Music Reviews : Recital by Lopez-Yanez

Jorge Lopez-Yanez clearly loves to sing, not just a little, but a lot. He strode confidently onstage at Ambassador Auditorium on Monday night with no sign whatever of tenorial trepidation.

To put to rest any doubts on the listener’s part that he has high notes to burn, Lopez-Yanez opened with the aria “Si, ritrovarla” from Rossini’s “La Cenerentola,” followed it with the first-act cavatina and cabaletta “Ecco ridente” from “Barbiere di Siviglia,” took a breather and returned for the aria of the nine high C’s “Ah! mes amis!” from Donizetti’s “La Fille du Regiment.”

Later on, he vocalized securely through the Duke’s arias from Verdi’s “Rigoletto,” more happily in the callow “Questa o quella” and “La donna e mobile” than in the deeper “Parmi veder le lagrime.”

What the young Mexican lyric tenor doesn’t yet have nailed down are the indispensable elements that have so often made great artists of those who don’t have high C’s to burn: refined, elegant, patrician phrasing and invariably pointed and clear tone in the middle voice --which is where the important music lies anyway--real legato line everywhere, and a permanent investment in the fact that the artist exists to demonstrate the music, rather than the reverse. With a singer this talented, there is no danger of going unnoticed.

Rapid passages aren’t so easy or so much in the musical framework for the tenor as yet, either, and at present his honeyed soft singing can get so precious that it fades out of audibility altogether.

The sound at the top is steady, ringing, exciting and, alas, just pressured enough that Lopez-Yanez is seldom able to release one of his climactic high notes without throwing his head back and emitting the tiniest little “yip!”

Familiar Neapolitan songs and the “low” aria from Adam’s “Postillon de Longjumeau” found the tenor at a disadvantage because they don’t run high enough often enough. Six Mexican songs, wonderfully arranged by his pianist wife, Ruth Lopez-Yanez, who accompanied, were warmly and affectionately sung.