Artist News

Kiri Te Kanawa retires from public performance

By | Published on Thursday 14 September 2017

Kiri Te Kanawa

Opera singer Kiri Te Kanawa has announced that she is retiring from public performance. She hasn’t performed for a year already, and has now confirmed that this is a permanent decision.

Speaking to the BBC, Te Kanawa, who already retired from appearing in operas in 2009, said: “I don’t want to hear my voice. It is in the past. When I’m teaching young singers and hearing beautiful young fresh voices, I don’t want to put my voice next to theirs”.

She added that after an “amazing career”, which spanned five decades, she wanted to decide “when it was going to be the last note”. The point came at a performance in Australia last October, she said. “Before I’d gone on, I said, right, this it. And that was the end”.

The musician now runs a foundation to support young singers in New Zealand.



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