As we noted in the Classical Music Agenda this week, Russian baritone Dmitri Hvorostovsky gave a nearly sold-out recital last night in the Kennedy Center Concert Hall, sponsored by Washington Performing Arts Society. It was an event that the music critic of the Washington Times predicted would be fueled as much by the singer's star power as vocal talent. Judging by the sighing of the majority of female patrons around this DCist, that was certainly true. "He's so cute," was the most common appreciation we overheard at intermission, with perhaps a comment about Hvorostovsky's singing appended.

The first half consisted of excerpts from Russian operas, both famous and obscure. The opening selection, the celebrated Procession of the Nobles from Rimsky-Korsakov's Mlada, featured members of Washington's own Cathedral Choral Society in the exalted cries of "Slava! Slava!" (Glory! Glory!), which are obligatory in any concert of Russian music. The group travels with Hvorostovsky to New York, to give the same program at Lincoln Center next week. They sang well, as usual, although their eyes were glued rather forcefully to the pages that contained the mass of complex Russian vowels and consonants they were supposed to sing. When Hvorostovsky took the stage, which he did quite forcefully after this introduction, it was with that pouty Russian gloom shown in the image to the right, as if he were assessing the audience's applause level. When it appeared to pass his standards, he broke into a broad smile, hand clasped over his heart, a gesture that sent much of the audience into a swoon.

Everything about the way that Hvorostovsky sings is dramatic, vocally and physically. He exudes charm, elegance, intensity, and it is a pleasure to watch and hear him sing. The voice is actually not as powerful as the presence, and there were moments in the opera selections, with those powerful Russian orchestrations, that the Philharmonia of Russia threatened to overpower the star singer. For the most part, conductor Constantine Orbelian did a good job of not allowing that to happen and provided a supple cushion for Hvorostovsky's voice. We especially enjoyed Aleko's cavatina from Rachmaninoff's Aleko, a pretty piece of music with dramatic punch at the end. (A local company, Opera Bel Cantanti, will give a complete staged performance of this rarely heard work, a one-act opera written as part of the requirements for Rachmaninoff to graduate from the Moscow Conservatory, next month.) Hvorostovsky was also exceptional on Prince Igor's aria "Ne sna ne Otdikha" from Borodin's Prince Igor. We certainly enjoyed the three selections from less well known operas by Anton Rubenstein, The Demon and Nero.

The instrumental selections were less pleasing, especially the prelude to Mussorgsky's Kovanschina, an opera we love. This music is intended to depict "Dawn on the Moscow River," but the extended birdcall and pastoral solos exposed some of the weakness of the Philharmonia of Russia's wind section. Orbelian tended to favor very fast tempos, which destabilized the ensemble and made for occasional sloppy passage playing in the strings. At the same time, Russian players excel at playing Russian music, and this was certainly the case overall last night.

In the second half, Hvorostovsky channeled Elvis for a performance that was more pop than classical, with a selection of Russian patriotic songs. A Russian acquaintance explained that the impressive number of Russian patrons last night -- and we heard Russian conversation as much as English -- were drawn not by the opera but by these popular songs, mostly from the World War II period. They are not Soviet songs, with a few exceptions, but they are definitely nationalistic. They are, we are told, incredibly popular among all generations in Russia at the moment, not least in the form found on Hvorostovsky's 2003 recording, Where Are You, My Brothers?. The idiom is not unlike that of other postwar popular music, Jacques Brel or Frank Sinatra, jazzy harmonies with the melancholy sounds of barroom piano and Russian folk instruments played by a Russian group called Style of Five. In keeping with the pop style of this music, Hvorostovsky chose to use amplification here (as did the folk players), which solves the problems of balance with a large orchestra, just without all the work. The attempt by opera stars to make themselves into pop stars can be disastrous, but for Hvorostovsky, the switch seemed all too easy. His adoring fans were only too happy to listen and watch.