Opera Quotes

Some may say that I couldn't sing, but no one can say that I didn't sing.

Italians are fantastic people, really. They can work you over in an alley while singing an opera.

I performed in Sydney some years ago for the Sydney Festival and I am just so pleased to be returning to the wonderful Sydney Opera House and also performing in Melbourne for the first time.

I still the love classic period, but also the baroque period, and even 17th-Century music such as the music of Monteverdi. He's one of the greatest opera composers. He was the one who really started the opera.

H is for Hardware store: I'd rather go to the hardware store than the opera. And I like the opera.

If I am the phantom, it is because man's hatred has made me so. If I am to be saved it is because your love redeems me.

Daytime soap operas, which I used to adore, have been declining in quality and importance for over a decade, and I gradually stopped monitoring them.

One gets, sensitive about losing mornings after getting a little used to them with living in a country. Each one of these endlessly varied daybreaks is an opera but once performed.

I ride horseback - arthritic knees permitting - or listen to opera. Sometimes I cook. I used to do needlework, but it's hard on my hands now, so I only do it occasionally, but I like it. And, of course, I read.

The first rule in opera is the first rule in life: see to everything yourself

We consider Monteverdi the first composer of opera. There was someone before, but everything started with Monteverdi.

Opera is for a lifetime, not just a minute.

The music of this opera (Madame Butterfly) was dictated to me by God. I was merely instrumental in getting it on paper and communicating it to the public.

It seems to me opera is just as relevant as an expressive art as anything else.

Strictly cop and go's until we laid in the Galapagos Eating tacos, higher than an opera note

Hey yogurt, if you're so cultured, how come I never see you at the opera?

The success of our operas rests most of the time in the hands of the conductor. This person is as necessary as a tenor or a prima donna.

One can't judge Wagner's opera Lohengrin after a first hearing, and I certainly don't intend to hear it a second time.

For me, you say the words 'concept record,' and the first thing I think of is theater or the opera or something.

My dream is to be played everywhere, not only at the Opera.

I tell you, it is easier to build a grand opera or a city center than to build a personal house.

I had a lot of classical influences. I had classical music and opera and literature, but I also liked sleaze. And putting it together, sleaze and glamour, it just made sense to me.

As an art form, opera is a rare and remarkable creation. For me, it expresses aspects of the human drama that cannot be expressed in any other way, or certainly not as beautifully.

Opera is when a tenor and soprano want to make love, but are prevented from doing so by a baritone.

The earth was once molten rock and now sings operas.

(Referring to the piano's natural shape) Isn't it a shame when those big fat opera singers lean against the pianos and bend them?

I want to reach as many people as possible with the message of music, of wonderful opera.

There's an opera out on the turnpike, there's a ballet being fought out in the alley.

If an opera cannot be played by an organ grinder, it's not going to achieve immortality.

Wagner used to read the libretti of his operas to his friends; I am glad I was not there.

The banging and slamming and booming and crashing were something beyond belief. [On Lohengrin]

It's like telling Mozart that there are too many notes in an opera. Which one do you want us to take out?

It's very difficult to photograph an opera. And they messed up on it. It just wasn't there. And I don't blame the Gershwins for taking it away. Of course, if they had gotten the original company to have done it, it would have been very good

Mozart has written opera, symphony, sacred and chamber music - not to mention his piano and violin concerti.

Dare to be honest and fear no labor. ... Opera is where a man gets stabbed in the back, and instead of dying, he sings.

I've never had any feeling of disconnection between the classical theater, or the contemporary theater, or musical theater, or the thing that we call opera.

The Germans are a cruel race. Their operas last for six hours and they have no word for fluffy.

For the shallow delights of matrimony and opera I have no courage.

Like an opera singer, I am able to sing out my song in paint.

If you're a young artist, wondering what to call yourself, consider 'multimedia artist.' It's so vague. Then, no one can say, 'Hey, how come you're a jazz person, and you're making a pop opera?

Why, in the Peking Opera, are women's roles played by men?...Because only a man knows how a woman is supposed to act.

The audience is requested not to refrain from talking during the overture. Otherwise they will know all the tunes before the opera begins.

Music conveys moods and images. Even in opera, where plots deal with the structure of destiny, it's music, not words, that provides power.

You couldn't tell if she was dressed for an opera or an operation.

Excepting a religious ceremonial, there is no occasion where greater dignity of manner is required of ladies and gentlemen both, than in occupying a box at the opera. For a gentleman especially no other etiquette is so exacting.

Premiering a new opera is probably one of the hardest things in the world to do, and opening nights of any opera are always pretty stressful.

My profession is to be always on the alert to find God in nature, to know his lurking-places, to attend all the oratorios, the operas in nature.

Opera is one of the most important art forms. It should be listened to and appreciated by everyone.

Opera is a beautiful and important diversion for me.

I'm not very well organized unless I'm plugged into a structure like the opera or a movie. When I'm doing that, I have to be organized.