Beverly Sills Quotes
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When I was general director of City Opera, we were pioneers in the practice of projecting supertitles so that American audiences finally could know what all the singing was about.
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In youth we run into difficulties. In old age difficulties run into us.
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You can't imitate; all our faces are constructed differently... and the vocal cords; otherwise, we'd all sound alike. I don't think anybody should ever teach by imitating.
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The last major childhood disease remains and it's the worst of them all: nuclear war.
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Just sing it. Don't prove you can sing it. I know you can, you know you can. So just do it, because if you try to prove it, you'll lose.
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As soon as I arrive at the house, Laurie starts running, hits my chest, knocks me down, and licks my face. It's become a family ritual.
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When you're in love, the whole world is Jewish.
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Don't get me started on critics.
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I've always tried to be cheerful, because I think people who whine are boring, and I never could tolerate bores.
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There are no shortcuts to any place worth going.
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The Lourie Center eases the burden of children and their families through early intervention and diagnoses and treatment.
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Opera became popular in Texas the same way it did in a lot of previously isolated regions of the nation. It started with money. In the case of Texas, it was oil money, and it made a lot of people very rich, very fast.
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I never share credit or desserts.
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A happy woman is one who has no cares at all; a cheerful woman is one who has cares but doesn't let them get her down.
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There were times in my career ... when I felt like a trapeze artist doing dangerous somersaults without a net underneath. When you execute those somersaults flawlessly, the audience feels the same sense of triumph the performer does.
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Opera is music AND drama. I'm prepared to sacrifice the beautiful note for the meaningful sound any time... I can make a pretty tone as well as anyone, but there are times when the drama of a scene demands the opposite of a pretty sound.
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I can't be happy every day but I can be cheerful.
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A primary function of art and thought is to liberate the individual from the tyranny of his culture in the environmental sense and to permit him to stand beyond it in an autonomy of perception and judgment.
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I had found a kind of serenity, a new maturity. I didn't feel better or stronger than anyone else but it seemed no longer important whether everyone loved me or not - more important now was for me to love them. Feeling that way turns your whole life around; living becomes the act of giving.
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There is a growing strength in women but it's in the forehead, not the forearm.
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I've always tried to go a step past wherever people expected me to end up.
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Attachment to spiritual things is... just as much an attachment as inordinate love of anything else.
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My dear brothers, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry, for man's anger does not bring about the righteous life that God desires.
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I got out while they were still fighting to buy tickets to hear me. I believe in getting out when you're on top, and that's what I did.