Lend an ear Andrea B how goo ocelli: d is he? Agin KENNICOTT Are critics too nice? What would a mean review read like? It's the dignity of art and not just audiences that suffer

Alittle substitute teaching recently put me in front of a classroom filled with very bright music students at Peabody Institute, one of the best conservatories here in the US. The subject was music criticism and we spent most of the afternoon reading through a stack of short, 250-word concert reviews, the kind of haikucommentary that has sadly become the norm in so many American newspapers today. I noticed, as we read together, that the students were generally hardest on my colleagues who were overall positive, if not very musically erudite. So I asked them: do you think that most critics are too nice, or too mean? Almost unanimously the answer was: too nice.

So, armed with that, I turn my attention to a new recording from Andrea Bocelli. The popular crossover tenor has released a new Pagliacci, venturing again into the harder, stiffer stuff of the tenor repertoire where his rather sparse voice is least comfortable. I remember putting on, quite by accident, his recording of Massenet's Werther, perhaps the most suitable role among the several operas he's recorded (11 trovatore, Tosca, etc). But Bocelli's Massenet made me do a double take. Every phrase was chopped up and nonsensical. The voice was strained and pale on top, unsupported throughout, and, while there were occasional moments of lyrical charm, there was little evidence of a musical conception, a controlling idea of what he was trying to communicate. It was almost unbelievably bad and I nearly drove off the road fumbling for the CD cover to check out who had the temerity to wield this mystery voice in public.

His Pagliacci is a little better, but not much. If I was inclined to be too nice, I would focus on his improvement. There are longer passages of several lines, sometimes adding up to a few minutes, when he does seem to be in control of his material. When he is working comfortably in the middle of his voice, there are times when he sounds like a real tenor with a pleasing nasal twang, a bit of ping and sometimes, for short stretches, hints of greater power in the voice. It is, in general, more boldly done but, alas, not consistently so.

That said, and in the full knowledge that some Gramophone reviewers like Bocelli rather more than I do, I'll take the Peabody students' advice and forgo nice. The primary thing that annoys me about Bocelli is that, in my opinion, he is being paid very handsomely to learn to sing in public. And he isn't learning very quickly. In fact, it seems quite likely to me that he is learning to sing in public so slowly that the few things that are pleasing about his voice will be spent before he has ever exhibited real mastery of any single operatic role. I'm more than willing to listen through a flawed recording to find the still radiant moments of a great voice in decline. But it's a very different thing to listen through a flawed recording for a few functional moments of an unschooled voice straining for the semblance of mastery.

If you want to write a really mean review, I've found, it's best not to limit yourself to musicians. So I'd put this question to Decca, the label whose red-and-blue logo once stood for something:

Why? Why sully the label of Sutherland and Nilsson, Corelli, Ghiaurov and Pavarotti, with recordings that, surely, diminish the brand? Not every Decca opera was great but, on the whole, the Decca imprimatur once meant something. Why risk decades of carefully-built credibility?

And, if you are absolutely determined to write a mean review, go after the fans. The problem with the Bocelli phenomenon is that it substitutes a kind of artificial singing for the real thing and most people who buy these recordings don't know the difference. Perhaps that shouldn't matter. Pleasure is pleasure after all and, if people enjoy Bocelli, what's the harm? To some degree, there is the worry that, in a world of limited resources, bad singing can crowd out good singing. The Met, fortunately, has said there are no plans to bring Bocelli to its stage. But other companies haven't been so fastidious. And, when it comes to recordings such as Pagliacci, it is rather a shame that Ana Maria Martinez's often charming portrayal of Nedda is matched with such an inferior Canio.

But mostly, I'd say the shame of the Bocelli phenomenon is that it dilutes the compact that ought to exist between the audience and the music world. On the one hand, musicians, composers and record producers (in an ideal world) strive to excel, to rethink and outclass the very best of what has come before. On the other hand, audiences complement artistic striving by developing their own taste, refining their own reactions and rewarding the very best. Bocelli may be a nice man and his story, as a blind singer, is an inspiring one to many people. But I don't think he is a singer who is worthy of the high profile in the opera world that his recordings and occasional staged performances have received. This is about more than just a few bad recordings. It's about the dignity of art.

That, if I were inclined to write a mean review, is what I'd say. And I'd probably regret it. (6