PAVAROTTI – Tribute documentary to feature rare footage, peak performances and dozens of new interviews, by Academy Award® winning Ron Howard
In cinemas 27 September 2019
Following on the success of recent box office record-breaking tribute feature films, Gravel Road Distribution Group, have announced the release of Pavarotti, the tribute documentary film. South African’s can look forward to experiencing the true splendour of Pavarotti’s career in cinemas nationwide from 27 September 2019.
“I want to reach as many people as possible with the message of music, of wonderful opera,” said Luciano Pavarotti. His wish evident, when looking back on a career stretching over 40 years, with more than a 100 Million albums sold.
Discotheque website, Discogs.com, reports that Pavarotti released 296 albums, 46 singles and EP’s and featured on 362 compilation albums. These facts together with a look at the life, career and lasting legacy of the musical icon, dubbed “The people’s tenor,” are all appreciated in this documentary.
“For me, music making is the most joyful activity possible, the most perfect expression of any emotion,” said Pavarotti, years after he abandoned his own childhood dreams of being a football goalkeeper. Growing up in a family of little means, his father’s fine tenor voice recordings, were his first and earliest musical influences.
Born in 1935 near Modena in Northern Italy, Luciano Pavarotti embarked on music studies in 1954, at the age of 19. The year after, his success story started to take shape, when, alongside his father, he joined the male choir, Corale Rossini, winning first place when they competed in that year’s International Eisteddfod in Llangollen, Wales.
Pavarotti slowly built a world acclaimed resume, with his debut operatic role as Rodolfo in the Teatro Reggio Emila’s production of La Boheme in 1961, followed by his American debut in the Miami production of Lucia di Lammermoor, in 1965. That year he formed one of his shaping partnerships with Joan Sutherland, an Australian Soprano. It was however only in 1972, during a production of La Fille du Regiment at the Metropolitan Opera in New York, when his major breakthrough came, with the delivery of nine effortless high C’s in the famous area, leading up to a record seventeen curtain calls, and the Title of the ‘King of the High C’s’. Even Pavarotti admitted: “Am I afraid of high notes? Of course I am afraid. What sane man is not?”
In 1980, Pavarotti appeared in Rigoletto, singing the role of the duke, to more than 200 000 people in Central Park. The same year, he won the Grammy Award for his album, O Sole Mio. The remainder of the 1980’s saw Pavarotti travelling the world with success in China with La Boheme, as well as in the role of Radames in Aida, before opening the opera season of the Metropolitan Opera with II Trovatore, collaborating with Eva Marton and Shirrill Milnes.
In 1990, he performed Puccini’s Nessun Dorma during the FIFA Soccer World Cup in Italy, which had been chosen to be the BBC’s coverage anthem for the tournament. This aria out of the operatic piece, Turandot, achieved pop status after Pavarotti’s rendition, and along with that year’s world cup soundtrack, remained the man’s trademark song.
More defining milestones were crafted in history, when the album, The Essential Pavarotti, became the first classical album to reach number 1 on the UK Top Charts for five consecutive periods. It was during this period that Pavarotti’s career entered its new era, which was focused less on opera, and more on collaboration with commercial artists and live performances.
Contributing to this success, Pavarotti joined Jose Carreras and Placido Domingo, as part of the infamous The Three Tenors, who sold more than a million copies of the 1991 Best Classical Vocal Performance Grammy Award winning: The Three Tenors in Concert.
Luciano Pavarotti’s record label since 1967, Polygram’s Decca Records, extended his contract in 1994, after already having sold more than 50 million albums. This partnership ensured more collaborations were within Pavarotti’s vision, with the ultimate cause, being more than just music.
It was between 1992 and 2003, when Pavarotti’s humanitarian side became just as influential a part of his story, as his music. As a member of the Red Cross, he worked for the improved circumstances of refugees and served at various other philanthropic organizations, where he continued to build the very famous, 10-series annual charity concerts, Pavarotti and Friends, raising millions of dollars for the intended charities, including the international Aid Agency, War child, and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. One tremendous achievement of Pavarotti’s humanitarian endeavours, would most probably be the benefit concert he organized in 1995 for the children of Bosnia, which included collaborations with Michael Bolton and U2’s Bono.
Pavarotti became well loved for his Pavarotti and Friends collaborations. The series saw duets with pop stars like Queen, Bryan Adams, Jon Bon Jovi and George Michael to name only a few. Besides these “Classical meets Pop” numbers, Pavarotti stayed true to his art, with the inclusion of classical duets, with the likes of Soprano Nancy Gustafson, the tenor Andrea Bocelli, as well as new age artist, Andreas Vollenwieder. The execution of the Pavarotti and Friends series, where a successful classical opera singer was performing pop songs with main-stream pop artists ranging from Ricky Martin, James Brown and even the Spice Girls, came with some criticism at the time, but this did nothing to hamper its success.
In 1998, Pavarotti was appointed as the United Nations Messenger of Peace. In 2001 he was awarded with the Nansen Medal from the UN High Commission for Refugees.
Much was said about Pavarotti’s career. In 1995 after the release of Pavarotti’s biography, Michael Walsh wrote in his New York article: “With stadium concerts, TV specials, and a chatty new autobiography, Pavarotti is bigger—way bigger—than opera itself.” Furthermore, in the Opera News, 1997, Terry Teachout said: “The remarkable thing about Pavarotti, of course is not merely that he is still singing, but that his essential vocal qualities remain, for the most part, intact.”
It as more towards the end that Pavarotti himself commented on most of his work: “I am always a student till the last day of my profession, when perhaps I will think [I know] what I am. But now, that is not my character. My character is to take life as it is. The mutual love I have with the public is everywhere. But I am ready to accept this situation when the public will not love me. Then, I will stop.”
Pavarotti’s successful and most influential career, saw his final appearance during the 2006 Winter Olympics opening ceremony in Turin, Italy, when he once again performed his trademark area, Nessun Dorma, which recorded the longest and loudest ovation from an international crowed. This man known for have changing the world while changing the world of music, died in 2007 of Kidney failure after a long battle with pancreatic cancer. He was survived by his two wives, four daughters and one grandchild.
At the time of his death, Pavarotti was the best-selling classical artist in history, as the Guinness World Record holder for receiving the most curtain calls of 165. Posthumously, he received the Italy-USA Foundation’s America award in 2013 as well as the Brit Award for Outstanding Contribution to Music in 2014.
PAVAROTTI, the Tribute documentary is set to feature rare footage, peak performances and dozens of new interviews, by Academy Award® winning Ron Howard.
PAVAROTTI, the film will open in South African cinemas nationwide on 27 September 2019. Check cinema listings for details for bookings.
