Celine Dion has kicked off her Courage World Tour, and I’m looking forward to the interviews that she’s going to give during the show’s year-long run. Celine sat down with Mikael Wood of the L.A. Times for a chat right after her first performance in her home province of Quebec. The whole interview is worth a read, and here are some of the highlights:

On the so-called “Dionaissance,” a tem that Celine “approves of,” to describe her evolution into an “avant-garde style icon”:
“I always loved fashion — it’s not something new . . . . But my team and I decided it’s OK to go to fashion shows, then it made such an impact that they wanted me to be in the front row. And that turned out to be a big deal.”

On Rene’s death
“The loss of my husband is still in me… I will grieve that for the rest of my life. And I see him through the eyes of my children every day.”

On how she wanted her current show to be “bigger and more theatrical”
“I love the spotlight — I love to be looked at. I’m in show business. You show your butt or your back or your shoulder and you go, ‘Voulez-vous coucher avec moi.’

On her fans of all ages
“Did you see children? I saw a lot of children. For me, I’m very impressed about that. I always thought my crowd was going to mature with me, and then it would fade a little bit. But what happened? I planted cucumbers in my garden, and now I have cucumbers, tomatoes, lettuce, radish.”

On attending this year’s Met Gala, the theme of which was “camp”
“I thought I was going to go with my sleeping bag. What is camp? I still don’t understand it. But I won.”

[From the L.A. Times]

I just loved all of this; Celine seems like a really easy person to chat with, and she has a great sense of humor. She mentioned not loving ‘My Heart Will Go On” initially, and recorded the demo because Rene asked her to (though she came around, eventually). The released song was created from that original demo, of which she said, “‘If I’m going to do a demo, I’m going to sell the s—,’” and the reporter noted that she “lower[ed] her voice as she swore.” At least she’s honest. I hope that any of you who are Celine fans are able to go see her on tour!

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British Summer Time Hyde Park

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