Anyone lucky enough to have heard and seen Jonas Kaufmann in
the Royal Opera's new production of Cilea's Adriana Lecouvreur
this autumn will know how compelling and refined his singing of
the Italian verismo repertoire can be. This terrific selection
of tenor arias includes two numbers from Adriana, as well as one
from L'Arlesiana, the other opera by Cilea that's still heard
occasionally, alongside extracts from works by Boito, Cilea,
Giordano, Leoncavallo, Mascagni, Ponchielli, Refice and
Zandonai. The only really well-known pieces are those from
Mascagni's Cavalleria Rusticana and Leoncavallo's Pagliacci,
which Kaufmann delivers with the same directness and perfectly
judged musicality that he uses for the far less familiar ones.
The colour, the elegance and the sheer beauty of tone in his
singing are truly exceptional, and the sequence ends with a duet
that provides a sample of a role it's rumoured Kaufmann will
sing at Covent Garden in five years' time – Giordano's Andrea
Chénier – with soprano Eva-Maria Westbroek joining Chenier in
his ride to the guillotine.
