“Soulful” … “soaring” … “transcendent” … any selection of adjectives cannot really explain the voice of Andrea Bocelli. There’s a purpose the tenor has marketed far more than 80 million albums. And there’s not just one Bocelli who sings. There’s his daughter, Virginia, and his son, Matteo. And now, for the first time, they’ve recorded an album jointly for Xmas.
Andrea Bocelli, Matteo Bocelli and Virginia Bocelli complete “The Best Gift”:
Correspondent Seth Doane met the Bocellis at dwelling as they were accomplishing a photo shoot for the cover.
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Doane questioned, “Why did you want to do a Christmas album alongside one another?”
“I believe it’s an amazing possibility,” Andrea replied, “mainly because we can devote time jointly. It truly is a privilege, I think.”
It can be a privilege the youngsters have grown up with. Not each budding musician will get to accompany a earth-famed tenor on the piano. Matteo mentioned, “As you can imagine, due to the fact I was in my mom’s tummy, I was listening to songs. You just imagine, I signify, I bought to do it as perfectly if I love it, but maybe I have to specific myself to absolutely everyone when I feel much more protected of myself.”
Virginia additional, “That’s the exact for me. Due to the fact at times I’m shy, like, singing with my dad.”
“Not now?” Andrea smiled. “It really is completed?”
“You’re even now a small nervous even now?” asked Doane.
“Yeah,” she stated. “Simply because, you know, like, he’s really excellent!”
He is pretty fantastic – one particular of the bestselling classical tunes artists of all time.
At lunch, we met the rest of his family: eldest son, Amos, an aerospace engineer and Andrea’s wife, Veronica Berti, who manages a lot of his vocation, and their charity endeavours: a foundation in Italy, and tunes system in Haiti.
They toasted: “Merry Xmas in July!”
Indeed, we achieved in July. Outdoors, it was a seaside working day in this ritzy town on the Tuscan coast the place the Bocellis have a dwelling. It was dressed up for Xmas for the cover shoot, and in-amongst can take we retained viewing Andrea Bocelli gravitate toward his instruments. “For the reason that songs is portion of my existence,” he reported. “I realized that my future was tunes due to the fact, since when I was a little one, when arrived in my house the kinfolk, good friends, everyone asked me to sing. ‘Sing a thing for us!'”
And it is really nonetheless that way, but now he is singing for presidents, popes and queens. And throughout Italy’s COVID lockdown, he sang for the world at Milan’s empty cathedral.
But singing was not his primary occupation route. Bocelli, who dropped his sight as a boy, experienced been studying to be a attorney, putting himself by means of university by actively playing in piano bars.
“I commenced also to play the piano bar just to get some revenue, due to the fact it was significant for me to invest in my instruments, and also, over all, to meet up with some wonderful lady,” Andrea laughed.
Virginia covered her eyes. “I really should cover my ears from now on,” she claimed.
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The Italian tenor is so typically witnessed on the world’s grand levels, so it was specific to see him in this much more compact location, at house, playfully teased by his 10-calendar year-outdated.
“He listens to opera a whole lot,” Virginia stated. “So at times, like, I wake up in the morning to, like, Caruso! I am like, ‘It’s 7 in the early morning, go again to mattress!’ From time to time my dad will get disappointed due to the fact I hear to, like, pop songs, and Dad’s like, ‘What is this sound?'”
But Andrea himself has embraced pop songs, teaming up with some of the industry’s greatest stars, this kind of as Ed Sheeran …
… whilst bringing opera to new audiences.
Doane asked, “How do you understand new music?”
“I examine a whole lot,” Andrea replied.
“What are the mechanics of finding out? Is there a Braille for understanding songs?”
“Like anyone, it truly is yet another language. But the consequence is the same.”
Matteo explained, “The system of the Braille is a very little little bit different in comparison to the classical, you know.”
“It is really like to say one thing in English and in Italian,” reported Andrea. “At the conclusion, the notion is the similar.”
Bocelli will be touring the planet with Virginia and Matteo, undertaking in the U.S. starting off upcoming month. He is keen to share his spotlight. Although it presents clear pros for his kids, there is that additional pressure, according to Matteo: “Component of this remaining the son of, is that you simply cannot really make faults. I was fairly shy when I was little, so I was singing much more in entrance of my mom and less in entrance of my father. And then I experienced at 18 this stunning chance to make a duet with my father. And that’s the place I realized that this passion was a thing greater.”
They recorded “Drop On Me” collectively in 2018.
Doane asked Andrea, “You’ve sung a lot of duets with quite renowned musicians, singers. How distinct is it for you to sing with your young ones?”
“You can lie!” Virginia interrupted.
“No, it is a wholly unique knowledge,” Bocelli laughed.
Matteo reported, “I solution for him, and say that from us there is certainly nothing at all to discover. But for guaranteed there is a good link.”
We obtained to see that relationship this summer months … a passion for songs and undertaking that’s been passed down to a new technology.
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Tale generated by Mikaela Bufano. Editor: Brian Robbins.
