Daphne Guinness Discusses Her Love (and Hate) of Opera

PETER BRANT II: I’m musically challenged. I love music, but I can’t play . . . When I was little, I wanted to be a child prodigy, but I was awful at the piano.
DAPHNE GUINNESS: I had an accident with my right hand, so I stopped playing. It had to do with a lawn mower. Can you imagine? I’ve still got scars. I’m almost ambidextrous as well. So I’ve always had this kind of left hand-right hand problem anyway, but my writing on this hand is almost calligraphical now. I don’t know why, because I didn’t ever learn it. My hands kind of work separately. But singing was always very, very, very easy for me. I know in the last few months it doesn’t look like I’m afraid of putting myself out there, but I also have terrible nerves. I don’t think I’m going to be performing any time soon, but I might join a choir.
PETER BRANT II: Really?
DAPHNE GUINNESS: Yeah. It would be kind of fun. I always wanted to join the choir up in Harlem. They really know how to sing! That’s really great. I like certain operas. I’m not very keen on Puccini. If I have to see another La Bohème, I’m going to shoot myself. I mean, really. There are certain ones I love like the Ring [cycle], and I love Tristan und Isolde. I love Parsifal. I love Il Trovatore. I love all the Mozart operas. The Magic Flute bothers me because I just don’t like it when there’s no recitative. They start talking in the middle. I don’t like musicals for the same reason. Because when someone suddenly bursts into song in the middle of a sentence, you just think, That’s weird. But I like it when the whole thing is sung.
PETER BRANT II: I love The Marriage of Figaro.
DAPHNE GUINNESS: I can sing that from beginning to end And the Overture . . .

After the jump, an excerpt of Ms. Guinness singing "L'ho perduta, me meschina" from Mozart's Le nozze di Figaro. [Source]

Beer Heiress Once Aspired To Be Opera Singer

The Honourable Daphne Suzannah Diana Joan Guinness (born November 9, 1967) is an artist of Irish English French descent and an heiress of the Guinness family. She was named to the International Best Dressed List Hall of Fame in 1994. [Source]

"She loves friends and family, first of all. Reading ('I can sit for hours dissecting a book on English grammar') and going to the Opera. She has got a stunning voice, though: before getting married she had ambitions of becoming an opera singer and used to take singing lessons." [Source]