Golden tenor at his best in Italian

It was a wise singing teacher who persuaded 16-year-old Joseph Calleja not to waste his vocal chords roaring hrough Mario Lanza songs, to put aside Be My Love and apply himself to the discipline of bel canto.

It is only a year ago that Calleja made such an impact with his Tenor Arias CD, recorded under the baton of Riccardo Chailly - a recording that thrilled rather than surprised, especially where the Maltese tenor's choice of arias was concerned.

This time around Calleja seems less determined to look like a minor cast member of The Sopranos. The shades have been taken off for the booklet shoot, and instead of La donna e mobile we have La mia letizia infondere vorrei from Verdi's I Lombardi.

It is still the Italian bel canto repertoire that best suits his fairly delicate voice. Deserto in terra from Donizetti's Don Sebastiano is a luscious lament, and in Elvino! E me tu lasci from Bellini's La Sonnambula he has the enviable partnership of Anna Netrebko.

The French offerings are less riveting. Arias from Gounod's Romeo and Juliet and Massenet's Werther need to be a mite fuller in their rapture, especially with Rolando Villazon's recent CD on the competition list.

Nadir's Je crois entendre encore from Bizet's Pearl Fishers sounds vocally unsupported, with Calleja's vibrato irritatingly speedy and at times in Pourquoi me reveiller the magnificent playing of the Academy of St Martin in the Fields threatens to drown him out.

Barbara Bonney, however, has no problems competing with Malcolm Martineau's elegant piano on her The Forgotten Mozart CD.

I had occasion, some decades ago, to search out the songs of Wolfgang's son, Franz Xaver. I was mortally disappointed. How could, I wondered, the son of the great Mozart have such feeble talents?

Despite Bonney's advocacy, The Forgotten Mozart does not convince me that FX deserves to be remembered. That is, unless cute songs about butterflies on forget-me-nots, served up with trite musical settings, are to be taken seriously. Considering the talent expended on it, this recording seems like going to the local movie matinee in your best Versace.

* Joseph Calleja, The Golden Voice (Decca 475 6931)

* Barbara Bonney, The Other Mozart (Decca 475 6936)