater voice, so I'll aspects of voice and we did some really fun things this semester and I'm I'm looking forward to continuing in that vein. Next semester, so we I I, I believe that it's really important for artists to create their own. Work and I I always say to them, if you can learn to create your own work, you'll never be without work. Right and and I think with all of these wonderful platforms like the Internet and and the way that we communicate today that there's there are many many platforms and opportunities for for students and young artist to perform no matter where they are on the planet and to also work together. So this. This past semester we started out with an exercise where they were. They were all assigned a song from a musical, and then I put them into teams and I said now I want you to write a scene that will take you into that song. So each team would have two songs and they would have to find a way to connect those songs and. Create their own working scene as actors. So they wrote those scenes together and then they presented them and used the existing music. Then I had them take the songs away and create new lyrics that would correspond to the scene. Then after they created their their scenes and their monologues or lyrics, I had them compose their own songs. And so. I think through that exercise you have a way in and a way to learn about how to create your own work and they I think. They went beyond their own. I think they were. I think it was really fulfilling for them to see what they actually could do, and I had no hesitation or feeling that they wouldn't exceed and excel.
John Carden
And they did. So that's that's sort. Of the way that I work, I work in this sort of cumulative. And and next semester you know they'll they'll continue to do work where they work together and work in in collaboration. Because I, I believe that collaboration is really key. And working in theater, and so it's all about us learning to be not only innovators and creators, but also learning to be really good collaborators.
Katherine Stewart
Yeah, and then. So Speaking of next semester, you will be directing our Big Spring musical little shop of Horrors.
Speaker
Right?
Katherine Stewart
We'll talk more about that. I would love to have you on the podcast again in the spring. To talk about that, but.
John Carden
Right?
Katherine Stewart
Anything, anything you want to share about that, just kind. Of I know you're. Just early kind of getting going on. It, but we're excited about that show.
John Carden
We have a. We have a wonderful cast. Yeah, and we are. We're working in trying to see if there's a new and interesting way to tell the story shop, and it's also my first time in this this. Theater of Fulton Chapel. And so I'm getting acquainted with that. I'm also lucky to be supported by a really wonderful design team, and so I've been working on the the whole design process of the show since the beginning of school and this over the break. My whole cast has gone home. And scores and scripts. And we're working in the way that we work in New York, so they are endeavoring to. The off book the off script by our first rehearsal.
Katherine Stewart
Wow, and that's exciting. So when is. The first rehearsal.
John Carden
So the first rehearsal is in February on the 20.
Katherine Stewart
I was going to say it. Must be yeah, kind of. Mid February, yeah.
John Carden
And because there's so many activities as you know that go on in the spring. I felt like it would be good to see if we can get all that out of the way over the break, because a long break when they get back have another show they're doing prior to little shop. And then of course they have all of their class work. They have CTC, they have spring break. Some of them celebrate the Easter holiday, so a lot of things are coming, but I do know that I think when you work that way where you come in the first day. And you have. All of those things out of the way, the memorization, the notes, the music you can really embody a character in a in a way that you. Might not be able to do if you were. If your time was shortened and you were having to learn the part on the job.
Katherine Stewart
And it's still a short. Time I mean.
John Carden
It is.
Katherine Stewart
These these shows happen in quick succession each semester.
John Carden
Right, right?
Katherine Stewart
Yeah, that's wonderful. Well, John, is there anything else? You would like to share.
John Carden
I am I'm looking I I'm I'm having a wonderful time here. I'm so grateful. To and if people are seeing this and they haven't been over and been around here in the in the Department of theater Film, I hope that they will come over and visit and kind of see. What we're doing and the exciting things we're doing. It's it's it's. Wonderful to have this type of opportunity from me for the students and just to be in this community has been has been wonderful.
Katherine Stewart
Yeah, great, thank you.
John Carden
Most welcome.
Katherine Stewart
Thank you so much again.
That was John Carden, assistant professor of musical theatre. As we discussed in this conversation, John will be directing our big spring musical, Little Shop of Horrors, which will take place in Fulton Chapel, April. 21st through 23rd. We'll have another conversation about that in a future episode. In the meantime, please check the show notes For more information. About that, and about John, we're breaking for the holidays and we'll be back in January until next time. This is Stage & Screen.