Opera House Quotes

• The opera is to music what a bawdy house is to a cathedral.

  H. L. Mencken

  Funny, Music, House

  1925 Letter to Isaac Goldberg.

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• An opera begins long before the curtain goes up and ends long after it has come down. It starts in my imagination, it becomes my life, and it stays part of my life long after I've left the opera house.

  Maria Callas

  Long, Imagination, House

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• Cathedrals are built with pennies of the faithful. A great opera house also is a spiritual center, a temple of sorts, where many gather together for recreation, education, and inspiration - a blessed trinity worthy of public support.

  Eleanor Robson Belmont

  Spiritual, Blessed, Inspiration

  Eleanor Robson Belmont (1957). “The Fabric of Memory”

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• I want to get out of the major opera houses.

  Renee Fleming

  House, Opera, Want

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• I don't think an opera house is ever a place that can make you entirely happy.

  Bernard Haitink

  Thinking, House, Opera

  "Haitink lays down operatic baton on his 75th birthday". Interview with Martin Kettle, www.theguardian.com. March 5, 2004.

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• I'd love to come to Australia. I'd love to walk about the Sydney Opera House.

  Nik Wallenda

  Australia, House, Opera

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• I've always gravitated towards opera, and the Royal Opera House is quite possibly the greatest opera house on earth.

  Rufus Wainwright

  House, Earth, Opera

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• The number of opera houses around the world and the high attendance rates show that opera an art form that is more popular than ever.

  Bruce Beresford

  Song, Art, Numbers

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• I belong to the givers. I want to give a little happiness even if I haven’t had much for myself. Music has enriched my life and, hopefully - through me, a little - the public’s. If anyone left an opera house feeling more happy and at peace, I achieved my purpose.

  Maria Callas

  Giving, House, Feelings

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• The work that launched Snohetta into the architectural big leagues was their Oslo Opera House, which will certainly rank among the firm's highlights whatever else they may do. Although this is by any measure a triumph of city planning, the building itself is not quite a masterpiece, though very fine indeed.

  Martin Filler

  Cities, League, House

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• Fitzcarraldo is a mad dreamer. He's willing to sacrifice everything in order to make his vision of an opera house. That metaphor of pulling the boat over the mountain is so integral to anyone making any creative effort. It's that universal Sisyphean struggle.

  Sam Pressman

  Struggle, Sacrifice, Order

  Source: www.indiewire.com

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• One of the most wonderful memories in my life was when I sang at the Opera House in Sydney. I will never forget that. It is one of the most beautiful Houses I have ever sung in my life.

  Nana Mouskouri

  Beautiful, Memories, House

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• Every orchestra I know, every opera house I know, is desperately looking around trying to find new talent, new composing talent, supporting young composers, supporting new ideas, supporting new ways of getting the message across.

  Esa-Pekka Salonen

  Ideas, House, Trying

  Source: www.pbs.org

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• And what unity is to be had, at a time when orchestras are dying out, and when opera houses are about to close their doors; what's going to come next - when nothing new in music, for the orchestra, is truly lasting: pieces are performed once, and then they're thrown away.

  Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau

  Doors, House, Unity

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• People think top singers are overpaid, but opera houses have a top fee, which is a good thing. Of course concerts are different- everyone wants to make as much money as possible.

  Bryn Terfel

  Thinking, People, House

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• At the moment I'm enjoying a new challenge at the Royal Opera House, but I'm also keen to pursue my interest in television and particularly in science.

  Deborah Bull

  House, Challenges, Television

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• In Hamburg, there are three major orchestras, an opera house, and one of the great concert-hall acoustics in Europe at the Laeiszhalle, in a town a fifth the size of London. And that's not unusual. In Germany, there are dozens of towns with two or three orchestras. The connection with music goes very, very deep.

  Jeffrey Tate

  Europe, Two, House

  "Jeffrey Tate: 'I've had to fight all my life'". interview with Tom Service, www.theguardian.com. October 13, 2011.

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• I can go from one extreme to another, from playing at the Sydney Opera House on the Songbook tour to shows with Soundgarden at Voodoo Fest, all in a week.

  Chris Cornell

  House, Opera, Week

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• Until the Eighties, Oslo was a rather boring town, but it's changed a lot, and is now much more cosmopolitan. If I go downtown, I visit the harbour to see the tall ships and the ferries, and to admire the modern architecture such as the Opera House or the new Astrup Fearnley Museum on the water's edge.

  Jo Nesbo

  Museums, Water, House

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• After I left college, I went to work at the Royal Opera House in London, which became a real catalyst for me because it made me realize that I was interested in cinema and in the way life is thrust at you. So I started making films.

  Sam Taylor-Wood

  Real, College, House

  "New Again: Sam Taylor-Johnson". Interview with David Furnish, Lauren Lieb, www.interviewmagazine.com. July 23, 2013.

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• 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.

  Lesley Garrett

  Years, House, Opera

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• I have a lot of projects I get asked for, but the opera house really is my house - my home. It's where I feel comfortable and confident and I get to explore these big human stories and dramas and collaborate with extraordinary people, great talented artists and administrators and other people who are passionate about it and support it. It's like working with a great big family - the family you love and enjoy being with all the time.

  Jake Heggie

  Drama, Home, Artist

  Source: www.broadwayworld.com

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• I was 11 when a teacher suggested to my parents that they should send me to drama classes to curb my disruptive ways in the classroom. The next Saturday I was acting, and thereafter it became a ritual of my youth to see a show at the Belvoir on Sundays and, if I was lucky, another at the Opera House on Monday after school.

  David Wenham

  Teacher, Monday, Drama

  "Biography/Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

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• [Rock 'n' roll] is still a primitive form and there's no way you can get away from that. It's one of the primitive art forms and that's why it's good and that's why it's lasted...you know, it hasn't become sophisticated and it's not in the opera house.

  Van Morrison

  Art, Rocks, House

  Source: ritchieyorke.com

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• I think it's the responsibility of a major opera house not only to cultivate debate and get people thinking, but also to be interfaced with things that challenge them. To challenge its audience and not just deliver things that they know, even though some of those things are wonderful.

  Wayne McGregor

  Responsibility, Thinking, People

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