Reuters is reporting the death of the star Italian opera singer Luciano Pavarotti, hailed by many as the greatest tenor of his generation. He died early on Thursday after a long battle with cancer, his manager Terri Robson said.

“The great tenor Luciano Pavarotti died today at 5 a.m. at his home in Modena,” Robson said in a statement. He was 71. “The Maestro fought a long, tough battle against the pancreatic cancer which eventually took his life. In fitting with the approach that characterised his life and work, he remained positive until finally succumbing to the last stages of his illness.”

Pavarotti brought a love of opera to the masses and performed to vast stadium audiences round the world. He shot to popular fame with a stand-in appearance at Covent Garden in 1963 and had soon had critics gushing about his “big” voice.

His last public singing performance was at the opening ceremony of the Winter Olympics in Turin in February 2006.

Jeremy Isaacs said on the BBC’s Today programme that said Luciano had a big, thrilling voice that was unmistakeable. He could sing almost anything and was a big favourite with Covent Garden audiences.

He is perhaps best known for teaming up with Spanish stars Placido Domingo and Jose Carreras at the 1990 football World Cup in Italy and introduced operatic classics to an estimated 800 million people around the globe.

Although the quality of his voice tailed off in recent years, his technique never did. His presence will be much missed.

Of all operatic arias, the one that truly escaped the clutches of the aficionado, and became a popular favourite, was Puccini’s dramatic song from Turandot, Nessun Dorma.

Although it has remained a classic of “easy listening” radio, it achieved pop status by being the theme for the 1990 World Cup in Italy, when it was memorably sung by Luciano Pavarotti, still in his pomp. It has also appeared in modern films, like Toys, The Witches of Eastwick, and an array of others.

The aria translates as, “And None Shall Sleep”. It was part of Giancomo Puccini’s last opera, Turandot, which remained unfinished. It was premiered in 1926 at La Scala, Milan.

Puccini nearly died in a car crash in 1904 as a result of his passion for fast cars. He had already completed the works by which he is best known : La Boheme, Tosca and Madame Butterfly.

Nessun Dorma is from the final act of Turandot. Other parts were in sketch form only and were completed by composer, Franco Alfano.

Puccini was fighting throat cancer, caused by heavy cigar smoking, while writing Turandot. Despite the use of radiotherapy — then a new technique — Puccini died of a heart attack from complications on November 29, 1924.

His work lives on, however, and Nessun Dorma is being played somewhere on the world’s radio stations round the clock.

Adapted from information given in Weekend Magazine.