This is a big voice with a warm Italianate tone and a fitting sense of the legato required for this repertoire. Verismo sobbing is kept to a minimum. Beczala knows exactly how to build the drama of an aria, as befits a pupil of Sena Jurinac.

Beczala simulates the hefty mid-range that he doesn’t naturally possess, and for many this won’t be a serious liability. The bottom line is that Beczala is enough of a star to convey the spirit of these familiar arias. I have no hesitation recommending this CD as an enjoyable listen as long as one doesn’t expect a rival to the great verismo singers of the past.

Just listen to the luminous ring to Beczała’s tenor in the open-hearted ‘Recondita armonia’...In an age when many singers are persuaded to take on heavier repertoire far too soon, it’s refreshing to read of an artist armed with patience. And it’s refreshing to hear a tenor tackle this repertoire with such apparent ease, for this is a simply wonderful disc...Beczała never needs to force unduly, yet there’s plenty of emotion to these readings.

There’s no finer tenor operating in the spinto verismo category today than Piotr Beczała...this is a highly enjoyable portrait documenting a musically scrupulous artist moving into a new phase in his career...Thoughtful artistry comes through in his ability to vary tone emotionally, even within the music of a single character...he manages freshly to illuminate some textual points even in this thrice-familiar material.

At 50, the Polish tenor is in his absolute prime: whereas others make a virtue of necessity and employ any signs of wear-and-tear to dramatic effect in this music, Beczała sounds in complete control of every interpretative gesture…his attitude to this repertoire seems to be less motivated by the smell of the greasepaint and the roar of the crowd and more by the desire to portray these characters as real, complex people.

He perhaps lacks the visceral Italianate “ping” for Mascagni’s Turiddu and Leoncavallo’s Canio. Even so, he phrases Calaf’s Nessun dorma aristocratically, and his voice, at 53, still sounds youthful for Lieutenant Pinkerton’s farewell to Madame Butterfly and Rinuccio’s paean to Florence.

All is delivered with the nuance and artistry of a singer with a nearly three-decade career under his belt but whose voice betrays next to no wear and tear.