Early life and musical training Luciano Pavarotti was born on 12 October 1935 on the outskirts of
Modena in
Northern Italy, the son of Fernando Pavarotti, a baker and amateur tenor, and Adele Venturi, a cigar factory worker. Although he spoke fondly of his childhood, the family had little money; its four members were crowded into a two-room apartment. According to Pavarotti, his father had a fine tenor voice but rejected the possibility of a singing career because of nervousness.
World War II forced the family out of the city in 1943. For the following year, they rented a single room from a farmer in the neighbouring countryside, where the young Pavarotti developed an interest in farming. After abandoning the dream of becoming a
football goalkeeper, Pavarotti spent seven years in vocal training. Pavarotti's earliest musical influences were his father's records, most of them featuring the popular tenors of the day—
Beniamino Gigli,
Giovanni Martinelli,
Tito Schipa, and
Enrico Caruso. Pavarotti's favourite tenor and idol was
Giuseppe Di Stefano and he was also deeply influenced by
Mario Lanza, saying: "In my teens I used to go to Mario Lanza movies and then come home and imitate him in the mirror". At around the age of nine, he began singing with his father in a small local church choir. In addition to music, as a child, Pavarotti enjoyed playing
football. When he graduated from the Scuola Magistrale he was interested in pursuing a career as a professional football
goalkeeper, but his mother convinced him to train as a teacher. He subsequently taught in an elementary school for two years but finally decided to pursue a music career. His father, recognising the risk involved, only reluctantly gave his consent. Pavarotti began the serious study of music in 1954 at the age of 19 with
Arrigo Pola, a respected teacher and professional tenor in Modena who offered to teach him without remuneration. According to conductor
Richard Bonynge, Pavarotti never learned to read music. In 1955, he experienced his first singing success when he was a member of the Corale Rossini, a
male voice choir from Modena that also included his father, which won first prize at the
International Eisteddfod in
Llangollen, Wales. He later said that this was the most important experience of his life, and that it inspired him to become a professional singer. At about this time Pavarotti first met Adua Veroni. They married in 1961. When his teacher Arrigo Pola moved to Japan, Pavarotti became a student of
Ettore Campogalliani, who at that time was also teaching Pavarotti's childhood friend,
Mirella Freni, whose mother worked with Luciano's mother in the cigar factory. Like Pavarotti, Freni went on to become a successful opera singer; they would go on to collaborate in various stage performances and recordings together. During his years of musical study, Pavarotti held part-time jobs in order to sustain himself—first as an elementary school teacher and then as an insurance salesman. The first six years of study resulted in only a few recitals, all in small towns and without pay. When a
nodule developed on his
vocal cords, causing a
"disastrous" concert in
Ferrara, he decided to give up singing. Pavarotti attributed his immediate improvement to the psychological release connected with this decision. Whatever the reason, the nodule not only disappeared but, as he related in his autobiography: "Everything I had learned came together with my natural voice to make the sound I had been struggling so hard to achieve".
Career: 1960s–1970s Pavarotti began his career as a tenor in smaller regional Italian opera houses, making his debut as Rodolfo in
La bohème at the
Teatro Municipale in
Reggio Emilia in April 1961. His first known recording of "
Che gelida manina" was recorded during this performance. Pavarotti's first of two marriages was to Adua Veroni which lasted from 1961 to 2000 and they had three daughters. He made his first international appearance in
La traviata in
Belgrade,
Yugoslavia. Very early in his career, on 23 February 1963, he debuted at the
Vienna State Opera in the same role. In March and April 1963 Vienna saw Pavarotti again as Rodolfo and as Duca di Mantova in
Rigoletto. The same year saw his first concert outside Italy when he sang in
Dundalk, Ireland, for the St Cecilia's Gramophone Society, he was engaged by the Dublin Grand Opera Society to sing The Duke of Mantua in Verdi's
Rigoletto in May and June, and his
Royal Opera House debut, where he replaced an indisposed
Giuseppe Di Stefano as Rodolfo. In 1964, Pavarotti appeared as Idamante in
Idomeneo at
Glyndebourne and was engaged by the Dublin Grand Opera Society to sing Rodolfo in
Giacomo Puccini's
La bohème and Alfredo in Giuseppe Verdi's
La Traviata. Reviewers favourably comment on his singing. While generally successful, Pavarotti's early roles did not immediately propel him into the stardom that he would later enjoy. An early coup involved his connection with
Joan Sutherland (and her conductor husband,
Richard Bonynge), who in 1963 was seeking a tenor taller than herself to take along on her 1965 tour to Australia. With his commanding physical presence, Pavarotti proved ideal. However, before the summer 1965 Australia tour Pavarotti sang with Joan Sutherland when he made his American début with the
Greater Miami Opera in February 1965, singing in
Donizetti's
Lucia di Lammermoor on the stage of the
Miami-Dade County Auditorium in Miami. The tenor scheduled to perform that night became ill with no understudy. As Sutherland had plans to travel with him on the Australia tour that summer, she recommended the young Pavarotti as he was acquainted with the role. Shortly after, on 28 April, Pavarotti made his
La Scala debut in the revival of the
Franco Zeffirelli production of
La bohème, with his childhood friend
Mirella Freni singing Mimi and
Herbert von Karajan conducting. Karajan had requested the singer's engagement. in
I puritani (1976) During the Australia tour in summer 1965, Sutherland and Pavarotti sang some forty performances over two months, and Pavarotti later credited Sutherland for the breathing technique that would sustain him through his career. After the extended Australian tour, he returned to La Scala, where he added Tebaldo from
I Capuleti e i Montecchi to his repertoire on 26 March 1966, with
Giacomo Aragall as Romeo. His first appearance as Tonio in Donizetti's
La fille du régiment took place at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, on 2 June of that year. It was his performances of this role that would earn him the title of "King of the High Cs". He scored another major triumph in Rome on 20 November 1969 when he sang in
I Lombardi opposite
Renata Scotto. This was recorded on a private label and widely distributed, as were various recordings of his
I Capuleti e i Montecchi, usually with Aragall. Early commercial recordings included a recital of Donizetti (the aria from
Don Sebastiano were particularly highly regarded) and
Verdi arias, as well as a complete ''
L'elisir d'amore'' with Sutherland. His breakthrough in the United States came on 17 February 1972, in a production of
La fille du régiment at New York's
Metropolitan Opera, in which he hit nine
high Cs in the signature
aria and had seventeen curtain calls. Pavarotti sang his international
recital début at
William Jewell College in
Liberty, Missouri, on 1 February 1973, as part of the college's Fine Arts Program, now known as the Harriman–Jewell Series. According to his manager at the time, Pavarotti clutched a handkerchief throughout this recital because he had a lingering cold. Pavarotti himself explained that he needed the handkerchief, since he didn't know what to do with his hands. He began to give frequent television performances, starting with his performances as Rodolfo (
La bohème) in the first
Live from the Met telecast in March 1977, which attracted one of the largest audiences ever for a televised opera. He won
Grammy awards and
platinum and
gold discs for his performances. In 1976, Pavarotti debuted at the
Salzburg Festival, appearing in a solo recital on 31 July, accompanied by pianist Leone Magiera. Pavarotti returned to the festival in 1978 with a recital and as the Italian singer in
Der Rosenkavalier in 1983 with
Idomeneo, and both in 1985 and 1988 with solo recitals. In 1979, he was profiled in a cover story in the weekly magazine
Time. That same year saw Pavarotti's return to the
Vienna State Opera after an absence of fourteen years. With Herbert von Karajan conducting, Pavarotti sang Manrico in
Il trovatore. In 1978, he appeared in a solo recital on
Live from Lincoln Center.
Career: 1980s–1990s At the beginning of the 1980s, he set up The Pavarotti International Voice Competition for young singers, performing with the winners in 1982 in excerpts of
La bohème and ''L'elisir d'amore
. The second competition, in 1986, staged excerpts of La bohème
and Un ballo in maschera
. To celebrate the 25th anniversary of his career, he brought the winners of the competition to Italy for gala performances of La bohème
in Modena and Genoa, and then to China where they staged performances of La bohème
in Beijing (Peking). To conclude the visit, Pavarotti performed the inaugural concert in the Great Hall of the People before 10,000 people, receiving a standing ovation for nine high Cs. The third competition in 1989 again staged performances of L'elisir d'amore
and Un ballo in maschera''. The winners of the fifth competition accompanied Pavarotti in performances in
Philadelphia in 1997. In the mid-1980s, Pavarotti returned to two opera houses that had provided him with important breakthroughs, the
Vienna State Opera and
La Scala. Vienna saw Pavarotti as Rodolfo in
La bohème with
Carlos Kleiber conducting and again Mirella Freni was Mimi; as Nemorino in ''L'elisir d'amore
; as Radames in Aida
conducted by Lorin Maazel; as Rodolfo in Luisa Miller
; and as Gustavo in Un ballo in maschera
conducted by Claudio Abbado. In 1996, Pavarotti appeared for the last time at the Staatsoper in Andrea Chénier''. Throughout the 1980s and 90s, promoters
Tibor Rudas and
Harvey Goldsmith booked Pavarotti into increasingly larger venues. and
Zucchero on the first edition of
Pavarotti & Friends (1992) In 1985, Pavarotti sang Radames at La Scala opposite Maria Chiara in a Luca Ronconi production conducted by Maazel, recorded on video. His performance of the aria "Celeste Aida" received a two-minute ovation on the opening night. He was reunited with Mirella Freni for the San Francisco Opera production of
La bohème in 1988, also recorded on video. In 1992, La Scala saw Pavarotti in a new Zeffirelli production of
Don Carlos, conducted by Riccardo Muti. Pavarotti became even better known throughout the world in 1990 when his rendition of the aria "
Nessun dorma" from
Giacomo Puccini's
Turandot was taken as the theme song of
BBC's coverage of the
1990 FIFA World Cup in Italy. The aria achieved pop status, became the World Cup soundtrack, and it remained his trademark song. This was followed by the first
Three Tenors concert, held on the eve of the
1990 FIFA World Cup Final at the ancient
Baths of Caracalla in Rome with fellow tenors
Plácido Domingo and
José Carreras and conductor
Zubin Mehta. The performance for the World Cup closing concert captivated a global audience, and it became the biggest-selling classical record of all time. A highlight of the concert, in which Pavarotti sang the opening verses using extended vocal runs for di Capua's "
'O sole mio" and which was in turn perfectly repeated note-for-note by Domingo and Carreras. The recorded album sold millions of copies, and the
first Three Tenors recording became the best-selling classical album of all time. Throughout the 1990s, Pavarotti appeared in outdoor concerts,
including his televised concert in London's
Hyde Park, which drew a record attendance of 150,000. In June 1993, more than 500,000 listeners gathered for his free performance on the Great Lawn of New York's
Central Park, while millions more around the world watched on television. The following September, in the shadow of the
Eiffel Tower in Paris, he sang for an estimated crowd of 300,000. Following on from the original 1990 concert, the Three Tenors concerts were held during the three subsequent
FIFA World Cup Finals, in 1994 in Los Angeles, 1998 in Paris, and 2002 in Yokohama. and Pavarotti in Modena, 1996 In September 1995, Pavarotti performed Schubert's
Ave Maria along with
Dolores O'Riordan;
Diana, Princess of Wales, who attended the live performance, told O'Riordan that the song brought her to tears. In 1995, Pavarotti's friends, the singer
Lara Saint Paul (as Lara Cariaggi) and her husband showman Pier Quinto Cariaggi, who had produced and organised Pavarotti's 1990 FIFA World Cup Celebration Concert at the
PalaTrussardi in Milan, produced and wrote the television documentary
The Best is Yet to Come, an extensive biography about the life of Pavarotti. Lara Saint Paul was the interviewer for the documentary with Pavarotti, who spoke candidly about his life and career. This was brought into focus in 1989 when
Ardis Krainik of the
Lyric Opera of Chicago severed the house's 15-year relationship with the tenor. Over an eight-year period, Pavarotti had cancelled 26 out of 41 scheduled appearances at the Lyric, and the decisive move by Krainik to ban him for life was well noted throughout the opera world, after the performer walked away from a season premiere less than two weeks before rehearsals began, saying pain from a sciatic nerve required two months of treatment. On 12 December 1998, he became the first (and, to date, only) opera singer to perform on
Saturday Night Live, singing alongside
Vanessa L. Williams. He also sang with
U2 in the band's 1995 song "
Miss Sarajevo" and with
Mercedes Sosa in a big concert at the
Boca Juniors arena
La Bombonera in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in 1999. In 1998, Pavarotti was presented with the
Grammy Legend Award.
Career: Early 2000s in
Marseille In 2001, Pavarotti was acquitted in an Italian court of a dispute concerning his official country of residency and taxable earnings. Pavarotti long claimed
Monte Carlo in the
tax haven of
Monaco as his official residence, but an Italian court in 1999 had rejected that claim by ruling that his Monaco address could not accommodate his entire family. In 2000 Pavarotti agreed to pay the Italian government more than $7.6 million in back taxes and penalties as a result of tax evasion charges that dated from 1989 to 1995. Pavarotti was subsequently fully acquitted by an Italian court of filing false tax returns in 2001. In late 2003, he released his final compilation—and his first and only "crossover" album,
Ti Adoro. Most of the 13 songs were written and produced by Michele Centonze, who had already helped produce the "Pavarotti & Friends" concerts between 1998 and 2000. The tenor described the album as a wedding gift to Nicoletta Mantovani. That same year he was made a Commander of Monaco's
Order of Cultural Merit. In 2004, one of Pavarotti's former managers,
Herbert Breslin, published a book,
The King & I. His awards and honours include
Kennedy Center Honors in 2001. He also holds two
Guinness World Records: one for receiving the most
curtain calls (165) and another for the best-selling
classical album (
Carreras Domingo Pavarotti in Concert by
the Three Tenors; the latter record is thus shared by fellow tenors
Plácido Domingo and
José Carreras).
Final performances and health issues Pavarotti began his farewell tour in 2004, at the age of 69, performing one last time in old and new locations, after more than four decades on the stage. On 13 March 2004, Pavarotti gave his last performance in an opera at the
New York Metropolitan Opera, for which he received a long standing ovation for his role as the painter Mario Cavaradossi in
Giacomo Puccini's
Tosca. On 1 December 2004, he announced a 40-city farewell tour. Pavarotti and his manager, Terri Robson, commissioned impresario
Harvey Goldsmith to produce the Worldwide Farewell Tour. His last full-scale performance was at the end of a two-month
Australasian tour in Taiwan in December 2005. In March 2005, Pavarotti underwent neck surgery to repair two
vertebrae. In early 2006, he underwent further back surgery and contracted an infection while in the hospital in New York, forcing cancellation of concerts in the US, Canada, and the UK. On 10 February 2006, Pavarotti performed "
Nessun dorma" at the
2006 Winter Olympics opening ceremony in
Turin, Italy, at his final performance. In the last act of the opening ceremony, his performance received the longest and loudest ovation of the night from the international crowd. Leone Magiera, who directed the performance, revealed in his 2008 memoirs,
Pavarotti Visto da Vicino, that the performance had been recorded weeks earlier. "The orchestra pretended to play for the audience, I pretended to conduct and Luciano pretended to sing. The effect was wonderful", he wrote. Pavarotti's manager, Terri Robson, said that the tenor had turned the Winter Olympic Committee's invitation down several times because it would have been impossible to sing late at night in the subzero conditions of Turin in February. The committee eventually persuaded him to take part by prerecording the song.
Death While proceeding with an international "
farewell tour", Pavarotti was diagnosed with
pancreatic cancer in July 2006. He sought treatment following this diagnosis, undergoing major abdominal surgery and making plans for the resumption and conclusion of his singing commitments, but he died at his home in Modena on 6 September 2007. After his death, his manager, Terri Robson, noted in a statement, "The Maestro fought a long, tough battle against the pancreatic cancer which eventually took his life. In fitting with the approach that characterised his life and work, he remained positive until finally succumbing to the last stages of his illness". Pavarotti's funeral was held at
Modena Cathedral. The then Prime Minister
Romano Prodi and
Kofi Annan attended. The
Frecce Tricolori, the aerobatic demonstration team of the
Italian Air Force, flew overhead, leaving green-white-red smoke trails. After a funeral procession through the centre of Modena, Pavarotti's coffin was taken the final to Montale Rangone, a village part of
Castelnuovo Rangone, and was interred in the Pavarotti family crypt. The funeral, in its entirety, was also telecast live on
CNN. The
Vienna State Opera and the
Salzburg Festival Hall flew black flags in mourning. Tributes were published by many opera houses, such as London's
Royal Opera House. ==Other work==