Herbert Breslin - The King and I: The Uncensored Tale of Luciano Pavarottis Rise to Fame by His Manager, Friend and Sometime Adversary

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Breslin, Herbert H.

The king and I : the uncensored tale of Luciano Pavarottis rise to fame by his
manager, friend, and sometime adversary / by Herbert Breslin and
Anne Midgette.1st ed.p. cm.
1. Pavarotti, Luciano. 2. Breslin, Herbert H. 3. Tenors (Singers)Biography.
I. Midgette, Anne. II. Title.

ML420.P35B74 2004
782.192dc22
[B]
2004045508

eISBN: 978-0-385-51414-9

Copyright 2004 by Herbert Breslin and Anne Midgette

All Rights Reserved

v3.1

F OR THE F AMILY

THE BRESLINS
C AROL , E RIC , C LEMENTINE , C AMERON

THE JAFFES
A NDREA , T OBY , A LEXANDER , I SABELLE

Herbert Breslin on Luciano Pavarotti

H es been called the worlds greatest tenor, the King of the High Cs, one of the twenty-five most recognizable people on earth. I call him Signor Cervello. Mr. Brain.

Luciano Pavarotti, you see, is one of the worlds leading experts on everything. He knows more about music, medicine, dentistry, the prostate, child care, legal matters, and so on and so forth than anyone else alive. The rest of us are mere incompetents. At least, thats how he sees it.

The fish in Pesaro are the best in the world, hell say. It doesnt matter if hes talking to someone from the North Sea, who might reasonably beg to differ. Pesaro has the best fish. Thats that.

Got a medical problem? Only Luciano knows what doctor you should go to. But when you do go to the doctor, dont listen to him. Luciano knows much better than the doctor what medicine you should take.

I say, Oh, Signor Cervello, excuse the rest of us for being so ignorant.

He calls me stupido. But thats not a special accolade. He calls everyone that.

Who am I? Call me Herbert, or Herbertino, as Luciano does when hes feeling more affectionatewhich is, these days, not often. If youre not in the classical music business, you may not have heard of me. People in my line of workartist management and publicitydont always get a share of the limelight. Its our business to stay behind the scenes and create limelight for other people. Were the movers and shakers, the people who make things happen, but not necessarily the people to whom things happen. At least, not from the publics perspective.

If you are in the business, you may have heard terrible things about me. Im supposed to be brash, rude, mercurial, ruthless, money hungry. I squeeze people for every penny I can get out of them, throw terrible screaming tantrums, send devastating one-line put-downs to business associates through the fax machine. For all I know, I eat babies for dinner. When youre successful, people say all kinds of things about you.

Well, screw them. Let them talk. For your purposes, all you really need to know about me is that Im one of the best managers and publicists in the business. Nobody knows classical music, and the business of classical music, better than I do. If I do say so myself.

You want proof? I guided Luciano Pavarottis career, the greatest career in classical music, for thirty-six years. Never mind the dozens of other major artists I advised, steered, and counseled: that alone should be enough to make my point. Not many opera singers penetrate to the consciousness of the general public. Most big celebrities have movie studios or networks behind them, with armies of employees pounding away at promotion and public relations. Luciano, at the beginning, had none of that. He had me.

When Luciano and I started together, I was a simple publicist who had never managed an artists career and he was a promising young tenor from Italy. I had done publicity for a number of important artists and he had appeared in some major opera houses. I met this young, eager, warm singer, and I believed he had the potential to be something huge. So did he. Neither one of us could have imagined where it would lead.

But I did see that this was somebody who could transcend the limits of the opera world. And I acted accordingly. I got him out of the opera house and into the concert hall. I kept him in front of the public with one performance, one event, one first after another. First U.S. recital, first Live from the Met broadcast, first solo recital from the Metropolitan Opera stage, first American Express commercial, first solo concert in a 20,000-seat arena. When Luciano first came along, sopranos ruled the opera world: Callas, Tebaldi, Sutherland. I shifted the attention of the opera world from rampant diva-dom to a tenor. Then I brought that tenor out of the opera house and into the arms of an enormous mass public. Those were my ideas. Nobody else had ideas like that. And Luciano was very happy to go along with them. Together, we changed the landscape of opera.