Crossover tenor Andrea Bocelli will be among the headline performers for the Milan Cortina Winter Olympics opening ceremony on Feb. 6, joining the previously announced pop diva Mariah Carey, organizers said Sunday. The opening ceremony will be centered in Milan's landmark San Siro soccer stadium, featuring the Parade of Athletes and entertainment over the course of the three-hour spectacle that is expected to be the most widely viewed moment of the Games in Italy, the AP reports.
Reflecting the Milan Cortina Games' status as the most spread-out Olympics in history, elements of the opening ceremony will also be conducted in three other locations, allowing athletes from all far-flung disciplines to participate. Moments will be beamed to the TV audience from Cortina in the heart of the Dolomite mountains, Livigno in the Italian Alps, and Predazzo in the autonomous province of Trento. The ceremony will include a tribute to Italian fashion designer Giorgio Armani, who died in September at 91. Armani has long designed the Italian team's Olympic uniforms, and his legacy as one of the founders of Italian ready-to-wear is tightly tied to Milan, where he left his mark with the Armani theater, Silos museum, and sponsorship of the EA7 Emporio Armani Milano basketball team.
Bocelli, a classically trained singer whose recordings include classical and pop music, sings in Italian, English, French, and Spanish. His performance "will constitute one of the most iconic moments of the event, uniting the spectacle with the essence of Olympic values," organizers said in a statement. Carey was the first international star named to perform at San Siro. The six-time Grammy award winner announced her participation in an Instagram post saying, "Ci vediamo a Milano"—"See you in Milan." A crowd of 60,000 is expected at the stadium. Internationally acclaimed ballet star Roberto Bolle will headline the closing ceremony, which is slated for Verona's ancient Roman Arena on Feb. 22.
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