Pavarotti brought opera to masses

The tenor sang with pop stars, hoping to attract young
people to opera.

By STEPHANIE M. PETERS

SCRIPPS HOWARD NEWS SERVICE

The phenomenon began on a February night in 1972.

During a performance of “La Fille du Regiment” at New York’s Metropolitan Opera, Luciano Pavarotti effortlessly hit the nine high C’s in the signature aria, “Ah Mes Amis,” provoking wild applause and 17 curtain calls.

And so was born the King of the High C’s, a man who would come to be known as much for the drama of his offstage life as the extraordinary voice that earned him the distinction “world’s greatest tenor.”

“The top notes are like tightrope walking,” Pavarotti said in a 1976 interview with Newsweek. “The public wonders if the tenor will fall. The tenor wonders, too. One cracked C and the whole evening is spoiled.”

In a career that spanned four decades, Pavarotti released 51 opera albums, 23 collections, and sold more than 100 million recordings, securing his position in the annals of classical music as the genre’s most successful recording artist.

The legendary tenor died Thursday at his home in Modena, Italy. He was 71. In July 2006 he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. Doctors discovered a malignant mass during a routine checkup, and he underwent emergency surgery. He was forced to cancel the remaining dates of his 40-show, worldwide farewell tour.

Pavarotti is often credited with transforming opera from a lofty art form to a popular genre with his media-friendly personality, popular outdoor concerts and, as part of the Three Tenors, performances at the World Cup and other nontraditional stages.

Early life

The genre’s greatest modern star didn’t begin life on a trajectory for the stage, however.

Luciano Pavarotti was born Oct. 12, 1935, in Modena, Italy, to Adele, a worker in a cigar factory, and Fernando, a baker.

As a child he was more interested in soccer than singing, but his father was a tenor in the local amateur chorus, Gioachino Rossini, and encouraged Luciano to join as a teenager.

Pavarotti, then 19, was working as an elementary school teacher when Modena’s chorus placed first in an international competition in Wales, persuading him to consider a future in opera.

After studying under Italian musicians Arrigo Pola and Ettore Campogalliani, Pavarotti won the Concorso Internazionale award in 1961. Later that year, he made his debut as Rodolfo in “La Boheme” in Reggio Emilia, Italy, a role he described to U.S. News and World Report in 1986 as “my good-luck opera and the opera that I have used for my debuts at many of the world’s greatest opera houses.” Offstage, Pavarotti began a family, marrying Adua Veroni in 1961.

Success in his home country led to roles in operas in Amsterdam, Vienna, Zurich and London and, in 1964, his first studio recording: a set of five arias for Decca records, his record label for the rest of his career.

U.S. debut

In February 1965, Pavarotti made his U.S. debut in a Miami production of “Lucia di Lammermoor” with Joan Sutherland, filling in for a tenor who fell ill. It was the first pairing in what would become a historic partnership for Pavarotti and Sutherland. He also appeared with some of the greatest sopranos of the era — Renata Scotto, Roberta Peters, Mirella Freni, Magda Oliver, Leontyne Price, Montserrat Caballem and Kiri Te Kanawa.

After his success at the Met, the demand for Pavarotti led to televised performances that drew record audiences, including the first “Live from the Met” in 1977 in “La Boheme.”

With his star established, Pavarotti returned to his roots as educator in 1982, founding the Pavarotti International Voice Competition to identify the genre’s next young stars.

In 1992, he created Pavarotti and Friends, an annual charity concert pairing the tenor with famous friends such as Liza Minnelli, Stevie Wonder, Sheryl Crow, and Bono and The Edge from U2.

By singing with popular rock musicians, Pavarotti hoped to turn a younger audience on to classic music, he said in his 1995 autobiography, “Pavarotti: My World.” “When the young people see their pop heroes up there on the stage with this heavy opera singer, all singing ‘La Donna e Mobile’ together, they might say, ‘Hey, if Sting can sing it, maybe this music is not so terrible,”’ he wrote.