Joseph Talia
At age 25, after six years of intense study, Luciano Pavarotti found himself in utter despair. His voice had just faltered under the pressure of an international competition. He felt his singing had deserted him, believing that he would never achieve the status of the great tenor he aspired to be.Thirty-three years later, he conquered the citadels of opera and sang to over 500,000 people in New York’s Central Park, with millions more watching the televised event worldwide. He had finally achieved his dream. Pavarotti’s professional success, a journey enriched by social, educational, and cultural experiences that fuelled his ambition and refined his craft, offers a wealth of practical lessons for today’s aspiring singers.In this remarkable book, accomplished conductor, director, and voice teacher Joseph Talia presents not only an insight into Pavarotti’s life but also a comprehensive analysis and critique of Pavarotti’s entire singing career. He reveals that success in opera demands more than just a great voice. It requires training, determination, intelligence, practice, and endurance. Operatic singing is assessed by criteria such as breathing technique, resonance balancing, register blending, and vocal quality. It calls for different voice types, temperaments, psychology, and operatic styles across varying musical and dramatic performances. Talia himself has a repertoire of over 50 major tenor roles. He brings his talent, passion and love for the melodrama that is opera to the first detailed analysis of the artistic and technical development of Luciano Pavarotti. In this intricate telling of Pavarotti’s life and singing performances, informed by exhaustive research and personal interviews with his widow and close colleagues, Talia examines Pavarotti’s professional experience and his adherence to the Italian School of voice training. Informed by contemporary scientific knowledge on the anatomy and physiology of singing, Talia shows us how Pavarotti’s singing matured over his years of dedication and learning, leading to his success.
