Great tenor hopes for the opera-Rolando Villazon and Joseph Calleja have the right stuff for

Pavarotti has limped off the stage, the Carreras voice of old is long gone, and Domingo remains a slowly declining but still marvelous presence in opera. Yet the fading of "The Three Tenors" need not cause opera-lovers to dress in black. Fresh, wonderful tenor voices offer hope for decades more of thrilling performances.

To our current embarrassment of mezzo and countertenor riches, we can now add the voices of three very different, relatively young tenors: Juan Diego Florez, Rolando Villazon, and Joseph Calleja. With the lighter-voiced Rossini specialist Florez already well-covered by the media, this review will focus on the latest two arrivals on the scene.

Villazon's debut disc, Rolando Villazon: Italian Opera Arias, featuring the Munchner Rundfunkorchester well-conducted by Marcello Viotti, was released by Virgin Classics. Initial impulses toward objectivity on my part were abandoned as soon as I played the opening aria, "E la solita storia" from Cilea's L'Arlesiana. Here we encounter an enviably virile instrument, under impeccable control as it smoothly swells from sweet (if not overly honeyed) piano utterances to full-blooded, ringing forte. The sound, distinguished by an unforced, masculine squillo on high, is produced with a grace and refinement that elevate performances far above the commonplace. In this aria, at least, Villazon lingers over notes, stretching out phrases for emotional effect without ever lapsing into ego-gratifying self-indulgence. Thanks to the palpable and credible emotion of the voice, the result is an undeniably moving performance of a kind last encountered from the likes of di Stefano, Corelli, and Bjorling.

Villazon was born in Mexico City in 1972. At the age of 11, he entered the Espacios Academy for the Performing Arts, where he studied music, acting, contemporary dance and ballet. Seven years later, he met baritone Arturo Nieto, who introduced him to the world of opera.

At age 20, Villazon entered the National Conservatory of Music. After singing in several operas and winning two national contests, he launched an international career. In 1998 came enrollment in San Francisco's Merola Opera Program, whose list of graduates includes many of today's top-flight singers. Then came the Pittsburg Opera's Young Artists Program. By 1999, the tenor had won Prize of the Public, the Zarzuela Prize, and second prize overall in Placido Domingo's Operalia competition.

Rolando Villazon's European debut came as Des Grieux in Manon lang=EN-GB in Genoa in March 1999. Debuts at Opera Bastille, Bavarian State Opera, Deutsche Oper Berline, Hamburg State Opera, Berlin State Opera, Teatro dell'Opera di Roma, Opera de Lyon, Opera de Montpellier, New York City Opera, Los Angeles Opera, and the Met followed. San Franciscans were treated to his Alfredo in La Traviata, lang=EN-GB a role he first sang as a Merola artist back in 1998.

Maltese might

Joseph Calleja is younger still. Dressed like a sunglass-sporting Mafioso on the back cover of his Decca disc, Joseph Calleja: Tenor Arias, backed by the Orchestra Sinfonica E Coro Di Milan Giuseppe Verdi conducted by no less a personage than Riccardo Chailly, the 26-year-old Maltese sensation was a pre-teenager singing pop songs when he saw Mario Lanza's cinematic performance in The Great Caruso. Blown away, he tried imitating Lanza until he went hoarse. After next hearing the disc Essential Pavarotti 2, he followed an aunt's suggestion and began studying singing. Soon, he joined a choir. After adding piano and theory lessons to his studies, he appeared as a second tenor in the chorus of Verdi's Rigoletto in Malta's National Theatre, Valletta's Teatru Manoel.

Calleja then began study with Paul Asciak, a Maltese tenor who was a regular at Covent Garden in the 1950s. Asciak developed Calleja as a light-lyric tenor, and exposed him to the great recordings of tenors of earlier generations.

In 1997, at age 19, Calleja debuted in the role of Macduff in Verdi's Macbeth, and was a prizewinner of the Belvedere Competition in Vienna. A year later, he won the Caruso Competition in Milan and appeared in Pesaro and Ireland. Since then have come performances in Brussels, Liege, Toronto, Dresden, Bologna, Welsh National Opera, Covent Garden, Frankfurt, Bavarian State Opera, and Vienna State Opera.

Because his sound is so focused and pure on disc, it's impossible to deduce with certainty the size of Calleja's voice. It may be slighter than Villazon's, more along the lines of Florez's, but with a true Italianate ring and ability to move into heavier if still essentially lyric repertoire. It's also a wonderfully controlled instrument. Calleja can be very sweet in the manner of Gigli when singing with honeyed softness, but he's equally capable of a ringing, full voice. The very top sounds a little tremulous, with the tenor wisely avoiding some of the roles Villazon has already undertaken. Nonetheless, the voice is gorgeous. Within the confines of repertoire right for his sound, the man is potentially one of the great tenors of the 21st century.

Both tenors undertake the Cilea aria. (Calleja has assayed it only on disc, finding the role as yet too heavy for his voice). They also both sing Macduff's "Ah! La paterna mano" from Verdi's Macbeth, "Parmi veder le lagrime" from Verdi's Rigoletto, Edgardo's tomb scene from Donizetti's Lucia, and "Quanto e bella" from Donizetti's L'elisir d'amore. Beyond that, Calleja stays with lighter repertoire, while Villazon undertakes heavier tenor arias from La Boheme, Tosca, and Don Carlo, as well as the Traviata Alfredo they have both performed.

Comparison shopping

Because we're dealing with debut discs, ultimate assessments are impossible. But careful listening to individual performances, combined with comparisons with some of the great tenors of the 20th century, does provide some enlightening insight.

First, a strong acknowledgement of operatic reissues from Naxos, EMI, Universal and other labels. There is no way any lover of opera, or anyone wishing to understand the greatness of the medium, can fully appreciate the range and possibilities of the tenor voice without listening to the recordings of singers from an earlier generation.

Naxos has done us all a tremendous service by reissuing Mark Obert-Thorn and Ward Marston's bargain-price digital remasterings of pressings from Jussi Bjorling, Beniamino Gigli, and Enrico Caruso. Even though EMI owns many of the original Bjorling masters from the early part of his career, their reissues have often been heavily filtered, with truncated highs that destroy the beauty and emotional impact of the man's voice. Their horrible Bjorling Heroes disc is a case in point. BMG/RCA committed a travesty when they reissued Caruso mated with a modern orchestra. Naxos may often have access to pressings as opposed to masters, but what Marston and Obert-Thorn do with those pressings is light years ahead of anything else you will hear. The Naxos Bjorling series is up to four, Gigli to three, and Caruso to 11. These discs are indispensable.

Equally indispensable is EMI's 2-disc The Very Best of series. For once, these selections frequently present an excellent cross-sampling of repertoire from a singer's prime years. The Very Best of Jussi Bjorling, The Very Best of Franco Corelli, The Very Best of Giuseppi Di Stefano, The Very Best of Fritz Wunderlich and The Very Best of Jose Carreras belong on every opera-lover's shelf. Throw in some Melchior, Martinelli, Schipa, de Lucia, Bonci, Tauber (also from Naxos), and Schiotz for starters, and you've got impeccable criteria by which to judge any new tenor on the scene.

Doing so, we make some interesting discoveries. To these ears, two men stand out singing Rodolfo "Che gelida manina" from Puccini's La Boheme. Bjorling has an innate longing in his voice, the kind of natural, heart-tugging throb and passion that makes us believe his every utterance. The sound is also gorgeous, with its vibrant head voice and impetuously hurled top-notes.

The dear departed Corelli, on the other hand, phrases far less impeccably, with heavy aspiration that upon occasion can border on bull-in-a-china-shop production. But he is so thrilling. Listen to his "Che gelida manina" on EMI's The Unreleased Franco Corelli. Even the fact that only the last half of the performance survives cannot detract from the incontrovertible truth that Corelli is the one tenor who, when declaring his love with a blazing high C, sounds so sensual, real, and mesmerizingly powerful that some of us must actively resist the temptation to tear off our clothes and throw ourselves at his proverbial feet. The man's sound affects the lower chakras like no other on disc.

Villazon is not, at this point, either a Bjorling or Corelli. His top does not ring as vibrantly on "Che gelida manina." Nor are either his tone or affect (while certainly distinctive) as ardent. For that matter, neither tenor's phrasing of "Questa o quella" from Verdi's Rigoletto or Villazon's rendition of "La donna e mobile" from the same opera impresses with the variety and verve of Caruso's (although that great tenor's "Che gelida manina" comes up disappointingly prosaic). But the voices of these two new tenors are nonetheless extremely beautiful, and their performances imaginative and deeply felt.

Listening to older tenors, or to a soprano such as Montserrat Caballe (who is still singing), one cannot help lament the modern tendency to perform arias in strict time. We only hear rubato occasionally at the end of phrases or in certain commonly accepted, idiomatic places. Think what more Calleja could do with his honeyed diminuendo if only he would slow down more and stretch things out for effect. Listen to how Bjorling stretches out high notes and key transitions in his incomparable "Nessun dorma" from Puccini's Turandot, or how Corelli and Callas turn a simple recitative into a major musical statement. Do not miss how Corelli causes a Parma audience to swoon by holding onto notes during the live Tosca performance available on Myto. The lack of elasticity with tempo is a problem that afflicts modern instrumental interpretations as well.

Music is a living, breathing organism. Artists must be allowed to breathe life into it at their own pace. We do not have to stick to the beat in all cases. The heart has its own rhythm and will show the way.

Villazon and Calleja are certainly pointing the way ahead. Depending upon how they proceed, how they husband their resources, and how they develop and deepen their artistry, we will have a lot to look forward to.