As part of the global Pavarotti 90 celebrations, Mercury Studios has unveiled a new documentary that resurrects a long-forgotten performance by legendary opera singer, Pavarotti.
Pavarotti: The Lost Concert is a 60-minute television documentary built around a Luciano Pavarotti’s return to the small Welsh town of Llangollen in the summer of 1995, to fulfil a promise he made four decades earlier.
In 1955, a 19-year-old Pavarotti stood on the Llangollen International Musical Eisteddfod stage performing as part of a choir alongside his father and won his first major international competition. Before leaving, he vowed to return. True to his word, in 1995 and at the height of his fame Pavarotti came back, stepping away from global stadiums to sing once more in a quiet Welsh field, for an audience of just 4,400.
“That performance – a rare and intimate moment in the Maestro’s storied career – has remained unseen for nearly 30 years.”
Pavarotti: The Lost Concert combines restored concert footage, intimate archive, and newly commissioned interviews with those who witnessed both performances.
“There was something so poetic in the idea that, after conquering the world, Pavarotti chose to honour a promise made in his youth,” said Amy Freshwater, Executive Producer and VP, Catalogue & Acquisitions at Mercury Studios. “We’re privileged to represent Universal Music Group’s vault of performances, but it’s not every day that a concert resurfaces after 20 years by one of the world’s greatest artists. This was a full-circle moment of nostalgia and artistic grace, so we knew the only way to release to the ‘Lost Concert’ was to reveal Luciano’s promise and share the full story with the world.”
Pavarotti: The Lost Concert will premiere to the international market at MIPCOM this autumn, with Mercury Studios also releasing a BluRay edition of the full concert later this year. The film is executive produced by Amy Freshwater for Mercury Studios, Hefin Owen for Rondo Productions (the team behind the original concert), and Mark Wilkinson. Sophie Deveson serves as Edit Producer for Mercury Studios and Amy Greer as Associate Producer for Decca Classics.
Jon Creamer
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