Quotes from Renee Fleming

It is always fragile, being a parent.

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.

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.

Certainly, jazz has become more of a niche, which is surprising, because it's our music. It's the national music of America.

I was always a very good student.

I cannot imagine a more satisfying calling than my own: beauty, humanity, and history every day, combined with the cathartic joy of singing.

It's funny, I've decided 'Hallelujah' is a kind of Rorschach test for people, because everyone has a different reaction to it and to what I'm doing. I just sang it, and whatever came out was just natural and spontaneous and maybe that's the best thing, because there's a kind of enigma, both in the meaning of the words and the way Leonard Cohen said them, that catches people's attention.

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.

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.

No voice teacher can be all things to all people. You have to gain information from whatever sources you can. You have to listen.

Having to travel so much plays havoc with your personal life.

My parents discussed singing every night over the dinner table I had a tremendous music education.

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.

Every singer eventually gets around to a Christmas disc.

Being steeped in the process of learning and exploring keeps me from becoming too nervous. Partly it's about not getting bored.

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.

For years, I had no time for exploratory travel.

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.

This is often the way we put together our lives, adding the striking qualities of others into our own character.

One major study observed that in recent years, we have done a magnificent job of turning out fabulously trained performers with no place to play. More encouraging news is that employment options and a real strategy for developing the arts are becoming part of many conservatory curricula.

Americans who want to perform in Europe face a cultural and vocal uphill battle. We're considered good students, very professional and often technically sound; but though there are droves of us to choose from, a European singer is almost always going to be the first choice of a European company—and often, of an American company as well.

The first thing I did when I made a little bit of money as a singer was to buy myself an amber necklace. This is often the way we put together our lives, adding the striking qualities of others into our own character.

He also gave me some advice that I follow to this day: "Sing in the mirror. If it looks funny, it's wrong.

Classical wasn't my only interest in those days. Potsdam was the place where I fell in love with jazz, a love that, for a while at least, I thought would be my life.