Gareth Gates Quotes

As you know, I was a solo singer, something I just got very much used to. Turns out I’m quite enjoying being in a band!

I live for my daughter. Every decision I make is about her and for her. It’s great. She’s perfect.

I’m part of a speech therapy programme called the McGuire Programme. It teaches you a new way to breathe, a new way to speak, a brand new way of tackling the mind-sets that come with having a speech impediment. Mainly, it teaches you how to slow things down, and that has really helped me.

I’m part of a speech therapy course called the Maguire Programme. It isn’t a cure; it’s something you need to maintain and work on. I get days where I find things more difficult than others.

No one knows for sure if you can inherit a stammer, and so I worry that my baby might. It’s why I want to work on my speech before he arrives. I don’t want him to hear me stammer.

In the music business, I found it was much more about interviews, photo shoots and appearances rather than actual performing, which I do best.

Because I see my mum and dad as such amazing friends, I think I’ll be a really good dad.

I’m not closing the door on my solo career, but with 5th Story, if the public demand is there, then I’ll continue to work with the band. If not, we’ll all go our separate ways again.

Sharing the stage while singing my songs was a bit of a daunting prospect.

I really love it in Belfast. I always stay in the most bombed hotel, the Europa!

Before all this happened, I always used to see my stammer as being a negative, all my life, but then when I went on ‘Pop Idol,’ and the first time I saw it on television, it was really, really bad, but also it made me stand out; it made people remember me. So for the first time in my life, it worked to my advantage.

The last thing I wanted was to be with someone who’s the same age as me and wanted the limelight, wanted the attention. There’s lots of girls out there who do.

Finally having the freedom to speak is a really liberating feeling.

I love musical theatre because I love doing a live performance eight times a week.

I was always used to being centre stage – something that had its good and bad points.

I was terrible when I first started skating and was clinging onto the side for dear life, but it’s something I’ll always have now, and the tour is always so much fun.

Living with a stammer is difficult. It’s a daily uphill struggle with emotional baggage weighing you down. You can’t be the person you want to be.

Speech and having a stammer is obviously a big part of my life.

Breathing is fundamental to speech. A stammer is caused by erratic airflow, so if you have a smooth airflow, you have smooth speech.

Musical theatre is something that I always wanted to be a part of, and my first ever role on the West End as Joseph in ‘Joseph And The Technicolor Dreamcoat’ gave me a taste for it.

The moment an athlete doesn’t train, things start to get a bit rusty.

I’ve got my feet firmly on the ground, I can’t see life changing too much. I reckon more girls will talk to me at college and more people will look at me, but they know me for who I am.