I was an elementary school teacher....

If children are not introduced to music at an early age, I believe something fundamental is actually being taken from them.

I want to be famous everywhere.

In opera, as with any performing art, to be in great demand and to command high fees you must be good of course, but you must also be famous. The two are different things.

I wanted to be a teacher. I love children, so I wanted to deal with children. Then I wanted to be a veterinarian. But by the age of ten or eleven, when I opened my mouth and said, 'Oh, God, what's this?' I kind of knew teaching and being a veterinarian were gonna have to wait.

It is the malady of our age that the young are so busy teaching us that they have no time left to learn.

I basically started playing violin at the age of six. That lasted about three years because my previous teacher died and the second teacher didn't really know how to successfully get me going.

You can get help from teachers, but you are going to have to learn a lot by yourself, sitting alone in a room.