N. Sanikidze and J. Calleja Aug. 3

CALLEJA AND SANIKIDZE CHARGE THE ATMOSPHERE IN WEILL WITH SUMMER FAVORITES

Maltese tenor Joseph Calleja has enjoyed two decades at the top of the opera profession, so there was heady anticipation at the Green Music Center’s Festival del Sole for a thrilling evening of singing by one of the world’s great voices. Calleja is known as a generous and charitable cultural ambassador for his tiny Mediterranean island nation, and beloved for his warm, charismatic personality, exciting voice and vocal artistry.

Mr. Calleja offered a recital of appropriately light-ish summer fare. But, for whatever reasons, Weill Hall was distressingly empty for this great singer, with only half of the floor seats filled and the balconies closed altogether.

Despite the embarrassingly low attendance, Mr. Calleja gave a resounding performance, filling Weill with his burnished lyric tenor.

His musical partner for the evening was the distinguished Professor Nino Sanikidze, a new faculty member of the prestigious Shepherd School of Music at Rice University, formerly head coach and prompter at the Los Angeles Opera, as well as an international opera star and concert pianist.

Together, these two artists gave us a taste of their respective talents. Mr. Calleja’s voice is highly energized and huge. It has also darkened and deepened with time; some selections put him down into the baritone range.

His choice of repertoire was a rather eclectic mix of opera arias, art songs, pop and Broadway tunes, nothing too high or demanding. The opera arias were by Massenet (“Ah! tout est bien fini” from Le Cid) and Puccini (“È lucevan le stelle” from Tosca). Italian art songs were familiar voice studio favorites: Donaudy’s “Vaghissima sembiance”, “Ideale” by Tosti and Leoncavallo’s soaring “Mattinata” which was a great closer. Likewise, Handel’s famous “Ombra mai fu” from Xerxes, with an achingly beautiful accompaniment by Ms. Sanikidze, and the beautiful old chestnut “None but the Lonely Heart” by Tchaikovsky, were both powerfully expressive.

His rendition of “Maria” from West Side Story was affectingly tender, but neither “Parla più piano” (The Godfather theme song) nor “Edelweiss” (from The Sound of Music) added much to the proceedings, heartfelt as they were. It would be a nice touch to invite the audience to sing along in “Edelweiss”, as Captain Von Trapp does in the movie!)

Happily, four encores covered more ground: the exquisite “En Aranjuez con tu amor” by Rodrigo and Lara’s ever popular “Granada”. For the famous Piaf anthem “La vie en rose”, he wandered out to the audience and sang directly to some delighted patrons. Then, rather inexplicably, he closed with “If I were a rich man,” from “Fiddler on the Roof”! And that was that. The audience definitely wanted to hear more.

To fill out what was otherwise a brief program with no intermission, Ms. Sanikidze contributed two charming piano solo sets. First was Chopin’s Impromptu no. 2, op. 36, which she touchingly dedicated to her recently deceased mother, and played with deep emotion and temperament. Later in the program she offered lightly moody interpretations of three of Schumann’s Op. 15 suite Kinderszenen. It was a pleasure to hear these pieces which showcased her deft pianism.

One came away from this recital with the distinct impression that all is not well with Mr. Calleja. His voice sounded darker and lower compared to what we have previously heard from him. There have been some well-publicized cancellations recently, and he has reported to his social media fans various health challenges affecting his voice. We wish him well in his ongoing recovery and hope to hear him again in full vocal health.