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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 announced on Sunday (Jan. 11).
The 2026 Olympics 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.
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 televised audience from Cortina in the heart of the Dolomite mountains, Livigno in the Italian Alps, as well as Predazzo in the autonomous province of Trento.
The ceremony will also include a tribute to the late Italian fashion designer Giorgio Armani, who died in September at the age of 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, has performed for the coronation of King Charles III and for the 75th anniversary of the Italian Constitution in Rome. In a career-spanning release titled Duets (30th Anniversary), Bocelli sings in Italian, English, French and Spanish, collaborating with musicians ranging from Karol G to Chris Stapleton.
He will appear at the Olympic ceremony during a break from a world tour, according to his official calendar, traveling the next day to perform at the Schottenstein Center in Columbus, Ohio, on Feb. 7, followed by six other U.S. dates.
Bocelli’s 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, adding that Bocelli’s inclusion will “contribute a contemporary and global tone to the narrative.’’
Details about the ceremony, which is being produced by Marco Balich, a veteran of more than a dozen Olympic ceremonies, have been trickling out over recent months.
Carey, the first international star named to perform at San Siro, adds some American pop-star pedigree to the opening event. The six-time Grammy award winner announced her participation in an Instagram post saying, “Ci vediamo a Milano,’’ Italian for “See you in Milan.”
Italian actors Sabrina Impacciatore, who appeared in the second season of HBO’s The White Lotus, and Matilde De Angelis, who starred in the Netflix series The Law According to Lydia Poet, will also participate in the opening ceremony, organizers have announced.
A crowd of 60,000 spectators is expected, with millions more watching on television.
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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