Actor Paul Sorvino Returns to Singing with a Concert at the Loew’s
By Jennifer Weiss • Oct 27th, 2011 • Category: Arts, Featured
Paul Sorvino has little patience for much of modern art, modern music, and don’t even get him started on reality TV shows like Jersey Shore.
The actor who played mob boss “Paulie” Cicero in Goodfellas is a renaissance man, spending many of his free hours molding clay into sculptures he casts in bronze, practicing classical piano, and singing. Sorvino will show off his vocal talent and training Nov. 4 when he performs in a solo concert at the Landmark Loew’s Jersey Theatre, his first such performance in a half-dozen years and his first-ever concert at the Loew’s. (Another show that had been scheduled for this evening, Oct. 27, was canceled due to illness.)
An operatically trained singer who has studied voice since the age of 16, Sorvino, now 72, has sold out shows with New York City Opera and Seattle Opera and appeared in his own PBS Special, An Evening with Paul Sorvino.
He has a full, rich tenor with a a three-octave range and a varied program planned — American standards, Neapolitan songs he heard in childhood, and opera favorites such as Vesti la Giubba and Nessun Dorma. Among the Neapolitan songs are “songs no one has heard” and others no one has heard for a long time; he says the most famous, O Sole Mio, was inspired by his aunt, a beautiful blonde child in Naples at the time of its writing.
“I sang a lot of these all my life and some of them I’ve always wanted to do,” Sorvino says. “One of them, On the Road to Mandalay, I’ve never sung in public. The lines are by Rudyard Kipling.” Here he spontaneously breaks into song: “Come you back to Mandalay, where the old flotilla lay…”
If you’ve heard the name Sorvino recently, chances are it has to do with the Golden Door International Film Festival, which debuted in Jersey City earlier this month. The festival’s founder and director, Bill Sorvino, is Paul’s nephew and the producer of his concerts at the Loew’s. Paul Sorvino was feted at the end of the festival weekend with a lifetime achievement award.
“He would sing at every party,” Bill says of his uncle. Whether it was an Italian aria or a Jerry Vale or Tony Bennett song, “he was always breaking into song.”
Paul Sorvino lives in West Hollywood, though he’s spent much of the last month in Manhattan, staying in his daughter Mira’s condo. He studies voice with Joan Barton DeCaro, “the best teacher” he says he’s aware of and the widow of Ugo DeCaro, credited with reviving the damaged voice of Renata Tebaldi and saving her career.
He’s been singing since age 2. “My mother says people used to come to the house to watch Paulie sing and dance,” he says.
It was a house, in Borough Park, Brooklyn, that was always filled with music. Not only did his mother teach piano lessons, she would let people practice in the house. “Morning till night,” he says, “there were people playing the piano.”
His routine recently has been full of music. Most days after he gets up, he spends about 45 minutes at the piano, works on his songs, and has a voice lesson. His accompanist comes two to three times a week. He’ll break up his practicing with a long walk, workout or tennis game, or cook or go to restaurants with friends.
His concerts were inspired by the Loew’s itself. Sorvino says that while he’s been busy acting and directing, he was always thinking about returning to singing. That idea coincided with his nephew Bill telling him about this “beautiful old theater” in Jersey City, where Paul’s brother, Bill Sr., lives with his wife, Roberta. “I said okay,” Sorvino says, “and that’s how it happened.”
Sorvino has struggled with asthma throughout his life and a portion of the proceeds of the shows will benefit the Sorvino Asthma Foundation.
“I’m looking forward to resurrecting some of this great music,” Sorvino says. “Doing some pieces I’ve never done and letting people know that I actually can sing. Singing is pleasurable when you do it well, and I’m hoping to do it well. I’m working like a fighter in training every day on my voice with my coach and my accompanist.”
The concert is Friday, Nov. 4 at the Landmark Loew’s Jersey Theatre, 54 Journal Square. Tickets are $35 to $125, with discounts available for students and seniors, with ID. They can be purchased at the box office and online.
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Jennifer Weiss is the editor-in-chief of the Jersey City Independent and NEW magazine.
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