Luciano Pavarotti is an operatic superstar whose popularity reaches far beyond the opera house. Through television appearances, performances in sports arenas and clubs, commercials for fur coats and credit cards, and promotional hype, he has transformed himself into a living legend with "the unique voice in all the world.".

In this controversial work, Jurgen Kesting skillfully combines a critical assessment of Pavarotti's singing career with incisive commentary on stardom, the myth of the tenor, the commercialization of art, and the forces that shape audience perception in a market-driven society. An expert on the history of singing, Kesting weaves his analysis of Pavarotti's early training, debuts, recordings, and concerts into a penetrating examination of the nature, creation, and consequences of fame.

He also considers the concept of the tenor voice and discusses the composers and compositional styles of the repertoire. Kesting examines how the myth of the tenor originated with Enrico Caruso, whose recordings opened the operatic repertoire to mass audiences, and discusses the ways in which Pavarotti both represents and defines the tradition of idolizing the great tenor voice.