Todd Duncan

“He told me he had searched for three years for his Porgy. He said he had heard them all - the concert singers, the church singers, everybody. Then he heard me, and he said, 'That's it.'”

“When I walked out on the stage in 'Porgy and Bess,' I was not Todd Duncan. I was Porgy. I was a cripple. I was begging. I was in love. I was a murderer. I was a man who was fighting for his life and the life of his woman. That's the way I sing.”

“I'm not going to play Jim Crow. I'm an artist. I won't play anyplace I can't sit down and have a drink of water with everybody else after the show.”

“The voice is an instrument, and you must learn to play it. But the music comes from the soul. Without soul, it is just noise.”

“I had to create a character from the ground up. There was no tradition for Porgy. I had to make him believable, not a caricature.”

“You don't just sing the notes. You have to sing the meaning behind the notes. The story must come first.”

“I don't remember ever not singing... It was just something that you did. You expressed yourself that way.”

“It was the hardest role I ever had to play. Physically, because I was on my knees so much. Emotionally, because this man's life was so full of tragedy and hope.”