Cecilia Xuereb, wites:
Charles Camilleri's was a unique voice difficult to describe, hard to categorise. At his best, such as his Missa Mundi and Astralis, he could create a world of beguiling colour and beautiful lyricism while at the same time being thought-provoking. His work could also be full of wit and irony as in some of his 'nationalistic' pieces.

Camilleri has a number of firsts to his name. His Malta Suite, based on Malta's folk music, for the first time incorporated these tunes into a formal composition that while leaving his source tunes practically untouched, used them to express his feelings and mood: the nostalgic Nocturne and the blazing Fiesta.

His opera, Il-Weghda, was the first opera by a Maltese composer with a libretto in Maltese while his other opera, Il-Fidwa tal-Bdiewa, makes use of a classical Maltese text for his libretto. His Missa Mundi is one of the first attempts by a Maltese composer to express philosophical thoughts in sound, while in his organ version of Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition, he was the first composer to use this instrument for non-sacred/religious music.

He invented his own method of notation for the free rhythms whose flexibility was eventually to become part of his musical identity.

Camilleri continued writing till the end of his career and his numerous compositions include practically every genre, choral, instrumental, vocal, dramatic, sacred and secular, Maltese and cosmopolitan, simple and sophisticated. But in his later years he also did a lot of teaching, both in his role as head of the Music programme at the University of Malta and privately. Not only did he pass on his love and his bubbling enthusiasm for his art to all those who came in contact with him but he also influenced a swathe of young composers who have emerged locally over the past two decades.

Camilleri passed through many phases, periods and styles. When he returned to Malta after a rather long absence he was still experimenting with folk music, particularly that of the Mediterranean, creating a soundscape that he never abandoned completely. His Ombras, performed in 1996, still refers back to the 'music, culture and landscape' of the Iberian peninsula, while quotations from folk music keep appearing even in his more mature works.

Camilleri also had behind him a sizeable opus of juvenilia, mostly simple works with a strong lyrical flavour and a traditional form. But even while he was writing works like his Mediterranean Piano Concerto, he was experimenting with new contemporary techniques.

Modality, a-tonality, note clusters, 12-tone and aleatory music, and improvisation were not just words for him, but techniques that he studied and out of which he eventually evolved a style of his own that picked him out from among his contemporaries.

Camilleri's writing of works for solo individual instruments and for ensembles led him to a deep study of the particular instruments' techniques and colours. This enriched the orchestration of his later orchestral works although he continued to favour writing for smaller groups and solos, often recapturing the lucid style of his younger days. His Fantasie Sonata for Horn and Piano, although written in 2003, harks back to an earlier compositional style.

Eventually, he arrived at his spiritual phase that characterised most of the compositions of his last phase, even when these were not expressly spiritual or philosophical. The seeds for this phase can be found in his Missa Mundi and came about as a result of his great admiration for composers like Messiaen and his meetings with people like Fr Peter Serracino Inglott and Teillhard de Chardin whose ideas he was still exploring five years later in his Noospheres. Stravinsky was another great influence on Camilleri. As his work progressed he felt himself getting closer to Stravinsky's aesthetics of music.

Charles will be missed. To his wife Doris, who stood by him so faithfully, throughout his career but especially during his illness, and his children, Malta's music world offers its deepest condolences.