Placido Domingo quotes:

I attended less than two years of Conservatory in Mexico City.

I then realized that I could never be satisfied again with the mere natural charm of my voice, that I had to constantly paint when singing, melting all the colors, expressing reds and blacks that had to be less primary but bursting with subtly colored combinations.

Every three days on average, I am alone on stage, facing the public.

The voice collects and translates your bad physical health, your emotional worries, your personal troubles.

Should it happen tomorrow, I would fall to my knees to give thanks to God for such a career.

When I was a young man, I was a baritone, very far from possessing the whole range of the tenor then.

Young singers are much better educated musically, much better informed, through discs and videos, than I was.

Between parts I was too old for and roles that were too overwhelming, out of reach then for my voice. I carved out a niche with the Wagnerian repertoire since I am attracted by its theatrical intensity.

I feel like a little boy who is constantly offered new toys.

We all have a destiny in accordance with the breadth of our shoulders. My shoulders are broad.

Honestly, if the public still wants to hear me in some works, I have to go down a half step.

I will prove that a great conducting career is expecting me.

On the other hand, I have devoted so much energy to reach the top that I accept the stress of being there.

The press regularly proclaims my ambitions and my financial demands.

The public is a part of my real life.

When a young artist is ready, one has to bring him into the limelight.

I have always studied my parts with the orchestral score and not with the piano reduction.

When you are confronted with an opera, you have to keep an eye on everything: the musicians, the chorus, the ballet, the singers, the staging.

When it becomes clear that no one else shares your level of passion, you are where you belong.

When facing symphonic orchestras which have played some works five thousands times, you have nothing to do.

The high note is not the only thing.

But enough joking. I am singing. This is all my life.

If money was my only motivation, I would organize myself differently.

My strength is my enthusiasm.

To stay at my best, I have to stop talking during the preceding day.

The atmosphere of the theater is my oxygen.

With my personal preparation at the piano, I can afford to hum at half voice.

I am never wrong when it comes to my possibilities.

I feel at home in an orchestral score.

But I won't deprive myself of singing opera as long as my voice follows.

Don't you think it astonishing that, at 58, I am still working at improving my career?

I hope I have given back half the joy music has given me.

I was married at 16, a father at 17 and divorced at 18.

I'm not superstitious because it brings bad luck.

In the last century, everybody was singing lower.

It is strange, but nobody is shocked when pop singers make a fortune in the space of two years.

Let us be clear: I take ten times more money for a concert than for an opera performance.

Singing becomes a form of therapy.

Sometimes pianists try to sound like singers: me personally, I try to sound like a Bösendorfer.

The public made me and then encouraged me for many years, and my future even now depends upon it.

This season, over eight productions, I am presenting four young tenors.

What is sad is not to be able to do today what you have done in your youth. But what is good is to remember that - when you were able - you did it to the best of your ability.

When working with an orchestra, you never spend more than 20 minutes per recording session.