After Luciano Pavarotti's week of misadventures at the Met and Jose
Carreras' recital in San Francisco tonight, I wonder about the future
marketability of The Three Tenors.

Tibor Rudas (the Zsa Zsa Gabor of promoters) may continue those
over-amplified arena events or he may ask Placido Domingo, the
still-functioning singer, to treble up.  But otherwise, it's Addio,
Tre Tenori!

The Carreras affair in the War Memorial - one-fourth of the orchestra,
two-thirds of the balcony occupied - was curious and disheartening.

Carreras never had a big voice, but back in time, it had a beautiful sheen,
his delivery featured a flawless, lyrical legato.  Tonight, sadly, it was
a different story.

Unlike Carlo Bergonzi or Beniamino Gigli at 70, who sang gloriously even
when they had no voice left, Carreras, at 55, still has some voice (darker,
drier than it used to be), but the beauty is gone.

Instead, he sings very carefully and somewhat laboriously (accompanied by
the competent and even more careful pianist, Lorenzo Bavaj), with a lot of
parlando, performing a cautious, sensible program.  It's neither thrilling
nor charming, although there was a group in the audience shouting their
approval, no matter what happened on the stage.

Songs by Costa, Albeniz, Denza, Tosti, Zandonai, Respighi, Ramirez,
Granados, Toselli, Lama and Rendine went by in a musical and visual setting
of sameness - the arm rising mechanically, the notes sung in a uniformity,
which deadened meaning or emotions.  Think of the umpteenth repetition of
a Three Tenors event offered as a small recital in a big hall, and you'll
have a pretty good sense of this concert.

Janos Gereben/SF
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