Italian opera phenomenon Andrea Bocelli comes to Denver’s Pepsi Center Wednesay, appearing with the Colorado Symphony Orchestra. We couldn’t resist the invitation to throw a few questions his way, about romance, the voice that has sold 80 million records worldwide, and his very passionate take on life. He answered via e-mail.
Denver Post: Are you as romantic a guy as you sound on record?
Bocelli: I think I am the least likely to answer; perhaps it would be better to ask my companion Veronica! I can confirm that I love breathing life to the fullest, that I love and I am interested in poetry, and that I am interested in all that surrounds me.
They say I am a passionate man. In fact, passion is one face of love, and love is the engine of the world.
Q: If we came looking for you one hour before a performance, where would we find you?
A: Singers are also athletes. Just like an athlete before the race, I need to concentrate to the maximum holding-off of trepidation. An hour before, I am surely in my dressing room, but the whole day of the exhibition, I try to spend my time in isolation and I observe a strict silence, putting into practice what my great master, Franco Corelli, indicated as an essential precaution for a singer before his performance.
Q: If there were only one piece of music in the world, one song or aria, which one would you want it to be?
A: I think I would choose “My Way,” a perfect song under all points of view, whose melody remains engraved in your soul, a song which arouses a powerful identifying process, able to give everybody the impression that the song is talking of them. More, that it is their inner voice.
As for the opera repertoire, I would be much more undecided, but as I have to play the game, I would choose “Un dì all’azzurro spazio” from the opera “Andrea Chénier,” by Umberto Giordano, because it has a great importance in my training path, that led me to pursue a career as a tenor.
Q: Americans are fascinated with Italians, especially Italian singers. Why do you think that’s true? What does it mean to be an Italian singer?
A: Each stereotype, positive or negative, shows the weakness of a generalization that does not physiologically correspond to reality: It is not sufficient to be Italian to sing well! But it is undeniable that in opera, diction is fundamental, and that words flourish through singing. The fact of being native speakers can objectively help in catching the most intimate sense of the sentences, and in performing in a convincing manner, the characters of the great works by Verdi, Puccini, Mascagni and many others.
Q: What can those at your concert expect?
A: A name will strongly emerge in the first part of the concert, that of Giuseppe Verdi, a composer (whose birth bicentenary we are celebrating this year) who, like nobody else, has been able to tell in music human passions. ..The second part of the concert will be dedicated to the pop classics of the album “Passione.”
Read more of the interview:
Andrea Bocelli performs at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday at the Pepsi Center, 1000 Chopper Circle. Tickets are $75-$350. 303-534-6773 or .
