Quotes About Talent

I really wanted to be an opera soprano.

My mother had a great voice. Not like mine, not like my sister's, not like my son's - a high soprano voice, but like a bird. I mean, really beautiful.

I was champion soprano of Sussex when I was 16!

Directors didn't know what to do with me in college. I didn't really sound like a belter. I didn't look like a soprano. But in New York, I was in the right place at the right time, where my unusualness fit the bill.

In school, I really felt like I didn't fit a type. I think everybody had a hard time putting me in a category. They all sort of realized, 'Hmm, you don't really look like a soprano. You're not really a character belter.'

I think I have got a peculiar voice really, it neither one thing nor the other. It's not a contralto and it's not a mezzo soprano; it's a nothing voice really.

I had been in a professional boys' choir, and as a boy soprano, you're aware that your voice has an expiration date.

I am actually a soprano. No one knows this.

You can't sing baritone when you're a soprano.

I remember at the age of, and I'll say this, 10 and a half, 11, I had a natural boy soprano.

I can hit baritone notes, and I can sing in the soprano range if I wanted to. I did this thing a long time ago where I did a duet with myself. I sound like two different people.

Genius is sorrow's child.

I'm sorry to say that no, I do not play the piano.

A lot of the times when I've auditioned for parts in America, the answer is, 'Sorry, we need a bigger name.'

I went through a phase where people would introduce me at parties as a cartoonist, and everybody felt sorry for me. 'Oh, Matt's a cartoonist.' Then people further feeling sorry for me would ask me to draw Garfield. Because I'm a cartoonist, draw Snoopy or Garfield or something.

When I saw Beyonce, she did a two-hour show singing and dancing - it was like my mouth just wouldn't close. I was like, 'OK, I'm drooling,' like, it's so good. Oh my God. No one's better. I'm sorry.

I say I design music. I can imagine it and sort of picture it. I think about all of the things I do in the world and say that I'm designing it because it takes the same skill set.

Despite being such a brilliant director, Hansal Mehta is a simple and down to earth man. He is very sorted and driven by passion. So that's a rare combination - being a good craftsman and a good human being.

I definitely grew up to Nina Simone and a lot of Ella Fitzgerald. And I loved Amy Winehouse. I loved that sort of soulful singer.

I buy everything India Arie, just because she's such a positive person, and I just love her music. Her music's so soulful... I think Kanye West is a genius musically.

John Legend is brilliant. I feel he may be my best collaborator when it comes to delivering that undeniable soulful sound, and he does it in such a classy way.

I don't just sing R&B: I'm able to sing pop and play with other sounds, but it's all real soulful.

People say that I could sing the phone book and make it sound good.

The greatest thing is nobody cares that I'm fifty years old. They only care what I sound like.