BIG LEAGUE
Report: Trump Courting Italian Tenor Andrea Bocelli for Inauguration Performance
The celebrated blind opera singer and the president-elect go back a long way.
It’s no secret that Donald Trump’s team is struggling to book an A-list performer for the president-elect’s Inauguration Day.
Over the past week, numerous reports have painted a not-so-pretty picture when it comes to Trump’s inauguration committee. A particularly damning report in The Wrap claimed that Trump’s team had stooped to offering up “six to seven-figure” fees and “even a government appointment” for a marquee name for the Jan. 20 festivities.
Beyoncé, by contrast, only had her travel and production costs reimbursed in exchange for performing at President Obama’s 2013 inauguration.
Well, it seems Trump may have found his man.According to a report in Page Six, the Italian tenor Andrea Bocelli “is being personally approached by President-elect Donald Trump to perform at the inauguration.” The piece goes on to claim that the 58-year-old blind crooner is set to meet with Trump on Friday—one day after his sold-out performance at New York’s Madison Square Garden.
For the uninitiated, Bocelli is a world-famous opera singer who’s sold over 80 million records worldwide—including the hit single “Con te partirò.” He’s in the midst of an international tour, and a biopic starring Antonio Banderas as Bocelli, titled The Music of Silence, is being filmed in Rome.
Bocelli and Trump go way back, too. The two are longtime friends, with Trump hosting a private 2010 concert by Bocelli at his Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, Florida. Trump and his family also attended Bocelli’s Concerto, One Night in Central Park mega-concert in 2011, and Trump even played Bocelli tunes at Trump Tower back in June 2015, just prior to delivering his presidential announcement speech.
In a bizarre twist, Mötley Crüe frontman Vince Neil, who pleaded guilty over the summer to assaulting a fan in a truly insane incident that was diffused by national treasure Nicolas Cage, had boasted in an interview with Billboard that he’d been offered the Inauguration Day gig by Trump’s associates months before the election—only to claim he was “uninvited” following Trump’s shock victory.
Colony Capital CEO Tom Barrack, a huge Trump donor who spoke at the Republican National Convention, is reportedly in charge of inaugural events, and is being aided by Trump’s Apprentice producer Mark Burnett. Trump, meanwhile, will reportedly remain on as an executive producer and profit participant on The Celebrity Apprentice even while serving as president of the United States.