Despite the cold wind and rain last week, Jonathan Lemalu was relishing being back in Dunedin with his wife, Sandra Martinovic, and their son Joshua, who is nearly 4.
They were visiting his parents, catching up with old friends and acquaintances and showing Joshua his father's old haunts.
As we talked in an Octagon cafe, Charlie Campbell, a long-time supporter of young Dunedin singers, spotted him and came to welcome him back and congratulate him on his successful career as an international opera singer, much to Lemalu's delight.
"People who've made a name for themselves must love coming back to Dunedin," he reflected.
He certainly does, and not only to spend time with his family. Even though he's been away 12 years, Dunedin, where he grew up and studied and became a local favourite, is one of the few places in the world where he feels he can just chill out.
The bass-baritone has recently finished a role in a new opera, Jake Heggie's Moby Dick, in Adelaide and is about to tour with the NZSO, singing Ode to Joy in Beethoven's ninth symphony and in Gareth Farr's new work Kaitiaki.
Then he goes to China to sing Mahler's Symphony No 8 before returning to sing at the Rugby World Cup, should any of the teams whose anthems he has to learn - England, France or Argentina - make the finals.
Before the end of the year he sings in Japan, and his calendar is booked up for the next three to four years.
But despite his fame, Lemalu still considers coming home to Dunedin almost a spiritual experience because he feels connected to the place and the people.
"Sandra's always laughing, because no matter where we are there's always someone we bump into I went to school with or who saw me in the paper, my old piano teacher from the '70s, or people who knew me or helped me out when I was a student," he said.
"Going to First Church for me is not just a spiritual experience. It's part of my family - these people were at my christening, these people were at my first concerts, these people were at my farewell concert, these people are always asking after me every Sunday when Mum and Dad are at church."
Lemalu now lives in central London, but he spends two-thirds of his time travelling the world to perform, and now has a network of friends around the globe.
"It's an inherently nomadic life. If you want to be at the top of this business or want a good living, you have to be prepared to travel and that means, I guess, knowing how to continue or create a life for yourself wherever you are.
"We need to know where the supermarkets, banks, trains and tubes are, and now we need to know where playgrounds and children's cinemas and things are. I guess we've just got really good at creating our lives at wherever our suitcases land, in a way."
His wife and child often join him, but Martinovic, who comes from Croatia, has a busy life herself as a mezzo-soprano and freelance theatre director. She is a founder of Fusebox Opera Theatre in London, which specialises in contemporary works.
"When Sandra had Joshua, I knew there needed to be a time when she could be creative as well, as we are both creative people. If I have a creative outlet and she doesn't, it doesn't really work for us as a team.
Now she is being more creative you can tell her zest for that is really contagious," he said.
He admires her skill as a director and likes her to come to general rehearsals of his operas because she always has pointers about his performance he finds invaluable.
In London, they have a network of nannies and babysitters, but Joshua goes to most of his father's concerts and operas. He has his own little violin and loves singing and dancing and his proud father believes he will also be a creative person.
He also hopes his son's early experience of travel will make him more sensitive to different cultures.
To have a busy life with children, a successful career and remain positive means being really organised he says.
Although he may have been disappointed to be away when Joshua's first tooth came through and has missed one of his three birthday parties, and despite often having to keep in contact via the internet, he thinks the toughness of his life has some advantages because of the flexibility of being freelance.
"I loved the fact that I was often one of the only fathers that went to the nursery days in the middle of the week - I could go to his graduation from nursery [school]. It's a pretty blessed business to be able to travel the world, and to see your family and your friends around the world."
He also feels lucky in his career. Of the 32 people in his post-grad year at the Royal College of Music in London, he is one of only three doing solo work and perhaps another half dozen doing chorus or ensemble work.
Many of the talented singers he studied with didn't get a break or could not get a visa to stay.
"I think I was very fortunate when I was at college. I got a nice buzz and that turned into agents and that turned into record deals. It wasn't necessarily for the finished product but it was for someone who had potential and that potential had been recognised.
"It was kind of, here's a minor role with a very good conductor; here's a cough and a spit with a great opera house to have the door opened. I was the new kid on the block and had to prove myself to get the bigger roles."
People may talk about talent or the X factor, but hard work is essential, he said.
Lemalu was taken on by agents Askonas Holt, who look after many big-name singers.
They helped him get a visa to stay in the UK. At the time, he had just made debuts with some big opera houses, won several awards, and his CDs were out in the shops, so he was becoming known.
However, the rules apply both ways, he says.
Although he sang the role of Queequeg, the Polynesian harpooner, to great acclaim in the world premier of Jake Heggie's opera Moby Dick in Dallas, Texas, last year, he says he probably wouldn't have got the same role in the Adelaide production, if he hadn't come under the Australasian quota - in this part of the world they try to use as many local singers as possible.
He will also be singing the role in San Diego and San Francisco.
Although Lemalu comes across as laid-back and is put off by blatant, cut-throat competition, he still considers himself competitive.
"Maybe there are different types of competitiveness. The fact that I will try really hard to prepare my music and my voice perfectly for a role is my way of being competitive.
"I want to make sure there are no wrong notes, that it's linguistically perfect, that I know it off the book so if they ask me to climb up a ladder or scale a masthead, as they did in Moby Dick, while singing, I can.
"It's got to be prepared and it's got to be right and you've also got to be open to what they want you to do, like holding a note longer or doing something differently. Being competitive is being able to say I can do whatever you want me to do."
Despite his laid-back approach, he says it's important to be ultra-organised and get work done early, and be prepared. However, he admitted it could be tough when he had committed to something and something better came up.
"I also think your reputation is important - reputation is a good colleague and when you sign on the dotted line, therefore you have to be there - which I guess means you shouldn't be too quick to sign on the dotted line!"
Besides enjoying his career, family life is enormously important to Lemalu.
"It kind of humbles you in a way. You could be competitive and successful and have no-one to go home to."
He feels his successes and awards, including a Grammy last year for his part in a recording of Britten's Billy Budd, debuts at Covent Garden, the Met in New York and a four-disc recording contract with EMI, were sweeter since he met Martinovic, because he could share the enjoyment and pride in his achievements.
In some ways he didn't enjoy it alone.
"None of that stuff means I've made it, but it means you must be doing something right."
Although only 35, Lemalu talks about his legacy in the same terms as he used to talk about creating a package of the vocal, the aesthetic and the linguistic.
"I guess now I'm into my career it's about being really proud of everything you do. I want to be remembered as, yes, he was a very good singer, a very nice guy, a good colleague, professional, and all those things take time."
Hear him
In its "Odes to Joy" concert, the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Pietari Inkinen, will perform Kaitiaki by Gareth Farr with words by Witi Ihimaera and Beethoven's Symphony No 9 "Choral Symphony" in the Dunedin Town Hall on Wednesday, September 28 at 6.30pm.
The concert features Madeleine Pierard, soprano; Sarah Castle, mezzo-soprano; Simon O'Neill, tenor; Jonathan Lemalu, bass; and the City of Dunedin Choir.
