There's a beguiling sweetness in the middle voice… an elegant legato, crisp diction as throughout and an unerring instinct about how to phrase Rossini.

Flórez is, of course, quite phenomenal irrespective of any hypothetical comparison with Rubini. The precision, fluency and evenness, the firm placing of the voice and its ability to flourish in the extreme uplands of its range are a delight and continual source of wonder. He attends conscientiously to words and their meaning; he moderates the habitual brightness of his tone to suit the more reflective phrases.