A Quote by Lea Salonga

The nice thing about doing a pop opera - in the way that doing, say, 'Miss Saigon' or 'Les Miz' would be - is that, because the convention is set from the beginning that this is an opera and everything is sung, there is never that feeling of 'Why is this person bursting out into song?' because the whole thing is sung.
The nice thing about doing a pop opera is that, because the convention is set from the beginning that this is an opera and everything is sung, there is never that feeling of "Why is this person bursting out into song?" because the whole thing is sung.
In the modern operas that 'Miss Saigon' and 'Les Miz' are, nobody breaks out into song from conventional book dialogue. Everything is sung from beginning to end, including the recitative.
The difference between me and, say, the opera critic is that I'm charged with thinking about the world beyond opera. I could go see 'Die Fledermaus', for instance. I've never done any of this, by the way. I've never written about one opera since I've had this job.
The little song and dance number at the end - that's me, my voice, howling out. It was a new experience for me. I've never sung before and I've certainly never sung on screen. I think I sung on stage when I was 13 and for some reason nobody's asked me to try it again since.
I never breathe through the nose, not when I'm singing. In the opera, you don't have so much time. That's fine at the beginning of an opera or after somebody else has been doing an aria, and you want to get a good fresh start.
I was going to be a singer. If I hadn't been in my profession, I was going to be an Opera singer. That's from a young kid. I had all these records from all those famous Opera singers. I wanted to be an Opera singer - that was my whole thing and physical fitness got in the way, thank God.
The very beautiful and very touching thing about opera singers is they are very willing to do whatever you want. Unlike actors, who constantly want to know why they're doing something, opera singers will sort of follow you into the fires of hell.
We tend to forget that in those days before the Internet and HBO and Imax and 3-D cinema, opera was the thing. Opera and theatre. If you were a man of the world and you mingled among the happy few, you would be at the opera.
That was my way, and I also use the music after five years, I started hearing opera, opera, it was very good instrument to keep the spirit very strong because you feel like you are yourself singing opera, and I used to hear a lot of opera, they send me tapes.
Really, the impetus driving me is I've always sung, but I like to act, I like drama, I like text, which is why opera is something I've come late to, I'd say.
You could play the blues like it was a lonesome thing - it was a feeling. The blues is nothing but a story... The verses which are sung in the blues is a true story, what people are doing... what they all went through. It's not just a song, see?
One nice thing about my momma is, she never gets on you for what you are not doing. I mean, she never looks away from the things you do only to notice what isn't on the plan. This is the most important thing in getting along with...anybody, and I can tell you because I copy it from her and it makes good sense. You don't go looking at the things people don't do, when they already be doing plenty in other areas. If your son collects stamps, why you want to go fussing at him because he doesn't play the clarinet? Check out his stamps, man.
I've sung my whole life. I've taken lots of voice lessons and I love to sing. But I've never really sung professionally at all.
I've never really gotten into the whole labels thing. There were times I would cover a pop song, and people would say 'You sound really country.' I gave up on that whole thing a long time ago.
My message is to forget about dichotomies. The Brain Opera is an opera, even if it does not tell a story in the usual way. It is a psychological journey with voices - so I do consider it an opera.
I've always loved opera; it never occurred to me that I would write a proper libretto. One of my closest friends is a composer, Paul Moravec, and a few years ago, Paul and I were at lunch, and I said to him, "you really have to write an opera." So, he says very casually to me, "I'll do it if you write the libretto." Well, little did I know that the within a couple of years we would end up getting a commission from the Santa Fe Opera to write an opera together, "The Letter," which turned out to be the most successful commissioned opera in the history of the Santa Fe Opera.
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