Luciano Pavarotti - His legacy will endure and inspire

THOUGH the legacy of great creative artists assumes a permanent place in the consciousness of humanity until relatively recently the work of great performing artists died with them. They left nothing but memories.

How lucky we are then that Luciano Pavarotti’s many studio recordings, along with the recordings of his stage performances, will illustrate and confirm to generations as yet unborn what a truly great artist he was.

He brought the repertoire of the classical tenor to huge, new audiences after recording Nessun Dorma as the anthem for the soccer World Cup in Italy 17 years ago. For an all-too-brief few years he, with Plácido Domingo and José Carreras, shared the sublime beauty of the work of Verdi, Puccini and above all Donizetti with audiences who might otherwise not have had an opportunity to share in that inspirational experience.

They used their cachet and wonderful talents to proselytise and encourage people to listen to the great European classics.

Pavarotti died yesterday at his home in Modena, Italy, after a year-long battle with pancreatic cancer.

He was 71.

We can only imagine what it might be like to enjoy the performances of great musicians and singers who were at their best before recording was reliable or commonplace.

Whether you imagine Pavarotti as a fleeting coincidence of cosmic biology or a gift from a generous God we will not have to rely on memories, each growing less sure with every passing year. We can wallow in his great recordings, one of which was Puccini’s Nessun Dorma. He made this piece his own and through the gift of his recordings we can indeed, in his case, say Nessun Dorma — None Shall Sleep.