Friday 2 November 2012
Conferment of the Degree of
Doctor of Literature (Honoris Causa)
Joseph Calleja
ORATION
by Professor Joe Friggieri
D.Phil. (Oxon.), Ph.D. (Milan), B.A. (Melit.), M.O.M.
We are gathered here today to honour Joseph Calleja, the Maltese tenor of international fame who, even though he is
only thirty-four, has already sung thirty principal roles and performed on most of the world’s leading opera stages,
including New York’s Metropolitan, London’s Royal Opera House at Covent Garden, the Vienna Staatsoper and the
Deutsche Oper in Berlin.
Born in 1978, Calleja sang in the school choir at De La Salle College and was a member of the rock group that
performed in the school chapel. When he was sixteen, inspired by Mario Lanza’s performance in The Great Caruso,
he started singing all the film’s arias at home, hitting high Cs three or four times a day and ending up without a
voice after three weeks. He began his formal training with Paul Asciak, who immediately recognised the young
man’s exceptional vocal qualities and gave him sound advice about what to do and what to avoid. Together, the
seasoned maestro and the aspiring young artist spent as much time listening to recordings of the great tenors of the
past as they did going through the usual technical exercises that ensured controlled breathing and a sustained
elegance of the vocal line. Over a period of three years, Calleja’s voice developed into a flexible and mellow
instrument with both a distinctive timbre and a bright, ringing top.
Calleja made his professional debut in Gozo in 1997, singing the role of Macduff in Macbeth. Six weeks later he
was one of the winners of the Belvedere Hans Gabor competition in Vienna, standing out among 3800 contestants
from around the world. He went on to win the 1998 Caruso competition in Milan and was among the prize-winners
in Placido Domingo’s Operalia the following year.
Calleja made his Covent Garden debut as the Duke of Mantua in Verdi’s Rigoletto in 2002, and soon returned to the
London stage to sing Alfredo in La Traviata, Macduff, and what was described by the Financial Times as “a
thrilling Adorno” opposite Placido Domingo in Simon Boccanegra. In addition to his celebrated Verdi and Puccini
roles, Calleja has interpreted main characters in operas by Rossini, Bellini, Donizetti, Mascagni, Bizet, Gounod and
Massenet. His German debut was as Don Ottavio in Mozart’s Don Giovanni at the Regensburg Festival. His
outstanding successes include his debut in the title role of a new production of Offenbach’s Tales of Hoffmann at the
Metropolitan in New York where, according to the New York Times, “he gave his all, singing with ardour, stamina,
and poignant vocal colourings, and winning a rousing standing ovation.” His golden voice sparkles on his third and
fourth solo albums, The Maltese Tenor and Be My Love: A Tribute to Mario Lanza, which became the two bestselling vocal compilations on the core classical charts in the U.K., Germany and many other countries as soon as
they were released.
Calleja compares his meteoric rise to fame to that of a young teenager from Attard who is picked up from the local
playing field and asked to join A.C. Milan’s first eleven. Like any football player performing at such high levels,
the opera singer has to lead a life of self-discipline, avoiding all excesses and keeping his body in perfect tune,
protecting his voice, which is a very fragile instrument, in order to be able to make it do things it was not designed to
do. Unlike the football player, however, the opera singer cannot rely on others to cover his mistakes, or to make up
for him when he’s off-form.
As a prime example of total theatre combining a number of different art-forms, opera makes huge physical demands
on the singer. In Tales of Hoffmann, for example, Calleja was on stage for almost four hours; and he had only
fifteen days to learn Simon Boccanegra. In Calleja’s own words, “It takes a lot of effort to make it sound
effortless,” and there are times when he misses the normal life, like having a dog or spending more time swimming,
diving, snorkelling or fly-fishing – his latest water-bound hobby which he first practised on the west coast of
Scotland. For him there’s nothing sadder than an opera-singer whose only interest is opera. He has a huge interest
in origins – the origins of the universe and the origins of life on earth – and he loves astronomy and the unfolding
story of the natural order as a gradual process of evolution. Still, opera is his passion, the vehicle through which he
seeks to convey emotions that cannot be expressed by words alone.
Laurence Olivier once said that eighty per cent of an actor’s success consists in looking the part. Combined with the
sheer beauty and power of his voice, Calleja’s physique allows him to portray the widest range of operatic heroes
and villains most convincingly. The natural voice for a man is the baritone voice. The tenor voice is a freak voice,
an unnatural voice, capable of eliciting a deep emotional response among listeners – the kind of response that
greeted Joseph Calleja when he sang Nessun dorma at the Royal Albert Hall on the last night of the Proms a few
weeks ago, receiving an ovation that lasted for a full three minutes. Calleja confesses that few people would
imagine how nervous he was before the performance on that occasion. Not only was he the first tenor in over thirty
years to take part in that event, he was also one of the very few non-British singers to be invited to do so. As
expected, the performance was extraordinary, and Calleja was deeply touched and visibly moved by the warm
reception.
From the Dvořák Prague Festival to the Nobel Peace Prize Concert in Stockholm, from the Tivoli Gardens in
Copenhagen to Barcelona’s Gran Teatre del Liceu, from the Rossini Opera Festival in Pesaro to the Opéra National
du Rhin in Strasbourg, from Dresden’s Semperoper to the Teatro Regio di Torino, from the concert hall to the
compact disc, Joseph Calleja’s voice brings joy to millions. Whether he’s singing Rodolfo in Puccini’s Bohème, the
Duke in Verdi’s Rigoletto, Hoffmann in Offenbach’s Tales, or Edgardo in Donizetti’s Lucia, Calleja breathes new
life into his characters, transforming each performance into a fresh, unique and memorable experience, where, to
quote the American philosopher John Dewey, “every successive part flows freely, without seam and without unfilled
blanks, into what ensues… like a river,” and where “the enduring whole is diversified by successive phases that are
emphases of its varied colours.” (Art and Experience, 1932).
Coming back home from school on the school-bus when he was a boy, Calleja could not stop singing. He feels
exactly the same urge now as he did then. The real reason why he does it is that he enjoys it – and it’s a feeling he
wants to share with as many people as possible. When he’s shaving at night after a show, and it’s just him, a razor,
a brush and a mirror, the thought that he’s made people happy gives him a deep sense of achievement.
In every interview he gives, Calleja insists that opera is not for the élite few but for everybody. While it’s the
highest form of entertainment where the performing arts are concerned, it is still entertainment. He thinks of himself
as an ambassador of opera, and of his mission as that of promulgating and promoting this beautiful art among the
widest audience possible. The reason why opera has never lost its popularity is that it conveys in an extremely
powerful way the most basic human emotions – love, jealousy, hatred and the pain of betrayal. “It’s surprising
sometimes how much art imitates life,” Calleja told Lucy Coward on Classic FM earlier this year. It takes a voice
like Joseph Calleja’s, described by the New York Times as “one of the loveliest voices in opera right now – pure,
sunny and strong, but with a ringing vibration,” to express such basic feelings in a memorably striking way. It’s a
voice that cuts through the orchestra and reverberates in the theatre, a voice that Riccardo Chailly describes as
“harking back to a quality one thought we had long lost.”
Joseph Calleja finds an almost perfect analogy for the good voice in a good wine. Incidentally, where wine is
concerned Calleja is a real connoisseur. Give him a vintage Bordeaux from the Saint Emilion region and he
becomes your friend for life. Just as good wine depends first and foremost on the quality of the grape, so a good
voice is primarily a natural gift, something you’re born with and which you haven’t deserved. The voice’s timbre
corresponds to the wine’s tipage. A good voice, like a good wine, needs consistency or staying-power. Both require
technique in the way they are produced. Both need a maturation period and the right conditions in which to mature
before they peak.
Joseph Calleja is in no hurry. He knows that accelerating the process can very easily ruin the product. So he is
prepared to wait until the time is ripe for him to sing Manon Lescaut, Tosca, Turandot, Werther, Le Cid, Fidelio,
Lohengrin, Un Ballo in Maschera, Aida and Otello. There is, as he says, so much to look forward to. In the
meantime his tight schedule will keep him busy for the next couple of years and beyond. Surprised at his own
success and overwhelmed by the way audiences warm up to him wherever he sings, Calleja has kept his
unpretentiousness, his charm, and his feet firmly on the ground.
Joseph Calleja, the Maltese tenor, is making it possible for millions of people around the globe, regardless of age
and social background, to have their lives enriched, their consciousness heightened, and their experience intensified
by being exposed to the beauty and power of his voice. We as a nation are justifiably proud of his achievement.
The University of Malta is the first academic institution to grant him an honorary degree. It will certainly not be the
last.