We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Catherine Kelly. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Catherine below.

Catherine, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. We’d love to hear about a project that you’ve worked on that’s meant a lot to you.

In itself, Sidewalk Opera has been the most meaningful project I’ve worked on. A creative career can be incredibly fulfilling. It’s better, though, when your own creativity can help make someone else’s life a little richer. After a Sidewalk Opera pop-up, when we’ve raised enough in donations to purchase musical instruments we can then donate to local families, is when I experience the most fulfillment from my work.

Catherine, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I started Sidewalk Opera after returning to the U.S. from Austria and Germany, where I’d been singing professionally for a couple of years. Performing opera abroad had been a long-time dream of mine. I was grateful for the experience and wouldn’t have traded it; but I experienced a bit of an adrenaline crash at the end of my second season abroad, and I thought: “Is this really it?” Don’t get me wrong: I was very fortunate to have had the opportunities I did, and I understood what a privilege it was to have gotten to sing in (what I considered) some of the most beautiful places in the world. It wasn’t that there was anything wrong with the music, or the career, per se. I just felt like I should have felt more inner peace than I did.

I decided to move back to North Carolina to be closer to family, and to try to figure out what was missing in my feeling of joy in my career. I worked as a voice teacher and freelancer during that time. I remember preparing for a particularly challenging gig and feeling so frustrated after a practice session that I took a “cry break;” literally, I poured myself a bowl of Cheerios and cried it out as I let my thoughts wander.

I realized that too much of my “why” — too much of my reason for singing in the first place — revolved around myself and my ego. I wasn’t finding fulfillment in my career because I was too centered on me. As long as I was focused on what my music could do for myself, or how I could build my resume or make connections or whatever else I was endlessly pursuing, I would never find the joy I was missing in my life. Sidewalk Opera started as an idea to rejuvenate my own passion for music by focusing on something bigger than myself. What it became was certainly bigger than me, something that humbles me daily; something that reminds me that music will always be about community and how musicians can serve others, and not the other way around.

At Sidewalk Opera, my talented friends and I perform free classical music concerts in various locations all over North Carolina, operating from our home base in the Triangle. 20% of the donations we receive goes toward our musical instrument fund, through which we purchase instruments to put in the hands of local children to help them toward their goals of taking music lessons or playing in their school orchestras. In addition to popping up on the sidewalk, as advertised, we have performed for charitable fundraiser events, retirement homes, and school programs. We are proud to be a 501c3 nonprofit organization.

Is there something you think non-creatives will struggle to understand about your journey as a creative? Maybe you can provide some insight – you never know who might benefit from the enlightenment.

Creative output doesn’t operate like machinery; artists are human. I think it might be difficult to understand why an artist might need some downtime, or why they might be unhappy in their careers. Real creativity can only thrive in a space where the person making art is in a good headspace — and, hot take — is in touch with their inner lives outside of their art. Using creativity to make something of a high caliber also takes so much training and focus! Well-meaning people often remark to me, “It must be so great doing what you love. It’s like you don’t have to work a day in your life!” I understand the sentiment, but I think it also undercuts how much artists strive to improve themselves, and how much time and dedication they put in with the hopes of creating something others can enjoy.

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

I had to unlearn idealizing hustle culture. As a freelancer, it’s hard to know when to put an end to the workday. A vacant hour could easily be filled with more practice, networking, booking auditions, marketing, studying — the list goes on. It’s easy to get swept up in doing as much as you can, thinking that will optimize your output. Hustle culture, and its partner-in-crime of perfectionism, are actually detrimental to creative work, which requires exploration, making mistakes, and having the energy to try again when things go awry.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.sidewalkopera.com
• Instagram: @sidewalkopera
• Facebook: @sidewalkopera

Image Credits
Dan Hacker