Word: pavarotti
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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With his extra measure of Ponselle's "certain something," Pavarotti occupies a unique position among the tenors of today. Placido Domingo, 38, his nearest rival, has a superbly smooth, rich voice and a wider range of roles?he sings the weighty Othello as well as bel canto parts?but he sometimes loses impact because of a veiled timbre and somewhat muted personality. Jon Vickers, 52, can match Pavarotti's intensity and puts more serious thought behind his performing, but his is an entirely different kind of voice: rugged, heroic, best suited to dramatic works such as Otello, Les Troyens...
...Pavarotti, reaching a top note brings on a mystical feeling such as a champion high-jumper might experience. "That second when you clear the bar in mid-air you lose consciousness," he says. "It is something physical, animal, beyond control. A moment later you are back on the ground and in full control." The haunting, universal fear that some day he will jump and miss?"that I shall open my mouth and no sound will come out" ?gives Pavarotti the whim-whams before every performance. In 1972 he made a transatlantic call to Beverly Sills about their upcoming appearance...
...performance and, if so, for how long. Most tenors seem to feel that two or three days of abstinence builds their strength. Several leading men in the 1940s, the story goes, were sabotaged by a shapely U.S. soprano who seduced them just before the curtain.) The only supernatural aid Pavarotti enlists to get himself onstage is a bent nail in his pocket, a traditional talisman of Italian singers. Fans, aware of this quirk, send inm nails by the dozens, sometimes silver or gold, dangling from chains or fasinoned into pins. But Pavarotti will use only an authentic nail from...
Tensions and insecurities may have something to do with Pavarotti's gourmandizing too, quite beyond his sensual gusto and need to replenish himself. After a hard evening onstage, he has been known to put away a lobster dinner followed by a steak dinner and an entire basket of rolls, and then to dive for leftovers on his companion's plate. Lambrusco, the slightly fizzy red wine of his native region, does not travel well, according to his palate. When on tour, Pavarotti orders bottles of Mouton-Cadet 1975, say, mixes them with bottles of Perrier water and?ecco!?instant...
...diet. He is currently forbidden to drink wine, and his most opulent meal is zuchini, rice and 250 grams (about half a pound) of meat or fish cooked with a few drops of oil. More tragic than any scene he plays onstage is the sight of a dieting Pavarotti at a dinner party, surrounded by gorging guests as he disconsolately sips soda water or diet cola...