57 Quotes by Jessye Norman

Pigeon-holes are only comfortable for pigeons.

I am not one to equate dress size and artistic performance.

I feel comfortable singing in the great cathedrals of the world because I spent so much time as a child singing in church. And it isn't very different. Of course, nothing looks quite like Notre Dame de Paris.

I was given a stethoscope in a child’s ‘doctor’s bag’ at about age six and I loved it! One could hear the heart beating through that plastic toy.

There’s no anger ever in a spiritual. There’s always the dream of a hope of a better day coming. That God understands the troubles that I’m experiencing.

I want to sing more in Spanish. I want to sing the songs of Granados; the songs of Montsalvatge. To do things that truly I’ve not done before.

If you send up a weather vane or put your thumb up in the air every time you want to do something different, to find out what people are going to think about it, you’re going to limit yourself. That’s a very strange way to live.

As for my voice, it cannot be categorized-and I like it that way, because I sing things that would be considered in the dramatic, mezzo or spinto range. I like so many different kinds of music that I’ve never allowed myself the limitations of one particular range.

I have a particular affliction. I am unable to say a word I can’t spell.