MILAN, Italy (AP) — Luciano Pavarotti will make his first public appearance since undergoing surgery for pancreatic cancer last summer to receive a prize on December 6 at a music festival in the northern Italian city of Bergamo. The 71-year-old tenor will accept the Donizetti Prize during the last performance of the Bergamo Musical Festival, Raffaella Valsecchi, a spokeswoman for the Donizetti Theater, said Thursday.

“His health has improved, aside from some problems walking. He uses a small cane,” Valsecchi said. Pavarotti was preparing to leave New York in July to resume a farewell tour when doctors discovered a malignant pancreatic mass.

He had surgery, and all his remaining 2006 concerts were cancelled. Pavarotti retired from staged opera in 2004.

Pavarotti will be awarded the Donizetti Prize in recognition of his interpretations of the opera composer’s works throughout the world, Valsecchi said.

Nine of Pavarotti’s students will sing arias from some of Gaetano Donizetti’s operas, including “Anne Boleyn,” “Lucrezia Borgia” and “Don Pasquale.” Donizetti was born in Bergamo in 1797.