Tenor Inspires Love-Hate Relationship

Tenor Andrea Bocelli tends to polarize people.

He’s either “one of the great Italian tenors of all time” or “an overreaching-prepackaged commodity who has inexplicably captured worldwide acclaim, mostly undeserved,” writes Steve Metcalf, music critic for the Hartford Courant.

“Bocelli is the tenor opera snobs love to hate, but the opera snobs are wrong,” writes Richard Dyer, music critic for the Boston Globe. “The microphone loves Bocelli’s voice, but it cannot invent his musicianship, his diction, his phrasing and breath control, his identification with the material, and his emotion.”

Fans of that musicianship will flock to his performances today at Staples Center in Los Angeles and Saturday at Arrowhead Pond in Anaheim to hear him sing from his new recording, “Cieli di Toscana.”

“Learning a song is nothing, really,” Bocelli said through an interpreter after a recent recording session in London. “It’s an easy task. The task that is more considerable is coming to grips with an opera. That is the real work.”

Bocelli has been devoted to opera since childhood.

Drawn to music as a child, he started piano lessons at age 6, then added flute and saxophone as he grew older. He also won several singing competitions as a youngster.

Still, given his affliction, a career in opera didn’t seem possible. (He was born with glaucoma in 1958 and went completely blind at age 12 after a soccer accident caused a brain hemorrhage.) So he went to college and took a degree in law at the University of Pisa--he had grown up on a farm in Laiatico, Pisa, in rural Tuscany.

He worked for a brief time as a court-appointed defense attorney, but he gave up that profession after he took a master class from retired operatic tenor Franco Corelli, whose career included stints in the world’s major opera houses and appearances with stars such as Renata Tebaldi, Birgit Nilsson, Montserrat Caballe and Leontyne Price. Bocelli continued to study with Corelli, paying for his lessons by singing in bars.

He was discovered by Italian rock star Zucchero (Fornaciari) in 1992 when he needed a tenor for a new duet, “Miserere.” Zucchero signed him to his tour, and recordings quickly followed.

His albums--from “Il Mare Camo Della Sera” to “Romanza,” “Sueno” and “Viaggio Italiano,” among others--have sold more than 20 million copies worldwide. He has sung duets and appeared on television with pop divas Sarah Brightman and Celine Dion.

Still, opera was never far from his mind. He recently recorded a CD of Verdi arias (with Zubin Mehta conducting the Israeli Philharmonic), which has made it onto the pop charts, selling 557,000 copies. His first opera recording, of Puccini’s “La Boheme,” sold 37,000 copies.

At his American operatic debut in October 1999 at the Michigan Opera Theatre in Detroit, he sang the role of the hero of Massenet’s “Werther,” entering astride a white horse to dispel doubts about his ability to move around on stage.

Critics praised such aspects of his performance but generally demolished his singing for being thin and strained without its usual electronic enhancement.

“Brave and not without a certain charm, but essentially inadequate to the task and ultimately boring,” wrote Lawrence B. Johnson in the Detroit News.

“I was surely not the only critic surprised by the extent of Mr. Bocelli’s vocal deficiencies for opera,” wrote Anthony Tommasini in the New York Times. “Even many of his fans in the house seemed shaken.”

Later, Bocelli uncharacteristically exploded at the critics. “Those reviews were not really appropriate,” he told Barbara Zuck of the Columbus Dispatch. “What they wrote was not what really happened onstage. It made me wonder if some of the journalists were actually in the theater at all.”

To his credit, Bocelli rejected the idea of amplifying his voice in Detroit. “Opera was born without the microphone,” he told Lawrence A. Johnson, in an interview for the Sun-Sentinel in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. “We can use a microphone outside the theater on a big screen for video. But inside, I think opera has to be done absolutely without microphones or amplification.”

Still, a projected “La Boheme” at Houston Grand Opera didn’t materialize. But a staging of Mascagni’s “L’Amico Fritz” in Verona, Italy, went well. He also has appeared several times as Rodolfo in Puccini’s “La Boheme” in Sardinia and in Lehar’s “The Merry Widow” at the Verona Festival.

Bocelli Is Preparing

for More Operas

Despite the critics’ dismissals, opera is more important to him than ever.

“Yes, of course, there will be more opera,” Bocelli said. “I am studying [Verdi’s] ‘Ballo in Maschera’ and ‘Aida.’ And [Puccini’s] ‘Madama Butterfly.’ ‘Aida’ is for a recording, and the other two are for performances. ‘Butterfly’ takes place in July or August. ‘Ballo’ in October. ‘Butterfly’ will be in Italy. ‘Ballo’ in Belgrade. We’re not allowed to tell where or when yet.”

He also just finished recording sessions of Verdi’s “Il Trovatore” and Puccini’s “Tosca” and plans no more pop recordings until he finishes an album of “Arie Antiche” with Lorin Maazel.

He prefers recordings to live performances.

“Firstly, because they last, they’re durable. And secondly, I’ve always suffered terrible stage fright. No, it hasn’t gotten better with success. In fact, it’s increased, as has the sense of responsibility.

“But opera has always been my greatest interest. Now there are more opportunities.”

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Andrea Bocelli will sing songs from his new album, “Cieli di Toscana” today at 8 p.m. at Staples Center, 1111 S. Figueroa St., L.A. $85 to $400. (213) 742-7340. Also Saturday at 8 p.m. at the Arrowhead Pond, 2695 E. Katella Ave., Anaheim. $85 to $500. (714) 704-2500.