Given the scarcity of operatic tenors that augur a worthy generational replacement, Peralada has allowed itself to program in this condensed edition the most rampant young singers of this string: Xabier Anduaga, in the light-lyrical tenor bel canto repertoire, and Freddie de Tommaso and Jonathan Tetelman, in lyrical-spinto. But given that the man from San Sebastian announced yesterday that he was canceling the closure of the festival due to indisposition –at 28, last-minute casualties cannot be abused–, the tenors in the southern European contest ended in a duel between two.

In two recitals held in a matter of a week, the rivalry that the record industry has wanted to establish between the Italian-British De Tommaso, who inaugurated the festival, and the American born in Chile (and adopted after two months) Tetelman, who sang yesterday. Impossible not to compare them. Both made their debut in the Empordà summer and Universal Music had managed to release their new albums on the same day (August 12 last year): Arias, in the voice of Tetelman, released by Deutsche Grammophon, the label that signed him exclusively, and Il tenore , the album of arias that De Tommaso recorded with Decca Classics after becoming the first British tenor to sing Cavaradossi at Convent Garden in 60 years… His flow and vocal brilliance made him a phenomenon.

For the rest, both already have a link with the Liceu: Tetelman had exhibited vibrant and perhaps excessive high notes like Cavaradossi in the 2019 Tosca. Since then he has grown as an artist. At 35 years old, he has enlarged his voice and there are theaters that see him –with good eyes– as the heir to Piotr Beczala, due to his variety of colors and his dramatic eloquence. And what about De Tommaso, who in the next high school year will be Riccardo in Un ballo… and Maurizio in Adriana Lecouvreur…

Who would take the cat to the water in this edition of Peralada? It was unknown, taking into account the complex acoustics of the Carme church when it comes to opera arias in the voice of spinto tenors. De Tommaso had given everything wholesale: he started big and ended in the same way, without a solution of continuity. And Tetelman was expected to put more measure and feeling.

Accompanied by the pianist Daniel Heide, Tetelman opened the recital yesterday with the Tre sonetti di Petrarca that Liszt composed after reading in Italy the 14th century poet, who had fallen in love with a young woman in the church of Sainte-Claire d’Avignon… “Pace non trovo”… and neither did Tetelman seem to find it looking for the style.

He then entered with dignity into “O figli, o figli miei!” from Verdi’s Macbeth – a composer to whom De Tommaso had dedicated his entire recital – and exhibited treble notes that hardly correspond in intensity to his midrange, the tonic of a recital somewhat lacking in depth. With a white James Bond jacket, he went out to kill in the second part combining artillery with impostor pianissimi.

He sounded confident in Tosti – A Vucchella and L’alba sepàra dalla luce l’ombra – and sought emotionality in Torna a Surriento by Curtis that the reverberation of the church mercilessly returned to him. And, aware of the square he was on, he gave himself up and to the classic Granada de Lara (with echoes of ranchera) to conclude with a Tabernera from the port of Sorozábal who did an excellent first encore with Léhar’s El país de las sonrisas. Proudly he announced “Nessun dorma” –soon Turandot sings-, but he did not know how to finish the final tour de force. I do not care. The audience responded with fervor, adoring every inch of him. And even more so when he turned the mistake into a party singing Funiculì, funiculà and asking the respectable to clap for this Neapolitan tarantella…