Xóchitl Hernández interviews opera singer María Elena Altany.

BY XÓCHITL HERNÁNDEZ
EL NUEVO SOL

Episode 6 of season 1. In this episode, I sit down to interview opera singer María Elena Altany. Upon her LA Opera debut as Susana in ¡Figaro! (90210), Opera News called María Elena Altany “delightfully smart and quicksilver.” As a soprano, she is a Company Member of the innovative and groundbreaking opera company The Industry, led by MacArthur Fellow Yuval Sharon. With The Industry, she has performed featured roles in Anne LeBaron’s Crescent City, Chris Cerrone’s Invisible Cities (an opera through headphones!) an adaptation of Brecht’s Galileo, and Hopscotch: An Opera for 24 Cars, which was an immersive multimedia production around Los Angeles where audience members experienced the opera with the singers in actual driving cars around the city! It comes to no surprise that she was featured in The New Yorker for this performance. Recent appearances include the John Cage’s Europeras 1 & 2 with the LA Philharmonic and The Industry, a tribute to Yma Sumac in the Radical Women series at the Hammer Museum, and Susanna in Ragnar Kjartansson’s BLISS with wild Up!, as part of the LA Philharmonic’s Fluxus festival. Upcoming performances include Drum in Sweet Land with The Industry, and a tour of The Marriage of Figueroa with LA Opera Connects. In this episode, I had a wonderful time talking with María, who by the way is a CSUN alumn just like me, SHOUTOUT CSUN. She addressed her journey of navigating between the privilege of colorism as a white-passing Latina, what that means, and how her experience differs from other women of color. Stick around to also hear María talk about pertinent issues to women’s health such as the effects of birth control, motherhood, and mental health and how to manage all of this as a freelance performer!

I love how María started the conversation by talking about her privilege as a white-passing Latina and honestly it blew me away because not many would care to admit that. It’s incredibly humbling and I think can challenge all of us, myself included to look at our own lives and acknowledge areas of our own privilege. I think it’s easy to forget how blessed we are especially in times of serious hardship. For example, with me, I think one of my privileges is the fact that I am an American citizen, therefore, I do not experience the plight and fears that many of my undocumented brothers and sisters experience in our present-day political climate. I also have not experienced the difficulty of leaving the comfort of my home and migrating to a new and radically different country like my farm-working grandparents did when they fled Mexico. I should even acknowledge the privilege that my parents both speak English as well as Spanish. The question is, what is the privilege in my life and in your life and how can we leverage that privilege to help others, to help those marginalized who do not have the same privileges we do.  I think how that can look for me and even my parents are translating things for our Spanish-speaking hermanos and hermanas and helping them communicate with English-only speakers or me using my citizenship status to help fight for my undocumented friends and their communities. For more info on this and how you can make a difference especially for undocumented people, click on the links in the description. Also, I know María Elena and I talked a lot about mental and physical health which of course should both be treated with equal importance because it is all connected. Ladies, especially when thinking about what birth control to take, Be sure to talk to your doctor about what’s best for you, and that goes for everyone when discussing appropriate medications, diets, and treatment for your overall health. For those who do not have medical insurance, you can also go to freeclinics.com to find a free clinic near you. Additionally, Because of María Elena’s transparency, we can be reminded and encouraged that we are not alone in our internal mind battles or nurturing our mental health, It’s brave and okay to ask for help because guess what, we all need it, I need it, you need it, everyone. I know it can be daunting to try and reach out to a pastor, teacher, mentor, or therapist for help (and guess what it doesn’t have to be only in hard times either) but sometimes the only answer we may be looking for when asking for help is that we won’t have to face anything on our own. Now in bringing up therapy, I know that unfortunately something like therapy and other mental health services, while super awesome, is expensive.  A reminder that most medical insurances will cover therapy services. An if you don’t have insurance, You can also try and find a counselor on pyschologytoday.com to find a therapist best fit for your preferences and your wallet.

For more information on María Elena and her upcoming projects, be sure to visit https://www.mariaelenaaltany.com or theindustryla.org. Or click the link in the description!