'People are jealous'

Celine Dion has sold 200m records worldwide, making her the best-selling female singer ever. The mystery is who exactly buys her music. She doesn't have quite the right shoes to be a fully fledged gay icon, and she certainly doesn't have a teen market. She has an amazing outstretching voice that reaches far into the vast expanses of the world's middle- brow. For every person who loves her and cries along with her tunes, there is someone who derides her because she wore a tuxedo back to front, or because they just hate her taste in songs.

She herself said a few years ago, "I don't try to be cool. That's not me." Yet any star who sticks around long enough can end up treasured. Is this true of Dion? She had a five-year residency at Caesars Palace, Las Vegas, which is coming to an end. It seemed a strange thing to do at first, yet it worked. It gave her more than the $250m (£125m) she supposedly made from it: she got respect. Unlikely fans have seen her show. Prince has been three times. Justin Timberlake, Ice-T and Britney have been. Rick Rubin, the über-producer who rediscovered the cool of Johnny Cash, loved it. And goth rock guitarist Ben Moody of Evanescence liked it so much he wanted to produce some songs for her new album, Taking Chances. Timbaland also said he would consider teaming up with her. When you call Caesars Palace they answer with the name of her show: "It's A New Day at Caesar's Palace".

Taking Chances is unexpectedly edgy. It has producers such as Linda Perry, best known for her work with Pink, Courtney Love and Gwen Stefani. It includes a song called That's Just The Woman In Me that she first considered 20 years ago, but she couldn't find that woman in her then. Twenty years ago, she was a child-puppet-songbird. Now she's 39, one year older than Stefani and the same age as Kylie, but she seems so much older than them. Maybe Dion is now ageing in reverse, becoming younger. There's certainly a child-like quality about her.

The new album is still very Celine, all flawless notes reached out of nowhere - just rockier. "It's been inside of me always. It's like it's coming out like a jack-in-the-box, you know?" Her long fingers twirl to describe the eruption. "It's me, who I am today. I grew. I didn't change. I evolved, which is different."

Of course, some people really don't like who she is. She has been hugely criticised: her music, her taste, her marriage. She remains relentlessly positive, simply saying, "I have an extraordinary life and people are jealous." Not that I believe this doesn't hurt her. She has had so much criticism by now that she has learned how to be thick-skinned.

Dion is weirdly emotional, available. She gets very animated about things she has a passion for - she stands up and waves her arms about if she is upset or excited. She speaks with a French-Canadian accent. Sometimes what she says doesn't make sense but it sounds very poetic and deep, not bland. She's very specific and very vague at the same time, which may be because English is not her first language. She has long tousled hair and the face that launched a thousand why-the-long-face jokes isn't even that long. Big eyes, sensuous mouth. In the flesh, she's sexy.

She was one of 14 children, her father was a lumberjack and they sang folkie little songs in their own family group around Quebec. At 12, she was signed by manager Rene Angelil, who was then on his second marriage. It had been dissolved by the time she sang for Switzerland in the Eurovision song contest in 1988 aged 20. He was 26 years older than her, but in the euphoria of winning the song contest she kissed him. She said that kiss was one of the greatest moments of her life. In fact, Angeli was all she had ever wanted - in a man, anyway. They married in 1994. She must have wanted other things because she worked relentlessly. In the UK, she is the only female artist to have two singles sell more than a million - My Heart Will Go On and Think Twice. She has five Grammy awards.

But now that she's achieved so many of the things she craved, she wants peace, family time. A house in the country where she can grow tomatoes and spend time with her seven-year-old, Rene Charles, who she conceived through IVF. In true Celine dramatic fashion she discovered she was pregnant on the same day as her husband was declared to be in remission from skin cancer. "Imagine - we faced life and death in one day."

Her career, she says, is no longer the most important thing. "In the beginning I needed to prove myself to the industry. Not any more. I'm doing this for fun." How many million albums had she sold before she realised she didn't have to prove herself? "This is the first album. Since my son was born I know my job as a mother is much more important." She's proud of her ability to weep. "I cry at everything my son does. I am much happier now though because I have meaning in my life. Before, I was singing, fighting for my place, holding on to my dream. Now I have a son and I am in love with my husband and I am singing because I love expressing myself through music."

You wonder how stressed she must have been before. She used to look different. Her face used to appear so strained and tight. She wore trouser suits a lot, dressed much older. Now she is always in floaty, lacy, chiffony things and she likes a bit of corsetting. Does she feel more sexy? "Absolutely. More sexy and more grounded." She insists she has not tried to change. "For me, being cool is to feel happy and stable and sure of myself. I think when you become a parent you become more involved in life. I take every decision more carefully."

Part of the Vegas residency was about bringing stability for Rene Charles. "When we moved to Las Vegas my heart of a mother was very fragile. I didn't want to tour the world and bring him backstage one night here, one night there. Now he's seven, I am ready to see the world with him. We would love another baby but we're not planning anything right now because I am touring for a year, but after that we'd love to try."

Before Angelil's cancer treatment - the illness was diagnosed nine years ago - she had IVF and frozen embryos await her. "You know, we have an extravagant life but we are normal people. Cancer happens to people. Once it touches you it's in your life for ever and it makes you realise how precious life is and how you have to live every day at its fullest." Angelil may have started off as the svengali in the relationship but the dynamic shifted after his illness. "Yes, I felt I was in charge as well. I needed to make decisions and be part of my life too. We got through it and it helped us." Isn't it incredible that she's only had one love in her whole life? "It is incredible and I'm very proud of it. It was always my dream. Before Rene, I had one little boyfriend but he was only a boyfriend for a moment." Was she very careful with the choice she made? "I listen to my own instincts and I didn't jump into the relationship. I was a long time with Rene before the relationship. He was like part of my family."

I tell her there are things that I read about her that I'm wondering about. One, she is anorexic. Two, she tried to commit suicide. And three, she doesn't dare have a glass of wine in case she becomes an alcoholic. She is outraged. "OK. First, I'm not anorexic. It pisses people off that I am thin and I don't make any effort. Second, it was written that I had committed suicide, that I was dead. I had to ring my mother to say, 'I am not dead.' I was freaking out. Imagine, my whole family were freaking out. I don't even know where that came from. And as for the third thing, it's also not true. I love champagne. Cristal is my favourite. A glass of wine doesn't destroy the voice. Four bottles will. I have an extraordinary life and people are trying to find something wrong with my life." She's angry now, especially about the anorexia bit. Her blue opaque tights reveal shapely legs; she has elegant thin arms but no bones sticking out. "I have been thin all my life. Nobody in my family is overweight."

She's a non-stop doer. She says that now she is ending her stint in Vegas she will have more time to relax and she likes to cook. "I love to take leftovers and make them look better. I play golf once in a while. I don't like to go to movies at all. I feel it's losing time. I should do something with my body, not just sit there. I prefer to plant a garden or clean out some drawers, give some old clothes away."

Thinking is not a natural state for her although she has recently discovered that she likes to read. "About three years ago I discovered this passion for reading. Mostly I read in French. I was concerned because I didn't go to school a lot and I was never interested in reading. My mum said, 'Don't worry, you are so busy. You've just had a baby, don't add reading to your list. Give yourself time to discover new things later.' Now I read a lot." Recently she has been reading in English too, Seven Spiritual Laws of Success by Deepak Chopra. "It's about being positive and not judging people. I like that."

She believes that life is more harmonious if you don't blame people. "I had an image once about what is a man and what is a woman. The man is a tree. He's big, he's beautiful, moves the leaves, makes the shadow. We like to hug him. The roots of the tree is the woman. Without the roots he won't survive. We feed him to make him look good, preserve him. But it takes two together to make the tree healthy. The man can take the spotlight but only with the woman behind him. For me it's the tree of life."

I'm not sure if this is pure Chopra or pure Dion. I suspect the l atter. Eccentric? Yes. Strangely submissive for one of the most powerful women in the music industry? Yes. But somehow endearing.

· A New Day - Live From Las Vegas is out on DVD today. An Audience With Celine Dion is on ITV1 on December 22.