IN THE AUTUMN of 2004, Renee Fleming appeared as Violetta in Verdi's La Traviata at New York's Metropolitan Opera. Her performance had critics fumbling for panegyrics. The diva was heralded as having joined opera's greats. But then, as now, Fleming showed few signs of the other meaning of that word.
Sure she gets up to adjust the room temperature a few times, but the lyric soprano could be considered an instrument that needs climate control. Why would anyone whose vocal chords have been coaxed, cajoled and crafted into the human equivalent of a Stradivarius want to damage them?
'I don't want to be a slave to my voice,' says the 47-year-old. 'On the other hand, I can't be in loud restaurants or smoky bars; I can't talk all day if I have a performance that night, and I need a certain amount of sleep. It's all about moderation.'
Moderation certainly didn't get Fleming to where she is now. Rather, her voice has been shaped by decades of vocal training, grueling dedication, ample disappointment and some good DNA. And when she steps onto the stage at the Hong Kong Philharmonic this weekend to sing her favourite Strauss, she arrives at what may be the height of her powers.
Fleming talks with the confidence of someone who knows her trade. Music is her passion, but the passion isn't overbearing. She says that having two vocal coaches as parents may have both narrowed and amplified her career choice, but it didn't smooth the way. 'It is an incredibly difficult road.'
Her parents were caught in the so-called middle-income trap: not enough money to pay for a private college, but too much to get financial aid. Fleming first attended neither her college of choice nor any of the top-flight conservatories that might have welcomed her.
