Elisir d'Amore, Donizetti

Süddeutsche Zeitung

Klaus Kahlschmid, Süddeutsche Zeitung

"After Giuseppe Filanoti and Pavol Breslik, Joseph Calleja has now stepped into the role as a dream casting, secure in singing and acting. Playing Nemorino as a kind of Chaplin-Keaton clown clone is not the thing for this tree of a man and his nobly vibrating timbre, And so in the costume and make-up and demeanor of a shy youngster we had the body of a giant. The not just marriage-hungry girls were allowed to undress him, and the sight of black, feel-good underwear instead of the usual body-hugging white variety – we could clearly hear it – still had plenty of impact on the ladies in the audience. He didn’t just sing his “Una furtiva lagrima” with infatuating beauty, but also managed the feat four meters up in the air on a lamp post."

Abendzeitung

Volker Boser, Abendzeitung

"Alessandro Corbelli…took some pretty flagrant liberties with the score. This was certainly not the case with Joseph Calleja’s Nemorino. Every note was spot-on, everything sounded magnificently harmonious, smooth, powerful yet restrained in expression. In his acting, the star tenor from Malta was a bit awkward, but left a powerful impression in his black underwear.” The heart of Donizetti’s opera, the aria “Una furtiva lagrima” was in the very best of hands."

Münchner Merkur

Tobias Hell, Münchner Merkur

"After delivering Jonas Kaufmann in ‘Fidelio”, the State Opera treated us to another Christmas present in the form of Joseph Calleja. …. While Borchev only played a part, Joseph Calleja totally identified with his role even when he passed on some of the director’s ideas preferring to use his own success formula. Like the late Pavarotti before him, Calleja also portrays Nemorino as a charmingly clumsy fellow. An inhibited dreamer, who needs some alcohol to loosen his tongue, so he can prove himself on a par with his Adina. If she had listened a bit more carefully, however, she certainly would have had to fall for him a lot earlier, because such a powerful, radiant and yet so meltingly gentle tenor sound was always a precious rarity."

Gisela Schmöger

Gisela Schmöger

“For the audience it was a great source of enjoyment to listen to the two of them together. Machadze thrilled us with her warm, glowing, virtuosic and flexibly guided soprano, Calleja with his powerful, house-filling, radiant tenor voice. As actors, both of them were also in top form. … Joseph Calleja delineated Nemorino as a naïve, lovable youngster, who nevertheless after tasting the love potion could switch over into a masculine, self-confident fellow with plenty of erotic appeal.” 

Süddeutsche Zeitung

Klaus Kahlschmidt, Süddeutsche Zeitung

“As a star guest from Malta at Prince Orlovsky’s party, Joseph Calleja put the crown on his recent performances as Nemorino with a star turn that brought the audience into spasms of enthusiasm.”