Italian tenor Andrea Bocelli, who easily navigates between opera and pop, has just released a Christmas album. (Darrin Zammit Lupi/Reuters)

Never underestimate the Christmas music market. Everyone from Elvis Presley to Nat King Cole to Mariah Carey to Josh Groban has recorded a holiday album and sold millions. While they generally only get played about three weeks out of the year, the most famous records keep selling as the decades go by.

'I have a switch in my mind. One setting is for pop. And on another setting, it's opera.'

— Andrea Bocelli

Andrea Bocelli's latest release, My Christmas, seems guaranteed to do the same. After all, the so-called "Fourth Tenor" has already sold over 65 million records worldwide — more than even Pavarotti.

"I was always asked to sing Christmas songs growing up," says Bocelli, a devout Catholic and family man, on the phone from Chicago. "Many of these English Christmas songs also existed in our [Italian] tradition. White Christmas and Silent Night, for example — these were songs we knew. But some of the other songs I did not know until David introduced me to them," he says, referring to Canadian super-producer David Foster .

"David and I have worked together for a long time," Bocelli says. "He is a great artist, very smart and sympathetic."

(Decca)

My Christmas is stacked with guest performers, including Natalie Cole, the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and Mary J. Blige. The list testifies to Bocelli's reputation. Bocelli's competitive edge is as sharp as ever, and he has no problem when people compare his newest disc to other holiday fare.

"In opera, this sort of thing is normal," explains Bocelli by phone. "Everyone in the audience can compare my performance with all the other tenors or singers. This is a challenge I accept."

Adversity is fuel for Bocelli — he has a knack for turning it to his advantage while ignoring his limitations. Blinded in a soccer accident at age 12, Bocelli went on to work as a public defender in his native Tuscany before becoming a singer. The 51-year-old artist is not a trained singer; he's not a product of the Italian opera industry, but rather a crooner. Bocelli sang lounge material and Italian popular songs in piano bars for years before his career exploded in the 1990s. He's more closely akin to Frank Sinatra than Placido Domingo. But there are some opera parts that suit him wonderfully, such as the brave and subtle painter Cavaradossi in Tosca, or the strapping, corporeal Don José in Carmen.

"I have a switch in my mind. One setting is for pop. And on another setting, it's opera. There's no big difference. Singing a popular song is as natural for me as singing an aria," he says, adding that "singers like Caruso had traditionally sung popular songs and opera."

Bocelli's pop forays include the biggest names in adult contemporary, such as his 1999 duet with Celine Dion, The Prayer, which first appeared on her own Christmas album, These Are Special Times. That track went to number eight in Canada, and appears on numerous compilations. His 1996 duet with Sarah Brightman, Time to Say Goodbye, topped the German charts.

To most North Americans, this division between pop and opera seems quite normal. Our popular music tradition is based on blues and rock and dance music, and we regard opera as a separate and almost sacred institution. But this is not actually how the system works, at least for singers. The opera world is populated by vocalists with great gifts and often years of conservatory training. However, no accreditation is necessary; it's not an academic process. Getting an opera role is based on auditions, like what an aspiring symphonic player goes through, except you have to factor in the performer's presence, personality and look.

Bocelli has performed in fully staged operas by Puccini and Verdi. He's even ridden into performances on horseback, famously dismounting and singing in Massenet's Werther. This is above and beyond traditional operatic stagecraft.

Andrea Bocelli arrives on horseback for the annual concert at the Theatre of the Silence in Pisa, Italy, in July 2009. (Fabio Muzzi/AFP/Getty Images)

Though in some ways vocally limited (critics have panned the tenor's uneven technical skills), Bocelli nonetheless generates enormous admiration. He's preternaturally handsome, for one thing — in 1998, he was listed as one of People magazine's 50 Most Beautiful People. He also has a disarming directness of manner, perhaps due to his being a fully trained lawyer. His voice is so rich it's like the listener is bathing in it.

He won his first vocal competition when he was 14, which he entered for the sake of pleasure. He was never under any serious musical pressure, and his delivery has the mellow tone of a supra-talented amateur. This is extremely appealing, a bit like hearing God singing in the shower. But for years Bocelli was just another working stiff, performing in Tuscan piano bars to supplement his lawyer's income. He had a young family to support.

His big break came in 1992, when Italian rock star Zucchero hired him to make a demo tape of the song Miserere. The idea was to use the tape to persuade Pavarotti to record that song. But after hearing Bocelli's version, Pavarotti urged Zucchero to use Bocelli for the track instead. Though Bocelli has said that Pavarotti probably just didn't want to sing the song himself, an endorsement by the Pav cannot be underestimated. It led to tours with Zucchero, who gave Bocelli solo sections in his concerts, where he would sing arias. His solo performances became extremely popular among Italians and throughout Europe.

Since his first solo disc, Il Mare Calmo Della Sera (1994) and the hugely successful followup, Bocelli (1995), the singer has been increasingly in demand. He has performed in concerts for popes and presidents, as well as operas since 2000, but he really isn't a product of the opera scene. We just think he is.

"Something has happened in the opera world," says Bocelli. "The artists now remain closed in the theatres." What he means is that opera today is too distant from the rest of the musical world. The idea of pop music being wrong or less worthy is snooty and irrelevant. Bocelli isn't that kind of artist. He's a freelance performer. No single genre can contain him.

John Keillor is a writer based in Toronto.