Andrea Bocelli – Passione (180g 2LP)

Filled with romance and beauty, Passione is a lush collection of Mediterranean love songs featuring duets with global pop stars Jennifer Lopez, Nelly Furtado, and the late Edith Piaf. The album reunites Bocelli with 16-time Grammy Award-winning producer David Foster, who produced Bocelli’s 2006 release Amore, which sold more than 4.2 million copies.

On the album, Bocelli sings in six languages (Italian, English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, and Neapolitan) with his unmistakable voice, as Foster accompanies him on piano, along with Peruvian guitarist Ramon Stagnaro. The sensual sound is rounded out by Cuban, Brazilian, and Portuguese rhythms and a 63-piece orchestra recorded in London.

Bocelli is an iconic figure in music with a myriad of breathtaking career achievements to his name. The Italian tenor is the most successful classical solo artist ever and one of the best-selling artists in music history, period, with more than 80 million albums sold worldwide. He is also credited with enabling the core classical repertoire to cross over and find a home atop the international pop charts, creating a new genre of music along the way. He has performed for four U.S. presidents, two popes, and the British royal family, as well as at ceremonies for the Olympic Games and the World Cup. He has been praised by such luminaries as Luciano Pavarotti, Franco Corelli (his beloved teacher and guide), Zubin Mehta, José Carreras, Lorin Maazel, Renée Fleming, and Celine Dion.

Andrea Bocelli’s new album Passione includes duets with Jennifer Lopez and Nelly Furtado and features the Italian tenor, singer-songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist at the peak of his romantic powers. When Bocelli was a teenager, he spent six nights a week working as a piano player and singer in the piano bars of his hometown of Tuscany.

“It often happened that a beautiful girl who could sing in tune would come up and ask to sing something with me,” Bocelli recalls. “It was a good time and perhaps it is to that time that I owe my peace of mind and serenity of today.” It is Bocelli’s fondness for his pre-fame years that has partly inspired Passione, a lush selection of the musical moments that marked and accompanied his youth.

Another lure in making Passione was recapturing the magic that Bocelli conjured up with 16-time Grammy Award-winner David Foster, who produced Bocelli’s 2006 collection of romantic songs Amore, which sold more than 2.5 million copies and debuted at No. 3 on the Billboard Top 200.

ID: Verve Records – B001845-01, Sugar (2) – B001845-01, Almud – B001845-01, Universal Music Special Markets – B001845-01, Original Recordings Group – ORG 155