Joseph Calleja, Tenor

I went to see the Munich Symphony (Muncher Symphoniker) last night at the Residenz (Royal Palace). The pieces performed were mostly overtures or songs from various Operas and Ballets. There were 14 pieces listed in the program, 8 of which featured Joseph Calleja, a tenor from Malta. Mr. Calleja is an excellent singer, and projected his voice into this huge hall without any microphones.

People here in Munich loved him. After each piece that he performed people were still going nuts, and he had to come back out for more bows. On 8 pieces. And as the concert was over, people were going nuts for about 5 minutes, and then he performed 2 encores. This was an excellent, 2.5 hour concert. The man sitting behind me was from England, and his wife is German. They are here visiting her sister, so they decided to come see this guy perform because they had seen him perform in London just a few weeks ago.

Today I am taking a train to Augsburg to see the Augsburg Philharmonisches Orchester, who are performing Mahler's 8th Symphony. I plan on doing some sight-seeing as well, but yahoo weather shows rain there, so we'll see how it goes.