International Performance Quotes

I did a long concert tour in England and Denmark and Sweden, and I also sang for the Soviet people, one of the finest musical audiences in the world.

I performed six concerts all over the U.S.S.R. during the time of Gorbachev. The entire audience was Russian. There were no Indians. Period. The audience turned out in large numbers and gave standing ovations to all my songs. They knew each song. That was an amazing experience.

The first time I took a plane to dance in front of an audience outside France was when I was in the Paris Opera Ballet School, and we flew to Japan.

If you go to Japan for instance, you should know that they have a different way of playing Beethoven or Brahms. But if you play with them Mozart, Debussy, Mendelssohn, they have a wonderful light feeling for that.

I have toured with the likes of Laxmikant-Pyarelal and performed in places like U.S., Canada, and Europe.

Maybe if you're playing in London or America, you don't feel that pressure quite as much.

My first time on TV doing stand-up, I actually did this show in Holland called 'The Comedy Factory' hosted by Jorgen Raymann. It was in 2006 in Holland. It was amazing. I had only been doing stand-up for four years, and I booked that gig through the Just For Laughs Montreal festival, and they flew me out and put me up.

We wanted to do it right. There is an expectation and WWE has a reputation to deliver the best show we possibly can when we perform in a new part of the world. We wanted to deliver Abu Dhabi with the best product we could. Also it's very difficult to make the travel work as we are constantly touring throughout the year.

Theatre has no national identity. It is something for the world, whether it is Irish, English, or French.

I've performed in Japan before, as well as many other non-English speaking countries. I find you really just have to be a bit more animated than usual. Call-and-response routines work well, if they are simple. Otherwise, I just dance around like a circus monkey and hope the crowd feels it.

When I perform in another country. The local people there sing along to my song in Korean.

Well probably the coolest show of that whole tour was in Germany. I had a chunk of material on [Adolf] Hitler, and I was worried about how they'd react, but they loved it.

I knew I have those skills and capabilities to perform at the international level.

I'd love to perform in India, but I don't book the gigs. It's one of the few places I haven't played. One of the Indian instruments that I love is the sitar. I played it on some of my songs, including 'Pyramid of Cheops' and 'Crucify.'

As a dancer, I know couples that have stayed married but separated to dance on different continents. Dance in general, but ballet in particular, is such a finite career. You can't do it later in life, and it's something that I think a dancer has to have some selfishness to fulfill.

Performing abroad is ambassadorial.

It's great having the best league in the world, no doubt about that, but the downside of that is the national team will suffer.

When I first was conducting as guest conductor in Europe 25 years ago, I would propose doing American pieces and grudgingly it would be accepted from time to time.