My Life Is An Opera: Alagna(T)Cassar / London O

Roberto Alagna (French pronunciation: ?[??. b??. to a. la. ?a]; Italian pronunciation: [ro'b?rto a'la??a]) (born 7 June 1963) is a French tenor. He was born in Clichy-sous-Bois, Seine-Saint-Denis, France and obtained French citizenship at age 18, while also retaining his previous Italian citizenship. Alagna was born outside the city of Paris in 1963 to a family of Sicilian immigrants. As a teenager, the young Alagna began busking and singing pop in Parisian cabarets, mostly for tips. Influenced primarily by the films of Mario Lanza, but also from recordings of many historic tenors, he then switched to opera, but remained largely self-taught. However, he was discovered by Gabriel Dussurget, the co-founder of the Aix-en-Provence Festival. After winning the Luciano Pavarotti International Voice Competition, an initiative backed by the Italian Ministry of Cultural Heritage and Activities, that started in Modena in 1988, Alagna made his professional debut as Alfredo Germont in La Traviata with the Glyndebourne touring company. [7] This led to many engagements throughout the smaller cities in France and Italy, mainly again as Alfredo, a role he would eventually sing over 150 times. His reputation grew and he was soon invited to sing at major theaters such as La Scala in 1990, Covent Garden in 1992 and the Metropolitan Opera as Rodolfo in 1996. His performances of Romo in Romo et Juliette by Charles Gounod at Covent Garden in 1994 (opposite Leontina Vaduva) catapulted him to international stardom.