Renee Fleming Quotes
Quotations and aphorisms by Renee Fleming:
Contrary to the norm, as my technique improved my voice became higher.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
Everybody's a work in progress. I'm a work in progress. I mean, I've never arrived... I'm still learning all the time.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
I'm American. I'm eclectic. I'm going to follow my musical passions. And if people don't like it, and it hurts my legacy, I'm not going to worry about that.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
I listen to archival and historic recordings. I love watching singers. I learned a lot from watching videos.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
I don't want to be somebody who stands still and sings pretty. Each song is a world. Each song is a story. I don't achieve nearly what I want.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
I have a certain image that's more classic, and I'm happy to stay out of the fray.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
One of my timesaving habits is to save all of my magazines and junk mail for airplane trips. I walk on the plane with a very heavy bundle, but by the time the trip is over, it can all be thrown away.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
I have had a very difficult time with stage fright; it undermines your well-being and peace of mind, and it can also threaten your livelihood.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
When a human being without amplification makes a sound that is high and loud, it is almost unworldly.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
For a while it was hard for me to say no to work.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
I have not changed with the accomplishments. I've remained the same. If I had changed, great. You know, but I haven't.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
I'm reserved, so I've always needed to find a way of opening up. Jazz helped me do that.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
It is always fragile, being a parent.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
I think singing is one of the most natural things that human beings do, but it's difficult.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
I would love to do more private concerts.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
I am so envious of my colleagues from 100 years ago who only sang new works, they hardly ever sang revivals.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
Opera is really fun.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
No voice teacher can be all things to all people. You have to gain information from whatever sources you can. You have to listen.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
Some of my first teachers were incredibly tough. You could never sing more than three words without being stopped and having to do it over 20 times. I loved that - that sort of process of dissecting and trying to figure out and master this incredibly mysterious instrument.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
There's no performance where I never have to think about setting up a phrase or making a technical adjustment while I'm performing.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
I do everything in the third person. Performance is about being someone else.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
I don't want to record anything unless it can be great and genuinely interesting.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
I want to keep my voice young, with nothing heavy.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
Well, any time I'm preparing for a performance or even a rehearsal, it's as if in a way, like any other athletes, these are muscles that support the vocal cords which are just I believe cartilage. It demands a kind of constant warming up and a constant feeling of where is the voice today.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
Being steeped in the process of learning and exploring keeps me from becoming too nervous. Partly it's about not getting bored.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
I think touring is hard.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
I'm lucky - I can do two things at once.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
My worry is that opera will become an historic art form as opposed to a living, breathing thing.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
I don't like to sing loud.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
I enjoy the more floaty, exposed, elegant singing.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
I think opera has gained a kind of glamorous appeal. It's a live performance that aligns all of the arts, and when it is represented in the media, in film in particular, it is presented as something that is really a special event, whether it's a great date or something that's just hugely romantic.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
My parents were both high-school music teachers.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
I was always a very good student.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
Having to travel so much plays havoc with your personal life.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
I learned so many roles so quickly as a young singer, I thought it was time to come back to them and make them better - deeper, more nuanced.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
For years, I had no time for exploratory travel.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
Every singer eventually gets around to a Christmas disc.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
Learning operatic roles is ongoing, and I find that I can learn on the train or subway, during a manicure, getting my hair done, and even while driving if I only look at the score at red lights.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
Because everything about the voice interests me, I felt it would be fascinating to learn a completely different style of singing.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
My parents discussed singing every night over the dinner table; I had a tremendous music education.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
I want to get out of the major opera houses.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
I've spent hours and hours doing research into Appalachian folk music. My grandfather was a fiddler. There is something very immediate, very simple and emotional, about that music.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
I'm not a reactionary.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
Certainly, jazz has become more of a niche, which is surprising, because it's our music. It's the national music of America.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
With classical singing you have to put out so much air - you project, you emit force.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
Very few opera singers in history have been able to cross into popular music.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
A lot of performers don't want to leave the circuit, the European opera house circuit, partly because most singers don't sing many concerts, or at least not while they are in their prime.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
I think singing it when it's done well is extremely natural. It feels great.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
I'm not exactly an angry young person.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
For my own singing, I used to be attracted by the baroque, the flashier the better, but now I prefer a simpler, purer style.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
I'm rarely singing in English.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
I was constantly being pushed toward a European ideal of what it means to be a classical or opera singer, let's say in the Renata Tebaldi mode. I reject that.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
My mother was the worst kind of stage mother. She would make me and my younger sister and brother little duckling costumes and put us in kiddie shows.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
I've always been inspired by artists who have shown musical and intellectual curiosity and the courage to take risks.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
At this stage in my career, I don't have to take any big risks. You want to take a calculated risk, not one that leads to people saying 'yes, but there was that one time when she made that big mistake.' It's always a shame when that happens, especially if you've gotten by for decades without anything hugely tragic.
~Renee Fleming
Link:
Share:
Permalink:
Browse: