ALFIE BOE and Russell Watson were fortunate to have been born into their generation. For the better part of 50 years, and the heyday of Kenneth McKellar, cultured trained voices were strictly marginalised solely for musical theatre and the better opera houses.

But Messrs Boe and Watson are part of a select group, which internationally includes Josh Groban, Michael Bublé, Bryn Terfel, Ramin Karimloo and the gentlemen of Il Divo, who easily cross the divide between opera and the sparkling middle of the road.

In theory, there should be a large catalogue for such voices, but there isn’t and competition for the best songs is immense. Alfie Boe has taken to combining out-and-out classics such as Danny Boy and Glory Glory Hallelujah with pop standards including Many Rivers To Cross, You’ve Got a Friend and Georgia On My Mind, with more contemporary songs of which Richard and Linda Thompson’s The Dimming of the Day and Elvis Costello and Burt Bacharach’s God Give Me Strength suit Boe’s delivery. The material is very safe, but to devoted fans, Boe is indeed an artist one can trust, so the title track is appropriate.

In the search for new material, Russell Watson must have been beside himself when Claude-Michel Schonberg agreed to write and produce Only One Man. Schonberg and lyricist Alain Boubil are considered one of the greatest musical theatre partnerships of all time, having written Les Miserables and Miss Saigon. So to be offered an entire album of new songs is an honour.

Well, technically Too Much For One Heart, actually the most captivating track on the set, was originally written for Miss Saigon and To Break The Ice was a hit single in France for Schonberg a decade earlier.

But that’s splitting hairs. Any singer would love to be the first to be associated with new Schonberg-Boubil works. Perhaps inevitably, the highlight is an acoustic piano and voice version of the true classic Bring Him Home.

• Alfie Boe will play Leeds First Direct Arena on December 5 2014.