Tenor Andrea Bocelli Celebrates Valentine’s Day With Omaha Debut February 6
After 30 years, it's not often that Andrea Bocelli performs in a new city, but that will be the case when he takes the stage at CHI Health Center Omaha Feb. 6.
The Italian tenor looks forward to performing before a new crowd for a Valentine’s Day-themed concert.
"It’s a musical performance that means a lot to me, also because it takes place in the heart of a great, extraordinary land that I call my second home," Bocelli said. "I hope to live up to the expectations. What I wish most is to give back to those gracious enough to come to my concert (is) a bit of positivity and faith in the future. I strongly believe in the therapeutic power of music, the quintessential universal language. Art softens the spirit and makes it flourish.
"If the audience in Omaha leaves the concert a bit more serene, possibly with smiles on their faces, then I will have fulfilled my purpose."
Bocelli's interview with Omaha Daily Record was conducted via e-mail with the assistance of his English translator.
Having recorded 15 albums during his career, Bocelli's latest - "Duet" - united him with several pop performers, including Shania Twain, Sofia Carson and Jon Batiste. They join a growing list of favorites with whom he's recorded, Bocelli said.
"The duet has always been an artistic challenge that has intrigued and gratified me," he said. "I am thus particularly happy about this latest recording project, because it documents my entire career, reflected in the voices of many marvelous artists, who’ve accompanied me along my journey, from Ed Sheeran to Céline Dion, from Stevie Wonder to Jennifer Lopez, from Sarah Brightman to Dua Lipa…"
He appreciates the opportunity to sing with others, Bocelli said.
"Putting together two voices is a challenge, a wager, a meeting of souls," he said. "Even more intensely when it’s two artists of a different generation. I have learned something from all, and a great deal from a few. To me, dueting entails having two different sensibilities meet and harmonizing them, with the goal of obtaining an artistic result that multiplies emotions."
However, Bocelli performing with his children is even more special, he said.
"I find it hard to describe the intense joy I feel when I am on stage with my children (and thus, feeling “at home”), singing around a microphone and in front of our ‘extended family’ that is the audience," Bocelli said. "To be able to sing with Matteo, as well as with Virginia, I consider it an enormous gift that life has granted me.
"Even with my first son, Amos, today an engineer, but also a musician who graduated from the conservatory in piano, we have had many opportunities to be on stage together. Virginia, now an adolescent, has many talents. But it’s Matteo who is currently, for all intents and purposes, a colleague."
Fans attending the Omaha concert should expect to experience a musical history of Bocelli's career, he said.
"It follows a tried-and-true formula that is by now a signature line-up that characterizes my live concerts. The first part will feature well-known and loved opera pieces, followed by a second part dedicated to romance and contemporary songs," Bocelli said. "For the latter, we have prepared a broad and diversified program, thanks to the guests who will be enriching the concert with their voices, instruments and dance. There will also be a few surprises, together with songs that the audience associates with me and expects to hear…which will be a joy and honor for me to perform."
Seeking to convey a sense of love with each song he performs, one of his favorite "classics" to sing is "Time to Say Goodbye,” which launched his international career, Bocelli said.
"To interpret a song, to give it meaning, I must first fall in love with it," he said. "I, myself, must feel touched by it to then be able to be credible and transmit those emotions to the audience. That is the only way in which music can deeply connect with my feelings. If that doesn’t happen, I usually avoid singing it, because it wouldn’t sound very credible. So, the most honest answer is that all of the songs in my repertory reflect that peculiarity; they’re music that touched my heart."
Singing since childhood, he was listening to some of the greatest operatic voices by the age of seven, Bocelli said.
"I knew many arias by heart, and I would sing them to the top of my lungs – competing, in my living room, with my record player," he said. "As a teenager, regularly receiving requests to sing – initially from my relatives, then from friends and ultimately from an audience at my first small concerts – I started to think that I could turn my greatest passion into a profession."
Knowing it was difficult for someone with his background to break into music, Bocelli said he was determined to succeed.
"...for a young guy like me brought up in the countryside, without any connections to the entertainment industry, (it) was considered pure fantasy, destined to remain as such," he said. "In the end, reality went beyond my every wildest dream."
He appreciates the opportunity to have enjoyed a career over something about which he's felt passionate, Bocelli said. "In general, I think the secret to a tranquil life is not so much doing what one loves but loving what one does," he said. "But I must admit that not a day goes by without me thinking about the privilege, the joy that it has been - and still is - to be able to dedicate myself, through work, to my greatest passion that is music and song." Knowing he's lived a charmed life, Bocelli still enjoys walking on to a stage to share his music, he said.
"The fact that I have a public following me with so much affection and kindness is the main reason that I still find the strength at my age to cross oceans and repeatedly take to the stage," said Bocelli, 66. "My life is like a fairy tale with a happy ending that tells the story of a young man that dreamed about offering his voice to all those looking for peace and joy in music. It has been and continues to be an extraordinary adventure, for which I will never cease to be grateful, to God and to my fellow humans.
"If my life story can leave a message, I would summarize it as proof that no dream is impossible. What’s important is to believe in it, and to pursue your life’s project with honesty, humility, discipline and enthusiasm."
The passion he feels for music resonates with people, Bocelli said.
"The good Lord has loaned me an instrument that enables me to express what I feel," he said. "My only merit, if it can be called that, lies in my always trying to honor this talent, with discipline and perseverance. Probably through song, I am able to touch peoples’ hearts. I am honored and proud to be able to offer my voice to all those who look to music for emotions or relief from the hardships of everyday life."
Tickets for the Feb. 6th concert can be purchased at ticketmaster.com.
Tim Trudell is a freelance writer and online content creator. His work has appeared in Flatwater Free Press, Next Avenue, Indian Country Today, Nebraska Life, Nebraska Magazine, Council Bluffs Daily Non-Pareil and Douglas County Post Gazette, among others. He is a citizen of the Santee Dakota Nation.
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