The three tenors (act 2): opera's next generation invade charts

Once it was a genre restricted to the likes of Pavarotti, Domingo and Carreras belting out "Nessun Dorma" for football fans. But the rise of "crossover opera", where Puccini meets the pop charts, is set to achieve new heights with three more tenors.

A trio of solo performers, whose repertoires range from Verdi to Elvis, are set, for the first time, to feature in Britain's top 10 albums this Sunday.

The three singers - Briton Russell Watson and two Italians, Vittorio Grigolo and Andrea Bocelli - took third, sixth and seventh positions in a midweek album chart listings released yesterday. They are expect to stay in at least those positions by the time the official chart is released this weekend.

The popularity of the artists, who between them have already sold nearly 60 million records, will elicit groans from opera purists concerned about the transformation of classical arias into three-minute tracks sung alongside pop classics by highly polished performers backed by slick marketing campaigns.

The record by Watson, a one-time Salford factory worker, includes lyrics by the Take That singer Gary Barlow and a rendition of Freddie Mercury's "Barcelona" alongside "O Sole Mio" and "Volare", while Grigolo mixes Stevie Wonder with Mozart and Bocelli, Elvis with Verdi.

But there will be satisfaction among record company executives at the increasing success in promoting crossover opera. Sales of classical albums in Britain are increasing at a rate of eight per cent a year, with a market value of £300 million a year. Gennaro Castaldo, spokesman for HMV record stores, said: "Musical taste has generally become far more eclectic and there is a gap that crossover has filled very well. The target demographic is anyone from seven to 70."

Watson has sold four million albums and Bocelli, a blind Tuscan tenor, has become the world's top-selling balladeer with 50 million record sales in the last decade. Grigolo, 28, is a new arrival but unlike the other two, is also a working opera singer. He became known as Il Pavarottino (Little Pavarotti )in his native Italy. The tenor, currently rehearsing Verdi's Otello in Barcelona, signed last year a £1m deal with Polydor .

Record companies deny they are dumbing down classical music and sexing up its performers. A spokeswoman for Universal Records, which signed Watson and Bocelli, said: "These performers are bringing precisely this music to a wider audience.

"People are a lot more open to this sort of music and artists such as Andrea and Russell are meeting a growing demand."