I'm reserved, so I've always needed to find a way of opening up. Jazz helped me do that.

We sing with the entire body. The sounds that we make emanate not just from the head, but from the whole heart and soul, and, most important, the gut.

Someone once said that there are probably seven naturally good singing days in a year-and those are days you won't be booked. What we must learn is how to sing through all the other days.

I haven't really been able to transfer into that extraordinarily other worldly creature, other than I hope on stage.

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.

Fostering creativity in children is as important as any other part of the school curriculum because it feeds the soul. A daily dose of creativity helps children imagine a better world and then create it.

We are unique, each human voice, not because we are completely self-generated, but because of who we choose to assemble the countless factors that made us.