Not just another tenor

I just finished listening to Rolando Villazon's two vocal recitals: Italian Opera Arias and Gounod and Massenet arias. This is the real thing! I heard his Metropolitan Opera debut as Alfredo in La Traviata and I honestly thought that he stole the show from Renee Fleming's well-sung but slightly faceless, Violetta. Listening to these two CDs further confirms my thoughts that here is a first rate talent (I will not, on pain of death, call him the 4th tenor). His voice is firm and secure with inherent musicality and a ringing top.

I hope that his career trajectory continues in the positive direction of the past few years. It seems that he has the goods to propel him into a first rate career and once sincerely hopes that the marketing machines don't take him in, chew him up and spit him out. There have been too many wannabe great tenors in recent years, that I can't pin my hopes up too high.

The French Opera aria recording seems to be the more sucessful of the two recordings. The Italian aria recording seems to me to just another collection of the usual suspects (apart from the Duc d'Albe and Nerone aria) which, although sung very well, doesn't efface memories of others. The French aria recording is altogether more interesting, incluing arias from Polyeucte, Roi de Lahore, Griselidis, Roma and Le Mage (the last two I've never heard of). Just to point outtwo of the niceties of this recording, listen to the opening phrases of Ah fuyez, douce image, sung in a real supported piano and his Ange du Paradis, while maybe not as beautifully floated as Gedda's, is quite lovely nonetheless.

Speaking of Gedda and floating, I loved Ken Benson's tribute to him in the recent Met broadcast of Les contes d'Hoffman. The Magische töne recording he played is one of my favorites (Leo Slezak also made a beautiful, if slightly bigger toned recording of this aria). Thanks Ken.