Review: Dame Kiri Te Kanawa, Jose Carreras, the orchestra of Opera North ****

It was also a fine way to mark the 3.5m refurbishment of Scarborough's open air theatre. Carreras, who returned to the circuit after fighting leukaemia in the 1980s, sang with great control and colour and the orchestra of Opera North sounded as rich as ever but, perhaps inevitably, it was Te Kanawa who was the star of the show.

The New Zealand-born singer, 66, makes fewer appearances these days compared to her peak but nonetheless her voice was so clear, and so flexible, that she had the audience in her grasp. This is no easy task at an open air theatre, where performers have to contend with the breeze and the chattering of revellers, but the quality of her singing was immense. With extracts from operas Carmen and Turandot, to Art is Calling for Me, the Herbert and Smith number which has become one of her signature tunes, Te Kanawa shifted across the vocal register with ease. Indeed, when she and Carreras rounded off the first half with the Brindisi from La Traviata, the effect was tremendous.

This would surely have made for a stronger finale than the lighter pieces from Bernstein, Gershwin, and Rodgers and Hammerstein which dominated the second-half but the crowd didn't seem to mind. It was the biggest party the seaside town has seen in a while and they marked it with a cheer when Te Kanawa ended the night with Simon and Garfunkel's Scarborough Fair.