The French items suit her slightly cool voice better. There’s a classy, moving grandeur to Didon’s ‘Adieu, fière cité’, and a lovely wistfulness to her Mignon…in short, here’s a beautifully regulated voice negotiating challenging repertoire with ease, going smoothly through the gears. Vocally it’s very impressive

Each of these complex and diverse women spring to life fully formed and meticulously differentiated, and you never get the sense that she’s using every item in her new technical tool-box for its own sake...And what a chest-voice!

Her best are Massenet’s Charlotte and Thomas’s delicate Mignon; her Didon (Les Troyens) is a promise for the future.

Garanča’s voice is full and glamorous with an increased weight behind it, but expressive despite its density. For the lower notes, she has a chest voice that she can brandish like a mace.

it’s into this vengeful verismo repertoire that Garanca appears to be steering her career. She’s hugely impressive at it, admittedly, but her fans might have enjoyed some contrasting fragility.

A collection of mezzo standards with some enjoyable rarities from Saint-Saens and Massenet thrown in. Garanča sails through the gentleness of Mignon and passions of Charlotte…she has a natural affinity with French repertoire