From the beginning of his professional career as a tenor in 1961 in Italy to his final performance of "Nessun dorma" at the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin, Pavarotti was at his best in bel canto operas, pre-Aida Verdi roles, and Puccini works such as La bohème, Tosca, Turandot and Madama Butterfly.

Pavarotti's earliest musical influences were his father's records, most of them featuring the popular tenors of the day—Beniamino Gigli, Giovanni Martinelli, Tito Schipa, and Enrico Caruso.

Pavarotti began the serious study of music in 1954 at the age of 19 with Arrigo Pola, a respected teacher and professional tenor in Modena who offered to teach him without remuneration.

[4] In 1955, he experienced his first singing success when he was a member of the Corale Rossini, a male voice choir from Modena that also included his father, which won first prize at the International Eisteddfod in Llangollen, Wales.

During his years of musical study, Pavarotti held part-time jobs in order to sustain himself—first as an elementary school teacher and then as an insurance salesman.

Pavarotti began his career as a tenor in smaller regional Italian opera houses, making his debut as Rodolfo in La bohème at the Teatro Municipale in Reggio Emilia in April 1961.

An early coup involved his connection with Joan Sutherland (and her conductor husband, Richard Bonynge), who in 1963 was seeking a tenor taller than herself to take along on her 1965 tour to Australia.

[16] After the extended Australian tour, he returned to La Scala, where he added Tebaldo from I Capuleti e i Montecchi to his repertoire on 26 March 1966, with Giacomo Aragall as Romeo.

His first appearance as Tonio in Donizetti's La fille du régiment took place at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, on 2 June of that year.

His breakthrough in the United States came on 17 February 1972, in a production of La fille du régiment at New York's Metropolitan Opera, in which he hit nine high Cs in the signature aria and had seventeen curtain calls.

[citation needed] In 1976, Pavarotti debuted at the Salzburg Festival, appearing in a solo recital on 31 July, accompanied by pianist Leone Magiera.

At the beginning of the 1980s, he set up The Pavarotti International Voice Competition for young singers, performing with the winners in 1982 in excerpts of La bohème and L'elisir d'amore.

[citation needed] In 1985, Pavarotti sang Radames at La Scala opposite Maria Chiara in a Luca Ronconi production conducted by Maazel, recorded on video.

[22] A highlight of the concert, in which Pavarotti sang the opening verses using extended vocal runs for di Capua's "O Sole Mio" and which was in turn perfectly repeated note-for-note by Domingo and Carreras.

In June 1993, more than 500,000 listeners gathered for his free performance on the Great Lawn of New York's Central Park, while millions more around the world watched on television.

He earned a reputation as "The King of Cancellations" by frequently backing out of performances, and his unreliable nature led to poor relationships with some opera houses.

[29] Over an eight-year period, Pavarotti had cancelled 26 out of 41 scheduled appearances at the Lyric, and the decisive move by Krainik to ban him for life was well noted throughout the opera world, after the performer walked away from a season premiere less than two weeks before rehearsals began, saying pain from a sciatic nerve required two months of treatment.

[citation needed] On 12 December 1998, he became the first (and, to date, only) opera singer to perform on Saturday Night Live, singing alongside Vanessa L. Williams.

He also sang with U2 in the band's 1995 song "Miss Sarajevo" and with Mercedes Sosa in a big concert at the Boca Juniors arena La Bombonera in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in 1999.

Pavarotti's manager, Terri Robson, said that the tenor had turned the Winter Olympic Committee's invitation down several times because it would have been impossible to sing late at night in the subzero conditions of Turin in February.

He sought treatment following this diagnosis, undergoing major abdominal surgery and making plans for the resumption and conclusion of his singing commitments,[41] but he died at his home in Modena on 6 September 2007.

After his death, his manager, Terri Robson, noted in a statement, "The Maestro fought a long, tough battle against the pancreatic cancer which eventually took his life.

[45] The Frecce Tricolori, the aerobatic demonstration team of the Italian Air Force, flew overhead, leaving green-white-red smoke trails.

He received two Primetime Emmy Awards for his PBS variety specials Pavarotti in Philadelphia: La Boheme and Duke of Mantua, Rigoletto Great Performances.

King, Andrea Bocelli, Zucchero, Jon Bon Jovi, Bryan Adams, Bono, James Brown, Mariah Carey, Eric Clapton, Dolores O'Riordan, Sheryl Crow, Céline Dion, Anastacia, Elton John, Deep Purple, Meat Loaf, Queen, George Michael, Tracy Chapman, the Spice Girls, Sting and Barry White to raise money for several UN causes.

[50] He performed at benefit concerts to raise money for victims of tragedies such as the Spitak earthquake that killed 25,000 people in northern Armenia in December 1988,[51] and sang Gounod's Ave Maria with legendary French pop music star and ethnic Armenian Charles Aznavour.

[52] In 1998, he was appointed the United Nations Messenger of Peace, using his fame to raise awareness of UN issues, including the Millennium Development Goals, HIV/AIDS, child rights, urban slums and poverty.

[53] In 1999, Pavarotti performed a charity benefit concert in Beirut, to mark Lebanon's re-emergence on the world stage after a brutal 15-year civil war.

The largest concert held in Beirut since the end of the war, it was attended by 20,000 people who travelled from countries as distant as Saudi Arabia and Bulgaria.

Six months prior, Pavarotti had held a large charity concert for Afghan refugees, particularly children in his home town of Modena, Italy.