Becoming Traviata

Natalie Dessay prepares to take on the role of Violetta in this documentary about the staging of Verdi's masterwork at the Aix-en-Provence Festival in France.

Her smiling face, her generosity and her simplicity have won the hearts of all those who have seen this great singer from afar or close up; a singer who could never be mistaken for a diva. No caprices, no bouts of rage, no outrageous demands: she simply sang. It was the Geneva International Music Competition, which she won with such great success in 1947, that propelled the young Spanish singer to the front of the world stage. Right away, she was enlisted to sing La Vida Breve by Manuel de Falla in London, and then Paris invited her to play Marguerite in Gounod's Faust at the Opéra, before becoming Mimi (La Bohème by Puccini), under the direction of Sir Thomas Beecham at Covent Garden. Salzburg, New York, Milan, Vienna and Buenos Aires followed. A coloratura soprano first and foremost, she sang roles from Rossini with agility. As the years went by, she expanded her voice and her repertoire, becoming a much sought-after lyric soprano. Thanks to her particular gift for languages, she has been Agathe in Weber's Freischütz, Desdemona in Verdi's Othello, Eva in Die Meistersinger by Wagner, or a touching Mélisande. She is a wily and spiteful Rosina (Barber of Seville), a simple and moving Mimi.

Luciano Pavarotti Cavaliere di Gran Croce was an Italian operatic tenor who also crossed over into popular music, eventually becoming one of the most commercially successful tenors of all time. He made numerous recordings of complete operas and individual arias, gaining worldwide fame for the quality of his tone, and eventually established himself as one of the finest tenors of the 20th century, achieving the honorific title “King of the High Cs”.

It was at 9 o’clock on the morning of 25 October 1832, in the village of María in the Spanish
province of Almería, that Antonia Local París gave birth to a son. That same day, held in the arms
of his godmother Manuela Ganíguez Robles, the baby was baptised Julián Gabino de Arcas Lacal
by the local priest, Pedro Manuel García Martínez, at the Church of Our Lady of the Incarnation.
Julián’s father, Pedro Arcas Arjona, was a talented guitarist, trained in the method of the great Spanish master Dionisio Aguado (Madrid, 8 April 1784–Madrid, 20 December 1849), and he passed his passion for the instrument on to his sons Julían and Manuel. As well as becoming a fine guitarist, the latter was also a singer who achieved great success at the Teatre Principal in Barcelona, the city in which he settled and lived until his death in 1890. In 1844, the Arcas family moved to Málaga, where Julián began lessons with José Asencio, a highly respected teacher who had studied directly with Aguado.