Yes, to write this article, I took a look at Andrea Bocelli’s life, and it brought me back to memories of previous readings from Joan Wester Anderson’s books. Books on angels, and the way angels intervene in our lives.

It seems that a fairy godmother has bent over the little Andrea’s cradle, and that angels watched over him along the way, to uphold him, to uplift him on the bumpy roads of life. Andrea Bocelli’s story is all about will and tenacity when coping with the hazards of life.

It is the story of someone having to cope with blindness, and who gets over it, indulging himself into the process of learning, and in the process of music learning. A process that will lead the young Andrea Bocelli to new roads, new roads full of hope, joy, lights and fulfilments.

Yes, Andrea Bocelli is making the news again this year, with his record simply entitled: MY CHRISTMAS, produced and arranged by David Foster, the multifaceted talent who produced, among other projects, Michael Bublé’s debut album.

In Andrea Bocelli’s MY CHRISTMAS, the songs arrangements are celestial, and like the French author-composer-singer Yves Duteil wrote it one day in his song “La langue de chez nous”: “It is as if the wind, making use of a harp, gave birth to a magnificent symphony”.

In MY CHRISTMAS, Andrea Bocelli is at his best singing in the language of Bel Canto : Italian. The interpretations in his mother tongue are winning numbers. It includes “Silent Night” and “Tu Scendi Dalle Stelle”. His Italian accent, when he sings in the language of Goethe, Schiller or Molière, is charming though.

Other great moments are to be found in the following songs: “White Christmas”, the joyful “Santa Claus Is Coming To Town” triumphantly featuring THE MUPPETS. A working duet with Mary J. Blige on “What Child Is This” makes us turn back time. In this moving duet, Mary J. Blige brings all the emotions of her “Lush Life”, and of the Afro-American heritage to the table.

MY CHRISTMAS ends with a climax embodied by two songs: the magnificent “God Bless Us Everyone” written by virtuosi Alan Silvestri and Glen Ballard. And “I Believe”, a duet with Katherine Jenkins, a song written by French artist Eric Lévi. “I Believe” is actually the official song of the 1997 Paris (FRANCE) 12th World Youth Day, a world reunion under the high patronage of Pope John Paul II. “I Believe” is originally sung by jazz singer Dee Dee Bridgewater under the direction of famed musician Myung Whun Chung. This new take with Andrea Bocelli and Katherine Jenkins is as good as the first one.

Yes, indeed, Christmas speaks to everyone of us, and of course, to the youth of the world. What makes Andrea Bocelli so successful, and what will make his opus MY CHRISTMAS, another success in his already long list of achievements, is that Andrea Bocelli brings humility and humanity in his art of singing.

(P)2010 Teddy Crispin : critic, music critic, music reviewer, liner notes writer, multimedia writer,(...).