Four from the boys

By WILLIAM DART

Jonathan Lemalu's new CD is an impressive debut, although not quite deserving the superlatives some critics have heaped on it.

With Roger Vignoles at the keyboard, the young bass-baritone offers some strange musical bedfellows, opening with Brahms' Four Serious Songs and signing off with a selection on the lighter and nautical side.

Recorded with the sort of presence that makes you feel you're turning pages for the accompanist, the Brahms is forcefully delivered, alas with none of the refinement of a Thomas Quasthoff. Too often with Lemalu, lower notes lack tonal definition, and he makes surprisingly little of some key lines.

A Schubert set is more comfortable - Lemalu is very much the stern and troubled hero in Der Wanderer an den Mond, the "heavenly joy" at the end of Der Schiffer is there for all to hear, and he provides a riveting dramatic continuity to Der Wanderer.

After Faure's L'Horizon Chimerique, which suffers from French that is less than convincing, the collection ends in hearty mode; you can almost feel the salt spray in your face with John Ireland's Sea Fever and Frederick Keel's Trade Winds.

Vignoles, an exemplary partner throughout, contributes a rather ordinaire arrangement of the folk-song Lowlands while the English art song tradition is represented by the likes of Finzi's Rollicum-rorum, which is jolly fun for those who like that sort of thing (I don't particularly).

At a budget price, this CD is a bargain and Lemalu may well be on the brink of a major international career, but I would be interested to hear him giving us some of this material in five years' time.

It's been a bad month for tenors. Quiereme Mucho finds Placido Domingo tackling material that might well make Julio Iglesias blush. There's an unattractive edge to this voice that once thrilled millions, and state-of-kitsch backings don't quite distract from it. Still, if you've ever hankered to hear Placido with bongos, then Flor de Azalea is the track for you.

Jose Cura is younger, sexier (even with his shirt on) and his Boleros has him doing the lounge circuit. He croons Latin American jazz ballads of yesteryear which, after a few tracks, have a low-key and insidious charm.

Meanwhile, Ben Heppner's Airs Francais has the Canadian heldentenor in bite-size chunks from French romantic opera. Rousing stuff this, with Myung-Whun Chung and the London Symphony going to town on the various lavish orchestrations.

There are a few strained moments from Heppner (try Berlioz' Seul Pour Lutter), speaker-blistering spectacle (Meyerbeer's Roi de Ciel) and, for Wagner enthusiasts, a wonderful party game is to be had, sourcing where the Master of Bayreuth got his ideas from.

* Jonathan Lemalu and Roger Vignoles, Songs (EMI 75203); Placido Domingo, Quiereme Mucho (EMI57294); Jose Cura, Boleros (Warner Classics 8573858212); Ben Heppner, Airs Francais (Deutsche Grammophon 471 372).