Jose Cura is a star. He knows it, and his audience knows it, too. There's the teasing build-up before the first appearance. There's that first entry - during the music, so that the burst of applause which disrupts the orchestra's playing makes perfectly clear what everyone is really there to hear. And there's the overall pacing, the choicest numbers left to the very end, the climax achieved so very late, withdrawal enforced so quickly that all the fans can do is wish for more.

There was ballyhoo about tenors a long time before The Three Tenors became a marketing phenomenon of the late 20th century. But that particular ballyhoo puts a very special pressure on a younger figure like Cura. And the Cura phenomenon is doing rather nicely, thank you very much, with angles all its own of musical ethnicity (Argentinian inspiration) and achievement (doubling up as conductor on some of his own CDs).

In the rather more straightforward matter of the sort of opera gala that Cork promoter Barra O Tuama has been presenting in major Irish cities for nearly two decades, Cura seems a slightly variable performer. In the first half of Wednesday's concert with the RTECO at City Hall, Cork, it was the support act, Italian baritone Marzio Giossi, whose singing roused the audience to voice its noisiest approval.

Giossi's tone was a bit hard and constricted, but he showed an ability to spin a dramatic musical line with greater cunning than Cura. It's Cura, of course, who has the more remarkable voice, spiked with a penchant for heroics and sentiment, and often a blatant combination of the two.

The tenor's manner is cast very much in that starry mould which concentrates on the projection of personality. When Cura got really into his stride - the tender opening of Puccini's "E lucevan le stelle", the highwire negotiation of "Nessun dorma" - you could hear what all the fuss is about, but the stories and banter were like a protracted warm-up.

As assisting artists, the RTECO under Alistair Dawes were disciplined but often domineering. Not that Cura can be an easy man to partner. There was too much of starry individuality for that. But then, this was very much a case where the star was the show.