As one of the fabled Three Tenors, José Carreras has performed everywhere from Los Angeles' Dodger Stadium to a park near Paris' Eiffel Tower, backed by lavish props and lighting.

Yet the setting was far less elaborate for his solo recital Saturday at downtown's Civic Theatre. With a couple of potted palms as visual enhancement, the 51-year-old Spanish singer was accompanied by pianist Lorenzo Bavaj in an enjoyable array of songs, primarily by opera composers.

Carreras turned a concert into an event, a performance into a love-fest. And he didn't need towering columns or dazzling waterfalls to do it.

Though not as great a vocal interpreter as Luciano Pavarotti or Placido Domingo, the other two tenors in the mighty threesome, Carreras proved that he's still a performer of uncommon warmth, sincerity and persuasiveness -- and a celebrity who knows how to please his fans.

The touring program, sponsored by Salt Lake City's Magicworks in conjunction with the International Management Group (IMG), was billed as "An Intimate Evening With José Carreras." While that may seem incongruous in a cavernous hall the size of the Civic, the concert was almost like a private get-together with 3,000 of his closest friends.

Some wore red ribbons adorned with Carreras' photo, tokens of the donations they made in the lobby to the Friends of José Carreras International Leukemia Foundation, formed as a result of the tenor's successful fight against the disease.

Audience members also gave Carreras nearly enough bouquets to fill a florist shop. And enough applause to prompt five encores: Gastaldon's "Musica proibita," Rodgers and Hart's "With A Song In My Heart" (the only work sung in English), De Curtis' "Torna a surriento" and "Voce e notte," and Lara's ever-popular "Granada."

The program booklet, however, was nothing to cheer about. It lacked biographical information about Bavaj, an impressively supportive pianist, as well as translations of the songs sung in Italian, French and Spanish.

Whether happy or sad, most of them were about love, and Carreras did his best to convey their emotional essence. His voice was a bit rough-sounding in the opening piece, Alessandro Scarlatti's "Gia il sole dal gange," where Carreras had difficulty mustering the elaborate trills that adorned cadences.

But his voice warmed up as the recital progressed, becoming brighter and fuller aside from occasional problems with strained high notes and a too-wide vibrato.

He handsomely shaped the familiar tune from Puccini's "Sole e amore," best-known for its incarnation in Act III of "La Boheme." He captured the tango-ish spirit of "Tengo nostalgia de ti," by the late, 20th-century composer Tata Nacho.

Carreras also conveyed the emphatic ardor of Leoncavallo's "Declaration," the elegiac beauty of Tosti's "Chanson de l'adieu," and the evocative mysteries of Ginastera's "Cancion al arbol del olvido," with its glintingly ambiguous tonalities.

Never mind that some of the repertoire -- including the three Puccini selections -- was also heard in his 1993 Civic Theatre recital, sponsored by the San Diego Opera.

On Saturday, Carreras was king. And where he led, his listeners gladly followed.

Copyright © 1998 Union-Tribune Publishing Co.