Joseph Calleja, a world-renowned Maltese tenor and cultural ambassador for the islands, has received stellar acclaim following one of his latest concerts in Australia.

In a review titled ‘The Maltese tenor earns Pavarotti comparisons’, writer-critic Michael Bailey said that Calleja’s performance at the Sydney Recital Hall on 24th October was “effortless”, “powerful”, and “expressive”.

“An imposing figure in his dark suit, Calleja professed to be suffering jetlag in his opening remarks, but there was no sign of that in the first half’s romanzas from Donizetti and Puccini. He raised gooseflesh when he belted, while his upper range possessed uncommon tenderness,” Bailey wrote on the Financial Review.

“The publicity materials linking him to great lyric tenors of the past, like Luciano Pavarotti and even Enrico Caruso, didn’t seem too overblown,” he continued.

Calleja’s performance in Sydney earlier this week is set to be followed by a string of other performances across New Zealand, Paris, Germany, Spain, and Denmark over the next seven months.

“New Zealand is beautiful, having landed yesterday afternoon after my concert in Sydney, I was astonished by the beauty of the mountains whilst flying in Auckland. Haven’t stumbled into Frodo or Gandalf yet, but might have spotted Gollum,” the tenor wrote on Facebook, sharing the review.

“The Aussies are great, only negative thing so far is that I can’t shake off jet lag and I’m only managing three hours of sleep at night, if I’m lucky. Meanwhile, I don’t normally post reviews, but since it’s my Australian debut, it was nice to wake up to this,” Calleja concluded.

Good luck for the rest of your tour!

Joseph Calleja / Facebook