Placido Domingo

I have just been watching on BBC2 a live filming of Verdi's Rigoletto with Placido Domingo in the title role. This is a massive part for the singer who turns 70 in January - or at least he does if you accept the official version of his age. Others tell us that he is even older. Whatever, it is a remarkable performance. He seems to have tremendous stamina to keep flitting around the world singing - as a tenor a or a baritone - as well as conducting and making his efforts for various charities. So what was he like as Rigoletto? We have only seen Act One so far. The remainder of the opera will be broadcast tomorrow. At the back of my mind all the time is the image of Tito Gobbi - surely the best Rigoletto of them all. Domingo has a lighter voice than Gobbi - he is a tenor turned baritone and he does not have the thunder in the depths that Gobbi had and Gobbi had sung the role over 200 times. Domingo was at his best in this production when singing the duets with his daughter Gilda. Here he sang with great passion, legato and tenderness. However, he was getting better as the opera progressed and we may see the best of him in Acts Two and Three.

Placido Domingo has been at the top of his profession now for nearly forty years. At his age most tenors have already stopped - or should have - but he seems incredibly ageless. Whatever I say about him I can never say that he sounds like an old man singing. It is other singers who have to match his stature as a performer and a professional. And what is more surprising, he does not seem to plague others with the tantrums and tempers of a top operatic singer. Everyone seems to find him wonderful to work with. I suppose that is as it should be but there is many a performer who has such an inflated ego and opinion of their own self-worth that they are impossible to tolerate.

I used to have a dream that one day I could sing Offenbach's Gendarmes Duet with Placido Domingo. Exactly how the circumstances could arise that might make this possible never seemed to appear in the memories of my dream. "We're public guardians bold yet wary and of ourselves we take good care.............." Yes, I can still picture it even now.

It is a pleasure to see and hear Placido Domingo and long may he continue to astound us.

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