Pavarotti Warms Up in Santa Ana

Superstar tenor Luciano Pavarotti sang in Orange County for the first time Wednesday --but it was only to rehearse on his way to his concert with the Pacific Symphony tonight at the San Diego Sports Arena.

Pavarotti, who is nearly as famous for his girth as for his voice, sat on a barstool facing the orchestra in the Santa Ana High School auditorium and rehearsed operatic arias by Puccini, Leoncavallo and Giordano, in addition to popular Italian songs. Some of the pop tunes, arranged by Henry Mancini, featured young flutist Andrea Griminelli, who comes from a town close to Madina--Pavarotti’s birthplace in Italy.

Wearing a dark, cassock-like shirt and an enormous rainbow-colored scarf wrapped around his throat, Pavarotti generally conserved his voice by singing softly throughout the hour-and-a-half rehearsal. Occasionally, he took sips from a diet soft drink, and often led the orchestra along with Emerson Buckley, guest conductor from the Fort Lauderdale Symphony.

Buckley has served in this capacity for Pavarotti’s big arena concerts since 1965 and will also accompany him in San Diego, according to the concert’s promoter, Tibor Rudas. The Pacific Symphony was booked for the concert, Rudas added, because the San Diego Symphony was unavailable.

“I looked for another orchestra that was comparable (to the San Diego players) and heard the Pacific Symphony,” Rudas said. “I was satisfied they were (comparable).”)

Before starting the rehearsal, Pavarotti declared that he had no compunctions about singing in large venues like the Sports Arena.

“I have sung in large halls often and it is OK,” he said. “I have sung pianissimos that could be heard because there was total silence from an audience of 20,000 people.”

His concern appeared to be elsewhere: “If the orchestra is well prepared, there will be no problems. I have worked with this conductor for a long time and we have worked out all the details in advance.”

Unfortunately, the rehearsal proved a working session plagued with problems:

- Often the musicians didn’t have the right music at hand, or, on occasion, the scores they did have contained errors.

- During the delicate opening of the aria “Che gelida manina” (“Your tiny hand is frozen”) from Puccini’s “La Boheme,” for instance, the harpist began playing some bizarre-sounding notes--and the conductor exploded. The harp parts, it seemed, hadn’t been transposed properly to the right key.

- Moments later, the second violin parts turned out to be wrong, too.

“The Ricordi (Puccini’s publisher) scores are famous for separate mistakes in different parts,” Buckley said with a snort.

Tempers began to flare as a member of the woodwind section challenged Buckley by asking him whom he was talking to when he criticized the players’ entrances. Buckley responded by saying, “Everyone.”

Pavarotti merely seemed wearied by it all.

Keith Clark, who is the regular conductor of the Pacific Symphony, said that first rehearsals were often that way. “By tomorrow, it will be perfect,” he observed.