Andrea Bocelli

Italian vocalist Andrea Bocelli recorded albums of operatic arias and pop songs that generated more than 75 million in record sales worldwide, making him the top-selling classical artist in recorded history. He rose from humble beginnings, which included total blindness at age 12, to win over such established talents in his home country as Zucchero and Luciano Pavarotti with his warm, powerful tenor voice. By the 1990s, he was an international favorite, scoring two of the biggest-selling singles in pop history with "Time to Say Goodbye," a duet with Sarah Brightman, and "The Prayer," which teamed Bocelli with Celine Dion. He remained enormously popular with worldwide audiences, which in turn helped to bring countless esteemed classical works back from the dust of antiquity, a service rarely accomplished by even the most highly regarded classical performers of previous decades. Bocelli used his vast worldwide star power in service to both the music and to countless charitable organizations across the globe. In doing so, he remained not only one of the most successful artists in the world, but a major force for charitable works.