And by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. Thank you. Fourtime grammy winner rehm Renee Fleming appeared in london, on sesame street one of the finest in the world and performing in the l. A. Production of a streetcar named desire based on the Tennessee Williams play singing the role of blanch duvois written for her by composes r andre previn. Lets listen to her singing i can smell the sea air. Into my ocean of blue you have done everything with everybody at least twice, i think in the world, yet i cant imagine what it feels like to have a piece written for you by andre previn. This is specifically Renee Fleming for you . You know, its incredibly exciting, because typically we sing in Classical Music where presenting works by composesers no longer with us and trying to fit into a template created by someone else. So when its for you and youre the template, this such freedom. I could say, andre a better fit if i had a high note there, if you let me do this glamorous thing and, ah what a joy. Because you just walk onstage its like stepping into a suit that fits you perfect linchts to your point, what is the joy of being able to work collaboratively like that because the piece is writing four . Specifically, hell come up with an idea. Ive done it with a couple of composers. Listen to my recordings, work with them, i like this part of your voice. Lets focus on that. I was able to say to andre, for example, i tour a lot, can i have an arya to take it with me . So he gave me five. You know . I just talked to him yesterday and he has a new piece in mind for me as well. This is its creative. Totally creative. Yeah. Have you already figured how you will fit this into the show . Your show as you travel . Oh, i actually do these arios all the time and have we premiered this a long time ago. Ive been singing it ever since and now young singers are performing it. Its been a successful piece, about 24 different runs. And ive been in 5 of them. Yeah. Your voice works well in this play. Why . You know, Tennessee Williams plays are all operas y think. So dramatic and the drama is, the emotional content is so extreme, and in many of them and the stories are really rich. So it lends itself twowell to p opera. Blanch is a exciting person and someone said last night we wanted to rescue her from the story, from the place. On the other hand not completely sipthetic either. To singer in a way gives her more range. The music heightens the drama. I think the pieceworks extremely well with music. A lot of his plays could be set easily to music. I had never thought about that. I wanted to talk about Tennessee Williams. Glad you took me in that direction, but ive never thought of his work as opper iraq. It makes sense as i think about t. All would be great operas. Rose tattoo. Night of iguana. All of these would be great operas. Others one, summer and smoke, made into an opera, some others have been already. But this works so well. This production works well also. We have the great stanley shouting stella, and aun dra was smart not to try to have him sing that. Tennessee williams, many believe hes absolutely the best. That its hard to top his work . I think the tragedy with him, so much success early and so young, and a fashion piece and struggled after that. Its a shame. Hes one of our greatest playwrights, ever. Yeah. The exact opposite of that is the fact that you have had this long and encuring career. You had a chance to do a variety of things. What is it about you that always finds you wanting to try and do Something Different . Thats it. Youre always pushing the boundaries. Yeah. Thats true. Im very musically curious, and i love new experiences. Im an adventurer. Some want to stay in a safe zone and repeat the same things and give them more depth and i want to do new things all the time. I also think because im, grew up with eclectic interests and tastes in music, from pop to jazz, and wanting to explore that music theater, and thats particularly an american thing as well, and at least in my generation, i didnt want to be pushed into a 50s italian template of what an opera singer is. It wasnt a good fit for me vocally. Which is why blanch is my tuska or madam butterfly. I cant sing those roles. Its my chance to be dramatic. I love the voice. Everything there is about the voice. I did a project at the Kennedy Center that will be on pbs this year called american voices that explore whats we have in common, we as opera singers, with all genres of singers and all came together to talk about it from medicine to the business to vocal technique to lifestyle issues, and what our challenges are. Loved that. Learned from it. Learned a lot from it, and im doing a holiday disc right now i just recorded with wynton and some fabulous other performer, and of holiday tunes, but nonclassic nonclassical. Another style of sings. You mentioned wynton. Weve had many, many allnight conversations about this very issue, which is this notion of particular genres wanting to box artists in. I suspect you and wynton have had this conversation, im sure, yours. This notion of purist in a particular field. It could be jazz, opperist pure it, but they want to oftentimes box in certain artists. Even critics will come after you for moving beyond the boundaries of what they deem appropriate choices musically. You dont seem to be one of those artists ache to navigate that mine field, youve been able to do this relatively well. What do you make how youve been able to do that and not have people just disdain you for trying so many Different Things . When i even, you know, a decade ago, you did it very carefully and there was tremendous risk. Associated. You know, everything is generational. Weve seen changes happening so quickly in life. And with each ensuing generation something new is possible and im finding younger performers have thrown all of the rules away, and theyre in a club with leather jackets on, performing penderretskiwi coldplay, and anything goes. Whatever they want to explore artistically as long as its quality and theres an audience for it, its fine. I love that and found even with myself, its much easier now, and i dont worry about it quite as much as i used to. What you basically said to me, ren ooeshgs its renee, its good for the artist. Good for the artist to be allowed to x, y and z so long as they do it well . Its good for the music . It can be. A lot of it is paced. A lot of it is audience tastes moop is the audience . Finding the audience. Sometimes its quality. Sometimes you think thats not really a fit. Ive certainly tried things ive thought, well that didnt work so well, but the active exploration and the process of the adventure i think it grows. You grow in that and its important. Stylistically i started in jazz. Uhhuh. And i didnt really learn how to sing until i was in a jazz club for 2. 5 years every weekend, and i found my voice, and my freedom, my ability to communicate with an audience. All of that came through jazz, at the same time i was studying Classical Music and opera. So i applied that stylistically to how i sang. Some people loved it, some didnt. But it was me. Whats the greatest gift . You mentioned a couple now. I think. You may have urd answered this. Make sure i god it right. Whats the greatest gift you think jazz gave you singing all of those weekends . Absolutely the improv, freedom. Having to improvise. Finding high notes through that. My voice teacher would say do you have any idea what you just sang . Id say, no. She said, good. Better if you dont know. It was, high cue. You know, but the main thing was style. It was really and ive replied that to strauss and everything. How you bend a phrase, how you create tension in a line. That makes music sexy. Its tension. And i learned that, and you know by singing in the club. You intimated so much is about taste and it is, because i want to get inside your head and your heart for that matter. What do you hear when you hear something that you have tried, that you dont think works . Because i mean if youre a Renee Fleming fan its hard to decipher anything youve done we dont like. We love the fact youre so brilliant at what you do. When you hear something youve tried that you dont like what are you hearing . To be fair, im hypercritical of everything i do. We all are. Were perfectionists. Right jt a lot of times there are certain givens. Pitch is one. I dont, on repeated hearing a recording is, i dont want people to be irritated by something ive done. So i dont want to be irritated by it. Thats one thing. Languages have to be perfect. You want to sound at awe tentic as possible and beyond that, how do you make an interpretation in something that sounds authentically, you know, sounds real . That sounds honest. Honesty is very important to me. But in terms of style, sometimes i just think, gosh, my voice doesnt do that very well. You know . I shouldnt have tried that, or sometimes its one track. Or and for the most part im conservative about my choices. There havent been many things i thought it was horrible. A lot of times i chalk it up to learning. I learned a lot from that project. Maybe it wasnt the most successful thing but i grew in that. I think i take your point about honesty in music. Im certainly turned on by the phrase, let me just drill a little further if i can, what you mean by honesty in music. Does that mean lyric, lived experience . Stylistically . What do you mean by the music having to be honest for you . You have to, i think, find the emotional truth for yourself in what youre singing. Thats very important that i feel something. Because otherwise youre not going to communicate with the audience. You sgloe if itknow . Just im doing everything right, thats not hitting home. Theres an emptiness to that. That said, im not saying im always successful. Im not. But thats what ive striving for and also always striving to find the most emotional moment in everything i do. You know . How to make that, find that line. Because you start crying, then you cant sing very well anymore, but almost to that point, thats where you want to be. Have you done performances where you almost tripped yourself up emotionally because of the power of the piece . Oh, sure. Yeah. Sure, sure, sure. And then, know, you have to rein it in enough to keep going, but thats a great fine line to be on. Yeah. I dont want cover this question any more than deliberately, because youve performs for audiences all over the world, give me two, three lessons, takeaways, dont want to color it more than this, that youve learned from performing before a Live Audiences . And i think that the answer, well see in a second. I think the answer youll give me applies to not just Musical Artists but to anyone who stands in front of a Live Audience and performs. What are some of the lessons you learned about how to do that successfully . We opened last night in the streetscar and have two more performances. I suffer a lot to perform. Im one of these crazy people who has to suffer to perform comfortably. After all of these years . Its almost worse now. For me, i made up a whole new level of suffering. Wow. So and i think, god, why am i still doing this . But theres something magical about that audience relationship. And theyre all different. You know, we stunned last night by how much people laughed. In streetcar and how funny they thought it was in the first half and second act and then, of course it wasnt funny anymore. I ought thats fascinating to me, and theres a high afterwards. I think you can get a little addicted to that. You know . To that that response, in a way, and its not a life like this. Its a life of a lot of mountains and valleys. Mountains and valleys. As you look back on the course of your career thus far what do you see as valleys . I see a lot of mountains. But whats the what are valleys . The valleys have a lot to do with the lifestyle. Im on the road a lot. I have two children. Beautiful, beautiful girls, who are, oh, theyre fabulous. And to, and they made sacrifices for what i do as women and thats a lot to ask of your children. Thats the biggest valley for 3450e. The debris to which you have to leave the people you love. And i also, to take care of this instrument thats in the you that you cant put in a closet or in a case. Its a big responsibility. And a trial. When traveling all the time. How do you think never behind critics say, what r how do you think after all of this use your instrument is holding up . I think its holding up very well. All Things Considered i can still technically do what i have always done, maybe not at consistently and i dont like that kind of risk. So im conservative in my choices now. But theres still a lot of music to sing. Its 400 years of music. I can keep going as long as i find things that are nice for the audience and that i enjoy doing. Yeah. Occurs to me, renee, ive mentioned and three or four occasions critics. What is your view after all of these years being criticized by so many, the good, the bad, the ugly, what its your take on the worth and the value of the critic in contemporary america . I well, two things to say about that. One i think critics can be incredibly useful in terms of helping the audience understand what theyre hearing. They can educate to a great degree, in that we dont have time to research what were seeing anymore. We have 1,000 pulls on our time now. So to be able to sort of read something that kind of sums it up and gives us history and some of the interesting history as well is good. That said, i think a great degree of negativity is not helpful to the classical arts, because were struggling as it is to find and maintain our audiences with all the competition out there, and by and large, if you see reviews of mainstream arts, you see whole different point of view on it. A different take on it. Classical arts over time have become the sort of, you know, in the navel kind of interior, and often not as constructive as i would wish it could be. We want to get enthusiasm, we want people to do want to come to these things. Im a consultant to a lyric author in chicago and not only performing there but trying to develop the audience and help the company sink much more broadly about what we present and how we present it, with a world premiere, with bringing second citys guide to the opera, and these kinds of fun projects, and its really made a huge difference. Created a lot of buzz, and i love that, and thats an important, i think, way in which we can try to get new audiences in. Your comment now about the classical arts. These new audiences raise two questions for me. One, true to your take, ive asked others this question, but not an artist of your stature, i think, of what its going to take for the classical arts in the most multicultural, multiracial, multiethnic america ever to survive . Even if the critics start saying nothing but wonderful things about what theyre seeing presented, if you dont connect to an audience that is multicultural, multiracial and multiethnic, at some point down the road in this america, the arts, those classical arts are going to suffer to an even greater extent. How do you, in place like chicago, or beyond, multicultural city, how do you address that . Well, chicago, lyric opera just presented its second mariachi concerts and i heard literally a woman was climbing on the stage. So excited. The latino culture, they can sing. Thinking ever think of all the great singers moat because of mariachi. Tenors mostly. Placido domingo, voila. Its important to reach out and find communities. Gone are the days when you simply built a spectacular hall and opens the doors and said you are so fortunate to come into this temple of art. Right . I mean, people are saying, so . You know . Or, gosh, we wouldnt know what to wear. Or, you know, when do you clap . I mean, so the internet i think is helpful, having broad cascas cinemas is helpful. Definitely going into the community and figuring out why and how do people sing . Why do they care about music . What culturally do we want to say about our lives . Arts, were the muses of history. Its really a fascinating thing to know that. I mean, super bowl for me this year was a huge which i gamechanger. Can i jump in and say we were talking about in in advance of your arrival today. To a person, every one of us, im at the front of this group, every one of us still has chill bumps for the performance. You killed that thing. Oh, thank you. Amazing at the super bowl. Oh, god. Ill tell you, sleepless nights, in preparation for that, two minutes that have to be perfect. 2 was worth it. Im glad you didnt get any sleep, but im glad you didnt sleep because you nailed that thing. Im excited. The smithsonian just took vera wangle amazing dress she made for me. Thats not so bad. You know . She could do that. Hopefully that will make people think in a more broad way. Ts what i love. I love singing, period. Yeah. What kind of response did you raise . What kind of response did you get from everyday bhepeople whe they saw you walking down the sidewalk in new york, after the super bowl performance . A lot of people, theyre so emotional about the National Anthem. It means a lot to them. I cant believe the mail i got from people saying, thank you, and we loved it, and were so glad it was somehow a more formal version of it. You know . So just incredibly positive response. Really positive. Ive asked this question of others, not of Renee Fleming. So as keys and chords go, of all the stuff youve sung, how difficult is it to nail the National Anthem . Oh, its hard. This is not for amateurs. I dont know how they thought every citizen could sing this in the same you could all sing this together. Its a octave and a half. Add the interpolated note people expect, its challenging for anybody. Granted, classical singer is, thats very basic for us to have range but still, us not a nobrainer. America the beautiful is much nicer. Why ray charles did that. Ray kimmed that. Nobo killed that. Nobody can do it like ray. Im almost out of time. Youre always in new york, never come to l. A. I have to change that. So great to have you on the set, first of all. Has this career turned out to be not that its coming to be over, are you where you hoped to be started in a whole different genre . Well, first of all, when youre young you dream everything. People say, did you ever think youd achieve when youre young, you are think youre going to beat the world. Its reality that really teaches you, and also, remember it wasnt that long ago that Beverly Sills hostsed Johnny Carson for a week. That people were on television all the time who sang like i do. So its gotten much more challenging in a way. The three tenors certainly changed the playing field. But that said, i could not theres nothing i could wish for. Ive sung all over the world. My children have traveled with me all over the world. Im going to japan in a few weeks. I love what i do. I think its a privilege, and an honor, to do what i do. Yeah. I wished for, what, 11 seasons were on now . Wished for 11 seasons for this moment to finally happen and it happened. Renee fleming cake to laechlt and appeed on the program and i could not be more tickled to have you here and talk to you. A streetcar named desire, Tennessee Williams what can you say, the last production starring Renee Fleming at blanch dubois, if you can get in. Good luck with that. I feel a high note coming on. If you can, go see it. Thats our show for tonight. Thanks for watching, and as always, keep the faith. The bombs bursting in air gave proof through the night that our flag was still there oh say doest that starspangled banner yet wave or the land of the free and the home of the brave for more information on todays show, visit tavis smiley at pbs. Org. Hi, im tavis smiley. Join me next time for a conversation with matthew weiner. Mad mens final season. Thats next time. Well see you then. Captions by vitac www. Vitac. Com and by kroshgss to your pbs station from viewers like you. Thank you. Like, lets do a live interview. And then we were like, well, lets bring our Online Community and do it livestream. And bring in twitter and facebook and allow people to ask their own questions. I really like veronica belmont. I tweeted to her. She instantly responded. She said, yes. And i was like, what . veronica if youre really passionate about a topic and you wanna work in that field, you should already be doing it. female announcer roadtrip nation would like to thank the College Board for supporting this series. The College Board connect to college success. male announcer this Public Television series is supported by the university of phoenix foundation. Helping roadtrip nation build hope, discovery, and educational