Josep Carreras

Josep Carreras (2001)

Josep Maria Carreras i Coll ( Catalan form of the name, [ ʒuˈzɛp kəˈreɾəs i ˈkɔʎ ]; Castilian José Carreras [ xoˈse kaˈreɾas ]; born  December 5, 1946 in Barcelona ) is a Spanish opera singer . He is counted among the outstanding tenors of the second half of the 20th century. Along with Luciano Pavarotti and Plácido Domingo, he was one of the Three Tenors . Outside of his homeland, he is known to the general public under the name of José Carreras .

Life

Josep Carrera's father, Josep Carreras i Soler , as a staunch Republican, was no longer allowed to practice his profession as a high school teacher after the Spanish Civil War . The family emigrated to Argentina in 1951, hoping for a better life. But after a year she returned to Barcelona. The father then became a traffic policeman and his mother Antònia Coll i Saigi ran a small barber shop.

Carreras first studied chemistry , but in 1963 switched to studying singing with Jaime Francisco Puig and at the Conservatori Superior de Música in Barcelona. He made his debut in 1970 at the Gran Teatre del Liceu , the opera house in his hometown in Verdi's Nabucco . In 1971 he won the Verdi Competition in Busseto , was at the Madrid committed Opera and debuted with Montserrat Caballé in London in Donizetti's Maria Stuarda .

From 1972 he made numerous guest appearances at the New York City Opera , the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires , the Chicago Opera , the Met , the Royal Opera House , the Vienna State Opera and Scala (1972). After his international breakthrough as a lyric tenor, further invitations from Salzburg , Hamburg , Munich , Brussels , San Francisco , London and others followed. Since appearing in the 1990 World Cup , he has formed the vocal trio The Three Tenors with Plácido Domingo and Luciano Pavarotti .

In March 2001, Carreras performed at the Liceu - the opera house where his career began - in Samson et Dalila . On 12 July 2002 he sang the title role in the opera in Tokyo Sly by Ermanno Wolf-Ferrari . In 2004 the tenor sang the final act from Carmen and the third act from Sly at a gala at the Vienna State Opera .

On May 8, 2009, Carreras announced his retirement from the opera stage, but declared that he would continue to perform in concerts.

On June 11, 2012 Carreras was awarded an honorary doctorate from Saarland University.

In April 2014 José Carreras returned to the opera stage in the title role of the opera El Juez by the Austrian composer Christian Kolonovits . The premiere in Bilbao at the Arriaga Theater was a triumphant comeback on the opera stage. Carreras performed in El Juez at the Erl Festival (Austria), in 2015 in the Mariinsky Theater in St. Petersburg and finally in July 2016 in the Theater an der Wien .

Relationship with Catalonia

Carreras is a football fanatic and has been a member of FC Barcelona for over 30 years . He explained his relationship with the club and with Catalonia in the following interview.

“That has to do not only with the sporting side of the club, but more to do with the role it played as a social institution during the Franco dictatorship . At that time we had to defend our identity, roots and traditions against the repression of General Franco . The only way to show our self-worth was to go to the FC Barcelona games. Only at Camp Nou did we openly show our true feelings, our identity as our own little country. That is why FC Barcelona has this incredible social strength and importance to this day. Barça was and always has been much more than just sport.

Catalonia is my country, my little country. I love the Spanish, I have a Spanish passport, Spain is a fantastic country, but we Catalans feel a little different. No better, no worse. Just different."

In non-Spanish countries he is still mostly known under the Spanish name José Carreras. He said in a radio report that he did not identify with this name.

“I was always' Josep ', in the family, and otherwise. But when I started my career in 1970, I was no longer officially allowed to be called' Josep '- I had to call myself' José ', which is why I am known as' José Carreras'. All my papers had to be changed to 'José'. My passport, my ID card, my driver's license - José, José, José everywhere. But I always felt like 'Josep'. "

Private life

The first marriage (1971–1992) with the history professor Mercedes Pérez had son Alberto (* 1973) and daughter Julia (* 1978). In 2006 he married the Austrian stewardess Jutta Jäger. The marriage was divorced in 2011. His nephew David Giménez Carreras , the eldest son of his sister Maria, is an international conductor .

Social work

In 1987, at the height of his career, Carreras developed acute lymphoblastic leukemia . Despite a poor prognosis, he was able to overcome the disease and resume his singing career with a year of intensive treatment including an autologous bone marrow transplant by Nobel Prize winner Edward Donnall Thomas in Seattle, which was hardly widespread at the time .

Out of gratitude for the help he received from the medical side, he founded the Fundación Internacional José Carreras para la lucha contra la leucemia in 1988 with its headquarters in Barcelona and further offices in Germany, Switzerland and the USA. Since then, the foundation has supported leukemia research, the results of which saved his life at the time, as well as the search for bone marrow donors and, ultimately, the improvement of infrastructure and patient care in hospitals. The German José Carreras Leukemia Foundation , based in Munich , has existed since 1995 . Since then, he has also presented a benefit gala every December from the exhibition hall in Leipzig to support the foundation. It was live from the MDR in the first program of the ARD transmitted. Victoria Herrmann (1995), Axel Bulthaupt (1996–2010), Désirée Nosbusch (2011) and Kim Fisher (2012) acted as co-moderators . On the occasion of the 2006 gala, viewers donated 5,380,934 euros by phone alone. 4.55 million viewers saw the live gala (MA 15.3% viewers 3+) and gave ARD second place among the top programs of the day. From 2013 the gala was broadcast from Europa-Park in Rust . This year it could be received unencrypted on Sky Christmas HD , GoldStar TV , Heimatkanal and Romance TV , as well as via livestream on the Internet. Esther Schweins moderated at Carreras' side. From 2014 to 2018 the José Carreras Gala was shown by Sat.1 Gold . Nina Eichinger was co-moderator . It was first produced in 2015 at the Estrel Convention Center in Berlin . In 2017 she came from the Bavaria Studios in Munich for the first time . In 2019 the José Carreras Gala returned to the Leipzig Exhibition Center and to the MDR. It runs live on MDR television . Mareile Höppner is co-moderator . In total, over 200 million euros have been collected over the past twenty years.

Discography

Solo albums

year	title	Top ranking, total weeks, awardChart placementsChart placements (Year, title, rankings, weeks, awards, notes)				Remarks
		DE	AT	CH	UK
1988	Collection	-	-	-	UK90 silver (4 weeks)UK	First published: September 1988
	Misa criolla	DE57 (3 weeks) DE	AT- gold AT	-	-	First published: December 1988
1989	Jose Carreras sings Andrew Lloyd Webber	-	AT19 (7 weeks) AT	-	UK42 silver (6 weeks)UK	First published: December 1989
1991	The essential	-	-	-	UK24 platinum (9 weeks)UK	First published: February 1991
	Hollywood Golden Classics	-	-	-	UK47 (3 weeks) UK	First published: March 1991
1992	Amigos Para Siempre - Friends for Life	DE82 (4 weeks) DE	-	-	UK53 (4 weeks) UK	First published: July 1992
1993	With a song in my heart	-	-	-	UK73 (1 week) UK	First published: October 1993
1996	passion	DE42 (9 weeks) DE	AT25 (6 weeks) AT	-	UK21st silver (8 weeks)UK	First published: January 1996
2004	Energia	-	AT35 (4 weeks) AT	-	-	First published: March 2004
2005	Together Strong	DE66 (1 week) DE	-	-	-	First published: December 2005

More albums

• 1990: Merry Christmas (AT:gold)
• 1998: Memories (Eloquence) (DE:gold)
• 2012: Live In Vienna
• 2012: Live comeback concerts
• 2015: The Phantom Of The Opera
• 2016: Christmas
• 2016: The Album

Collaborations

year	title	Top ranking, total weeks, awardChart placementsChart placements (Year, title, rankings, weeks, awards, notes)					Remarks
		DE	AT	CH	UK	US
1985	West Side Story	-	-	-	UK11 (32 weeks) UK	-	First published: May 1985 with Kiri Te Kanawa and Leonard Bernstein
1986	Highlights from West Side Story	-	-	-	UK72 (6 weeks) UK	-	First published: May 1986 with Kiri Te Kanawa and Leonard Bernstein
	South Pacific	-	-	-	UK5 (24 weeks) UK	-	First published: October 1986 with Kiri Te Kanawa, Sarah Vaughan and Mandy Patinkin
1992	From the Barcelona Games	-	AT14 (8 weeks) AT	-	UK41 (3 weeks) UK	-	First published: July 1992 with Montserrat Caballe and Plácido Domingo
1993	Christmas in Vienna	DE13 gold (9 weeks)DE	AT2 platinum (5 weeks)AT	CH7th gold (2 weeks)CH	UK71 (2 weeks) UK	US154 (3 weeks) US	First published: November 1993 with Diana Ross and Plácido Domingo
	Christmas Favorites ...	-	-	-	-	US127 (4 weeks) US	with Plácido Domingo, Luciano Pavarotti (Metha and Levine)
1996	Christmas in Vienna - Best Of	DE60 (3 weeks) DE	AT37 (4 weeks) AT	-	-	-	First published: November 1996 with Helmut Lotti , Patricia Kaas , Vanessa Williams , Charlotte Church , Sarah Brightman , Luciano Pavarotti and Plácido Domingo
	A Celebration of Christmas	DE37 (4 weeks) DE	AT10 (2 weeks) AT	-	-	-	First published: December 1996 with Natalie Cole and Plácido Domingo

The 3 tenors

year	title	Top ranking, total weeks, awardChart placementsChart placements (Year, title, rankings, weeks, awards, notes)					Remarks
		DE	AT	CH	UK	US
1990	In concert	DE3 platinum (100 weeks)DE	AT2 × 2 Double platinum (23 weeks)AT	CH10 gold (16 weeks)CH	UK1 × 5 Quintuple platinum (82 weeks)UK	US35 × 3 Triple platinum (100 weeks)US	First publication: August 1990 with Plácido Domingo, Luciano Pavarotti and Zubin Mehta
1994	In Concert 1994	DE2 × 3 Triple gold (48 weeks)DE	AT1 × 2 Double platinum (22 weeks)AT	CH3 platinum (22 weeks)CH	UK1 × 2 Double platinum (28 weeks)UK	US4th platinum (33 weeks)US	First publication: August 1994 with Plácido Domingo, Luciano Pavarotti and Zubin Mehta
1998	Paris 1998	DE3 (18 weeks) DE	AT8th gold (16 weeks)AT	CH10 gold (10 weeks)CH	UK14th silver (9 weeks)UK	US83 gold (10 weeks)US	First published: August 1998 with Plácido Domingo, Luciano Pavarotti and James Levine
2000	Christmas / Christmas	DE9 gold (5 weeks)DE	AT3 (6 weeks) AT	CH11 (4 weeks) CH	UK57 silver (2 weeks)UK	US54 gold (8 weeks)US	First publication: November 2000 with Plácido Domingo and Luciano Pavarotti
2002	Best of	-	AT37 (6 weeks) AT	-	UK86 (1 week) UK	-	First publication: May 2002 with Plácido Domingo and Luciano Pavarotti

More albums

• 1994: Encore (AT + UK:gold)

Songs

year	Title album	Top ranking, total weeks, awardChart placementsChart placements (Year, title, album , rankings, weeks, awards, notes)				Remarks
		DE	AT	CH	UK
1992	Amigos Para Siempre (Friends For Life) Amigos Para Siempre (Friends For Life)	-	-	-	UK11 (11 weeks) UK	First published: July 1992 with Sarah Brightman
1994	Libiamo / La donna è mobile In Concert	-	-	-	UK21 (5 weeks) UK	First published: July 1994 with Plácido Domingo and Luciano Pavarotti
1996	Tristesse Passion	-	-	-	UK92 (1 week) UK	First published: January 1996
1998	You'll Never Walk Alone Paris 1998	DE46 (4 weeks) DE	-	CH28 (2 weeks) CH	UK35 (9 weeks) UK	First published: July 1998 with Plácido Domingo and Luciano Pavarotti
2002	Show Me The Way	DE48 (7 weeks) DE	-	-	-	First published: December 2002 with Kim Styles

Awards for music sales

Golden record  Australia 2002: for the album Best Of  Finland 1994: for the album In Concert 1994  Canada 1991: for the album In Concert  Netherlands 1994: for the album Encore 2000: for the album Three Tenors Christmas  Poland 2001: for the album Three Tenors Christmas  Spain 2000: for the album Three Tenors Christmas  United States 1998: for the video album The 3 Tenors - Paris 1998  United Kingdom 2013: for the video album The 3 Tenors - Paris 1998 2013: for the album In Concert

Platinum record  Australia 1992: for the single Amigos para siempre (Friends for Life) 1992: for the album Friends for Life  Germany 1991: for the video album The Three Tenors in Concert  Netherlands 1989: for the album A. Ramirez / Misa Criolla 1990: for the album Misa Criolla ea 1990: for the album In Concert 1993: for the album Christmas in Vienna 1995: for the album Christmas with the three tenors 1996: for the album Passion 1996: for the album Merry Christmas  Poland 1995: for the album The Three Tenors in Concert 2003: for the album Pavarotti / Carreras / Domingo  Spain 1985: for the album West Side Story  United Kingdom 2013: for the video album The Original Concert 2 × platinum record  Belgium 1995: for the album The Three Tenors in Concert  Canada 1994: for the album In Concert 1994  Poland 1996: for the album In Concert 1994  Spain 1995: for the album In Concert 1994  United Kingdom 2013: for the video album The 3 Tenors in Concert 1994

3 × platinum record  Canada 1995: for the album The Three Tenors in Concert  Spain 1989: for the album Bravo Carreras 4 × platinum record  Canada 1992: for the video album The Three Tenors - In Concert  Netherlands 1994: for the album In Concert 1994 1998: for the album Misa Criolla 5 × platinum record  Australia 1991: for the album The Three Tenors in Concert  United States 1994: for the video album The Three Tenors in Concert 1996: for the video album The 3 Tenors in Concert 1994 9 × platinum record  Netherlands 1999: for the album The Three Tenors in Concert 14 × platinum record  Spain 1991: for the album En concierto

Note: Awards in countries from the chart tables or chart boxes can be found in these.

Country / Region	silver	gold	platinum	Sales	swell
Awards for music sales (country / region, awards, sales, sources)
Australia (ARIA)	-	gold1	7 × platinum7th	525,000	aria.com.au
Belgium (BEA)	-	-	2 × platinum2	100,000	ultratop.be
Germany (BVMI)	-	4 × gold4th	3 × platinum3	1,950,000	musikindustrie.de
Finland (IFPI)	-	gold1	-	28,684	ifpi.fi
Canada (MC)	-	gold1	9 × platinum9	590,000	musiccanada.com
Netherlands (NVPI)	-	2 × gold2	24 × platinum24	2,490,000	nvpi.nl
Austria (IFPI)	-	4 × gold4th	5 × platinum5	350,000	ifpi.at
Poland (ZPAV)	-	gold1	4 × platinum4th	390,000	bestsellery.zpav.pl
Switzerland (IFPI)	-	3 × gold3	platinum1	125,000	hitparade.ch
Spain (Promusicae)	-	gold1	20 × platinum20th	2,050,000	promusicae.es ES1 ES2 ES3 ES4
United States (RIAA)	-	3 × gold3	14 × platinum14th	6,050,000	riaa.com
United Kingdom (BPI)	5 × silver5	3 × gold3	11 × platinum11	3,175,000	bpi.co.uk
All in all	5 × silver5	24 × gold24	100 × platinum100

Awards

• Decoration of Honor in Gold for Services to the State of Vienna (1990)
• Prince of Asturias Prize (1991)
• Grand Officer (1991) and Grand Cross (1996) of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic
• Grand Decoration of Honor for Services to the Republic of Austria (1999)
• University Medal Bene Merenti of the University of Regensburg (2000)
• Honorary senator of the University of Regensburg
• Federal Cross of Merit (2004)
• Grand Officer of the Star of Romania (2004)
• Honorary doctorate from the Medical Faculty of the Philipps University of Marburg, Dr. med. hc José, Carerras, on May 3, 2006
• Steiger Award (2006)
• Medal of Honor of the City of Leipzig on the occasion of its Leukemia Donation Gala 2009 on December 17, 2009 awarded by the Lord Mayor of the City of Leipzig (unanimous decision of the Leipzig City Council)
• Dresden St. George's Order of the Semper Opera Ball (2010)
• Honorary award of the German Sustainability Award for his outstanding commitment to research and control of leukemia (2012)
• Honorary doctorate from Saarland University (2012)
• Ring of Honor of the Vienna State Opera (2013)

Web links

Commons : José Carreras  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• Works by and about José Carreras in the catalog of the German National Library
• Agency website

swell

1. ↑ José Carreras at the Gran Teatre del Liceu on jcarreras.homestead.com , accessed on May 14, 2015.
2. ^ Sly, opera by Ermanno Wolff-Ferrari on josepcarreras.operaduets.com , accessed on May 14, 2015.
3. ↑ 2004-02-27 José Carreras Gala, Wiener Staatsoper on operaduetstravel.com , accessed on May 14, 2015.
4. ^ Tenor Carreras withdraws from the opera stage ( Memento of May 10, 2009 in the Internet Archive ), Kleine Zeitung , May 8, 2009
5. ↑ DPA-Starline: People: José Carreras receives an honorary doctorate. In: Focus Online . May 31, 2012, accessed October 14, 2018 . 
6. ^ Kolonovits opera "El Juez" 2014 in Bilbao and Erl. Salzburger Nachrichten of November 5, 2013 , accessed on May 14, 2015.
7. ↑ Josep Carreras made "El Juez" triumph in Saint Petersburg on josepcarreras-tenor.blogspot.de , accessed on May 14, 2015.
8. ↑ José Carreras in conversation "An own national team for Catalonia" - Interview in FAZ.net of June 4, 2008
9. ↑ Manuscript of the broadcast of HR2 from October 2, 2007 (page 4) ( Memento from December 14, 2015 in the Internet Archive )
10. ↑ http://www.elpais.com/articulo/agenda/Jose/Carreras/ha/casado/azafata/Jutta/Jager/elpepigen/20060407elpepiage_2/Tes
11. ↑ http://www.bunte.de/society/jose-carreras-und-jutta-jaeger-sie-iegen-sich-scheiden_aid_28726.html
12. ↑ http://www.josecarrerasgala.de/danke-berlin-danke-deutschland/
13. ↑ ^{a b c d} Chart sources: DE AT CH UK US
14. ↑ Platinum for Amigos Para Siempre (Friends For Life) in Australia
15. ^ Platinum for Friends For Life in Australia
16. ↑ 5 × platinum for The Three Tenors in Concert in Australia
17. ↑ Honors awarded by the university: Honorary Senators , University of Regensburg.
18. ↑ Federal Cross of Merit for José Carreras ( Memento of April 21, 2007 in the Internet Archive )