In singing, you cannot 'cheat' if you want to give emotions to those who are listening. You must have something to tell.

Every audience has its character; I like America - they love me. I suffer from stage fright, but in America not so much.

I know that my passion is for opera, but sometimes I like also to sing songs, because there are many beautiful melodies.

I don't like crying. I'm a country boy, and we're the product of our upbringing. As a boy, I was told that men don't cry.

Very often, I recognize many, many defects, so I try to improve myself every day. I think my voice is very communicative.

I like reading... French, Russian classics - Gogol, Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky, Flaubert. I also like Hemingway, Virginia Woolf.

When I began singing, it was the first time I was happy in my life. As a baby, I would stop crying when I heard a great singer.

I have always tried to perform the music I love, and I think I am lucky because my preferences are often the ones of the public.

I also always carry my flute. It's very important for me to try to relax when I'm travelling, and playing my flute helps me to unwind.

It's always beautiful to sing with other great voices. I like voices in general. It's a big privilege to have great singers next to me.

People are often quite surprised by the sport and leisure activities practised by the blind. For example, tandem cycling is very popular.

Faith has a role to play in life. It is not related to success. It is the other way round. Success is related to faith. Faith comes first.

The voice changes very slowly. I keep mine well under control and try with all my might to keep it exactly as it was at the very beginning.

I have trouble with modern art. But in general, all art forms fascinate me - art is the way human beings express what we can't say in words.

I've always been on the side of science that tries to help man. I play an active part with the foundations I'm involved in. Science gives hope.

I loved playing football. In this particular match the ball happened to hit my right eye, the only one which I could see light and colour with.

I like very much to ride horses. I like soccer, I have had a passion for boxing since I was a child, although it would be stupid for me to box.

A career is like a house: it's made of many bricks, and each brick has the same value, because without any one of them, the house would collapse.

I change the language with which I use my voice. In opera, I know I have an orchestra behind me; I have to communicate to people very far from me.

When I sing for myself, I sing in a more free, athletic way. When I face an audience, there is always some fear that makes me put the brakes on a bit.

The feeling of an evolution is a constant for every artist who is pursuing the search of refinement and enlargement of his/her own means of expression.

When the mood takes me, I like to be a man of action. I like to windsurf and ski, and most of all I love to ride horses. The wilder and faster the better!

I loved riding bikes and horses. I was eight when I started having lessons, and when my father bought me my own horse I couldn't wait to go off on my own.

Because, in opera, I have to sing for people that are very far from me, instead of, when I sing a song, I try to imagine to sing like in an ear of a child.

When I was very young, I started trying to sing like the great tenor Mario Lanza; my family used to play his records. We all learn best by imitating others.

It's important for me who is at the table with me; the moment when everyone speaks to each other and everyone listens. If there's good food, it's much better.

I was a daredevil before, and after I lost my sight I was the same. I loved riding bikes, scooters and horses. I even learned to box. Muhammad Ali is my hero.

I don't have an extraordinary degree of self-confidence, but I know the gift I have been given from God, and I try to share it with as many people as possible.

I don't like being called 'macho.' Macho basically means stupid and a real Italian man is not macho, he's smart. That's smart in both senses: elegant and clever.

Opera singing is in every way of inestimable value; a real heritage for all mankind that has been reached over centuries of studies, attempts, flights of the spirit.

I began when I was a child, because I was born and grew up in a little village. And many people ride the horses. So, it was a big - it has been a big passion for me.

I have had the good fortune of being able to sing with many of the finest voices in the world, and for someone who loves voices as I do, this is an enormous privilege.

'Passione' is a selection of the music moments that have accompanied my youth; a collection of cherished memories, of moments, of fleeting emotions, of sleepless nights.

Let me say that I've never thought to conduct because the conductor has to think to the music before the orchestra. And the orchestra comes later. For me, it's terrible.

Losing my sight had nothing to do with my focus on music. My passion for music was already there, so it would be a mistake to give too much significance to my blindness.

I love eating shabu-shabu in Japan - a kind of beef hotpot. But if you're talking about authentic, traditional food, then Italian cooking is one of the best in the world.

To sing a duet together means sharing with someone both the pleasure and the responsibility of making music for an audience which is there to feel enjoyment through music.

I have always felt an excellent rapport ever since my very first concert in Britain at Hampton Court. I have always felt understood. The British understand opera very well.

Music is able to make a person dream. When you dream, you dream of something good, something beautiful, and when you dream, you always dream of yourself better than you are.

The most widely criticised singers in the history of opera, Maria Callas and Franco Corelli, happen also to be the best singers. I am honoured for being part of their group.

I prefer to work for my country in a free and independent way. I was born free, and I want to die free. I am always suspicious of ideology. Instead, I respect men with ideas.

My real passion is for opera. It was born and developed by listening to records, and my dream as a child was to record entire operas when I grew up, and this dream came true.

I want to have time for myself, my family and my friends. It's important because in order to sing well, you must have inspiration, and inspiration comes from life, from living.

I consider the voice a gift from the heavens, and as all the gifts from the heavens, they must be used, but the minute that the heavens call it back then of course I will stop.

A love song must respect the canons of music beauty, entering the fibers of those who are listening. It must make them dream and pleasantly introduce them to the universe of love.

I was overcome with happiness, love, and tenderness ... Right after he was washed, I studied him with my hands: his downy little head, his little nose, everything on the tiny body.

My life experience has taught me nothing happens by chance. Even the idea of the ball in a roulette game: it's not chance it ends up in a certain place. It's forces that are at play.

In my iPod, there are many operas, from A to Z. I have 'Aida' and 'Boheme' and 'Butterfly' and 'Cavalleria'. My passion is for opera, but when I'm in the car, I listen to everything.

A positive frame of mind will definitely enhance your travelling experience. If I'm not in a positive frame of mind then the whole thing definitely becomes more of a challenge for me.

I'm most impressed by the Russian writers, so I love reading the works of Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky. Another author who has informed the way I think is the French philosopher, Blaise Pascal.

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