An Evening with Dame Kiri Te Kanawa

The Daily Telegraph in London described her as the least snobbish singer in the world and here is one of the least snobbish conductors in the world, Stephen Barlow...

– Paul Holmes introduces Dame Kiri Te Kanawa's outdoor concert at Auckland's Hobson Wharf

And lastly, can I just thank you very much from the bottom of my heart, that you have chosen me as the warm up act for the arrival of the Whitbread fleet... 

– Dame Kiri Te Kanawa jokes about being a "warm up" act for the Whitbread Yacht Race

I had very good teachers, I had very good coaches, teachers, managers, everything. But most of all, I had a singing teacher who was Hungarian, and she went through the war. I remember I brought her a loaf of bread once and she said 'Kiri, I once had only a raw onion and your bread has reminded me of what I went through during those times of trying to escape'. So she had that drive, whether it be the war or me, but that sort of thing was in her along with [Hungarian-British conductor] Sir Georg Solti who once again, was in the war and escaped as well. So I had two people who were survivors and they made sure that I was going to also do this job and make it, not survive it but make it. And they were always driving me, driving me constantly.

– Dame Kiri Te Kanawa on the drive needed to make an international singing career, RNZ, 2 March 2024