Italian opera star Luciano Pavarotti (71), hailed by many as the greatest tenor of his generation, died early this morning.
Italian television said yesterday that the opera legend, who had pancreatic cancer, had lost consciousness and was suffering from kidney problems at the Modena home where he had been staying following a two-week hospital stay.
Luciano Pavarotti, who died this morning, aged 71
Pavarotti died this morning, surrounded by his family, manager Terri Robson said in a statement. "The Maestro fought a long, tough battle against the pancreatic cancer which eventually took his life," the statement said.
"In fitting with the approach that characterised his life and work, he remained positive until finally succumbing to the last stages of his illness."
The singer left hospital on August 25th, more than two weeks after he was admitted with a high fever. At the time, his manager denied Italian news reports that he had been treated for pneumonia.
Pavarotti had surgery for the cancer in July 2006 in a New York hospital. At the time of the operation, he had been preparing to resume his farewell tour. He has made no public appearances since then.
His last public performance, singing Nessun Dorma, was at the opening ceremony of the Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy, in February 2006, and his last full-scale concert was in Taipei in December 2005.
Bono, who sang Miss Sarajevowith Pavarotti, today paid tribute, saying: "Some can sing opera, Luciano Pavarotti was an opera. He lived the songs, his opera was a great mash of joy and sadness; surreal and earthy at the same time; a great volcano of a man who sang fire but spilled over with a love of life in all its complexity, a great and generous friend."
The rotund tenor teamed up with Spanish stars Placido Domingo and Jose Carreras as The Three Tenors at the 1990 soccer World Cup in Italy and introduced operatic classics to an estimated 800 million people in TV coverage around the globe.
Pavarotti scoffed at accusations that he was sacrificing his art in favour of commercialism. "The word commercial is exactly what we want," he said, after appearing in the Three Tenors concerts. "We've reached 1.5 billion people with opera. If you want to use the word commercial, or something more derogatory, we don't care. Use whatever you want."
Pavarotti's big break came thanks to another Italian opera great, Giuseppe di Stefano, who dropped out of a London performance of La Bohemein 1963.
Luciano Pavarotti
Thirty years later, he was still one of the highest paid classical singers even though his public performances were fewer and further between.
Medical problems beset "Big Luciano" in the final years of his career, forcing him to cancel several dates of his marathon worldwide farewell tour.
"I have had everything in life, really everything. And if everything is taken away from me, with God we're even and quits," he said in one of his last interviews.
On the few occasions he performed in the past decade, Pavarotti was criticised for his lack of mobility. He was also criticised for dropping out of operas diva-like at the last minute and for failing to hit all the notes.
In 1992, he admitted miming to recorded music during what was supposed to be a live concert because he had not prepared. He offered to pay the BBC the full cost of the broadcast.
In 2003, Pavarotti married Nicoletta Mantovani, an assistant 34 years his junior and younger than his three daughters, after an acrimonious divorce from his wife of 37 years.
As Nicoletta was bearing twins, the pregnancy ran into complications and their son Riccardo was stillborn. Pavarotti recorded his first solo album in 15 years for his daughter Alice, calling it "Ti Adoro"( I Adore You).
His complex finances caught the tax man's attention, and in 2000 he settled a four-year dispute and paid more than $12 million in Italian back taxes.