You have your children and it's hard to even hold it in - emotionally.

The [Frank] Sinatra interpretation of the music, as opposed to some other music that you were listening to - where you felt like they were singing at you - you felt Sinatra was singing to you. It's a very intimate art form, and that's what I responded to - the intimacy of his performance.

My parents, the effect that [Frank Sinatra] had on the Italian community, in terms of all our friends at the house were multicultural. We weren't just Italians. My dad's close friend was a black gentleman - this was back in the early 50s when Tony Bennett was reprimanded for having lunch, when he was in the military, with a black man.

I've been going around the world; I've been to China, I sang at the General Assembly, the Security Council.

It didn't feel organic and [Tito] Gobbi was one of the artists that was able to, along with Maria Callas, incorporate not just the sound, but the emotion, the technique of the singing.

There was something in the bel canto, not just opera, but a certain style of Italian singing that I responded to deeply.

[Frank] Sinatra, to everyone, even Tony Bennett, was such a huge influence because he had mastered not only music, but film and radio.