LES MISERABLES' Original West End Cosette, Rebecca Caine, Writes Of Persevering Through Dwindling Opportunities For Sopranos

Before Ethel Merman belted the Gershwin's "I Got Rhythm" to the back rows of the Alvin Theatre in 1930's GIRL CRAZY, soprano voices like those belonging to Marilyn Miller and Adele Astaire were the preferred singing voices of female Broadway stars.

And while heady sopranos have never left the boards, "the belt" became synonymous with the Broadway sound until stars like Julie Andrews and Barbara Cook started adding more variety to the mix.

In a career that has been divided between musical theatre and opera, Rebecca Caine is perhaps best known as the Royal Shakespeare Company's original Cosette in LES MISERABLES. Before then she made her West End debut at the age of 19 as Laurey in OKLAHOMA! and toured as Eliza in MY FAIR LADY. She followed LES MISERABLES by joining the West End's THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA, playing Christine twice a week opposite Michael Crawford.

But in a recent entry in her blog, "No, No Cosette! A Soprano Speaks," Caine expresses frustration at the shrinking number of opportunities for legit sopranos in musical theatre.

"I see the same faces I've been seeing at auditions since 1980. I listen to the noises coming from the studio. It's a Rodgers and Hammerstein show featuring a possible four decent soprano roles. Everyone is belting. I hear SISTER ACT, for God's sake. Someone got the wrong nun memo... I go in. I sing in my own, old fashioned legit voice. I do my thing, a pianissimo floated high note at the end. They chorus with approval. They hire belters for every role. I'm fine because I was true to myself but I still feel sad because my sound, my fach is vanishing."

Caine is still in demand as a concert solo performer, and describes with warmth and appreciation the experience of touring her native Canada.

"I've looked out into a sailors church in the Arctic and seen an audience filled with First Nations (indigenous Canadians) looking back at me, smiling and crying... I've seen moose and bald eagles and seals and the Northern Lights and I've crashed a snowmobile on the ice road and I've swum in the sea and the lakes and I've made incredible friends."

And even though she assures readers she is "incredibly grateful for the amazing things being able to go la la la at a decent ability has brought me," there's still the admission that "that the business itself makes me miserable. The rejection and disappointments, the injustices, the bitchiness, all of it."

Nevertheless, like many artists who surge ahead in the face of professional adversity, performing is a part of what she is.

"I still yearn for that hit I get on stage when it's right. It's a drug. I yearn for it. I plow on. I have a run of auditions. I'm myself in them and that's all I can do."

Click here for the full entry.