To the sounds of a joyful 18th-century overture, a breakdancer wearing bright red leaps and turns, throwing himself upside down to spin in a handstand on two hands, then just one. It’s thrilling to watch, his acrobatics unexpectedly capturing the spirit of the music. A brilliant dancer in an opera production is no surprise, perhaps, but if you’ve ever encountered Jakub Józef Orliński before, you’ll have guessed by now that this whirling figure is no stunt double.
He is also the same person who, later, sings with bewitching beauty about love and loss, joy and sorrow. Orliński’s voice is something special. So transfixing are his performances that more than 11 million people have watched him sing rare Vivaldi on YouTube, casually dressed, not expecting to be filmed, apparently hungover – and yet singing from the heart.
undefinedI’ve caught up with the Polish countertenor, 33, on Zoom, while he’s having his morning coffee (‘just a tiny one’) at home in Warsaw, preparing to embark on a 21-concert European tour for his Beyond programme. He’s fizzing with energy – and I don’t think it’s the caffeine; that’s simply his character. He sings, he breakdances, he lives life at full throttle, full of enthusiasm and curiosity.
Since his first album, Anima Sacra, in 2018, he has earned a reputation for digging up rarely known Baroque gems and giving them the Midas touch. Beyond is classic Orliński. ‘Not just lavish, but groundbreaking,’ wrote The Sunday Times, naming it one of the best albums of 2023.
Jakub Józef Orliński takes on Orfeo
But we’re not here to talk about Monteverdi, Caccini and their 17th-century friends. Orliński is excited to tell me about a rather different recording that’s out this April on his label Warner Classics. This time, Orliński has landed not on a clutch of arias, but a whole opera. And it’s not an obscure discovery by the likes of Saracini or Pallavacino, but a work that arguably changed the direction of musical history: Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice.
It’s the piece in which the German composer put into practice his desire to shake up the opera world. As he later explained, he wanted to offer listeners ‘simplicity, truth and naturalness’. Lengthy da capo arias and recitativo secco (unaccompanied recitative) were out; music that expressed the meaning of the words was in. The result was a compact, popular opera about Orpheus (Orfeo, in Italian) – ancient Greek hero, son of a Muse, part-human, part-divine and a musician of extravagant skill.
Orfeo ed Euridice: what's the story?
‘To be honest, I can’t deny it. It’s going to be great. Orfeo ed Euridice is Gluck’s masterpiece,’ says Jakub Józef Orliński. ‘It’s one of the most phenomenal pieces, not only because the story is beautiful, not only because the music is genius, but also because it’s presented in a very accessible way.’ The story is not short on drama either. Orfeo loses his great love, Euridice, and embarks on a perilous journey to the underworld to save her, employing his musical gifts along the way. Just when we believe he has succeeded, he does the one thing he’s been told not do to (turn back to look at her) – and loses her forever. Until, that is Amore, god of love, takes pity on the heartbroken, suicidal Orfeo and brings Euridice back to life yet again.
Orliński on the challenges of creating an emotional arc in opera
‘As a character, Orfeo shows bravery, true love and passion, and he’s a very dramatic character, which I love,’ says Orliński. ‘In Baroque operas, you have to have it all musically: there are slow pieces, fast pieces, low notes, high notes – so many things you have to do vocally. But also emotionally, you are all over the place.’ Take the start, for example, says Orliński, when Orfeo cries out for Euridice, who has died after being bitten by a snake.
‘His scream out for her is very painful, very strong. I have experiences of losing my grandma and my friend, and when I sing it, the sense of loss really strikes me,’ he reflects. That’s also one of the challenges of the opera: learning to pace its emotional journey. ‘If you start too emotionally, it’s dangerous. You learn by experience how to manage the emotions so that listeners will feel them, but as a singer you won’t be drowned by them.’
Jakub Józef Orliński: the model
It’s a skill Jakub Józef Orliński has been perfecting ever since that viral Vivaldi video propelled him to international fame – an unexpected bonus of his debut at the Aix-en-Provence Festival, where it was filmed. Success has followed success, with bookings at the world’s major opera houses and six albums to his name, plus appearances on the covers of Vogue and Elle (he’s also a model). And during that time, the character of Orfeo took hold of his imagination. It began back in 2021, when he sang at the Metropolitan Opera in Matthew Aucoin’s Eurydice, a contemporary opera which tells the story from the nymph’s point of view.
Orliński's enduring relationship with the story of Orpheus and Eurydice
‘In my opinion, it’s phenomenal. Eurydice is based on a fantastic play by Sarah Ruhl – if you have a chance, please read it. I strongly suggest it to everyone,’ Orliński says. ‘I went for a walk through Central Park and read it – and I was gone. It’s so beautifully written.’ While he was in New York – a familiar city, as Jakub Józef Orliński trained at the Juilliard School – he also headed to Broadway to see the ‘extremely cool and super-fun’ (his words) musical Hadestown, yet another modern update of the ancient myth. Fired up, Orliński was ready to turn to Gluck’s opera.
His first foray into the underworld was in Paris a year later, when he took the lead role in the revival of a Robert Carsen production that has attracted a host of leading countertenors – including Philippe Jaroussky, David Daniels and Carlo Vistoli – over the years. Even though Orliński had worked with Carsen on Handel’s Rinaldo at Glyndebourne, he wasn’t sure what to expect.
'Orfeo loses Euridice and he goes to hell'
‘The production was not as modern as I thought it might be, but it is very deep,’ he says. ‘I think people loved it. We had a fantastic cast. And after these performances, we did a few concerts in Paris with the same people, which was great as everybody knew the piece so well.’
From there, Orliński hopped on a plane to San Francisco. Same role, totally different production. This time the director was Matthew Ozawa. ‘His idea was to project brain scans while the brain does different activities – while it’s stressed, scared and so on – to show the different levels of what was actually happening inside your head. Carsen’s production was very literal.
'Orfeo loses Euridice and he goes to hell. In Ozawa’s, people don’t know if Orfeo really lost her or not. We are inside his memories.’ Cast your mind back to that whirling breakdancer in red: that was Orliński in this Orfeo. It was hailed as a triumph by the critics.
A new Orfeo recording
Doing two Orfeo productions back-to-back meant that Orliński spent six months immersed in the opera. Ideas sparked, inspiration absorbed, he was finally ready to make his own recording. He gathered together his dream team in Warsaw, his home city, where he’d spent his formative years singing in a Gregorian choir, skateboarding and becoming a breakdancer. His friend Stefan Plewniak was on conducting duty, while friends and fellow Warner artists Elsa Dreisig and Fatma Said took the roles of Euridice and Amore. ‘We were laughing that this is the Warner Classics Greatest, you know – boom! Super-nice team,’ he says.
Not that the story was quite that simple. ‘A fun fact is that in Paris I sang Orfeo at classical pitch, with A=430 (Hz). In San Francisco, at 440. And then we recorded it in 415,’ he explains, referring to the pitch the performers sing at, which is less of a fixed constant than one might imagine. ‘For listeners, it might mean almost nothing, but for a singer it is a huge challenge. You’ve put the whole role in your voice, your body, in that certain pitch. Suddenly, if something is a little bit lower or higher, it’s very difficult. Your muscle memory drags you up and down. I felt like I had to prepare the role three times.’
Taking on an off-stage role
Jakub Józef Orliński also had his work cut out for other reasons. As well as singing the title role, he took on the task of being a ‘semi-artistic director’ and was also involved with the sound engineering. ‘From the very beginning, I said to the whole team that I had a very clear idea of what I wanted from the piece,’ he says. ‘Of course, with Stefan – who knew this piece really by heart, word by word – we had to make our visions the same, so we were not fighting on the recording,’ he laughs. ‘We had meetings, and it was very possible. But we right away said to each other, “Let’s not be closed. If we hear somebody has an idea and it works, we go there. We really explore.”
‘With Elsa, for instance, it was phenomenal that I could ask anything of her. I could say, “Hey can we try it this way?” And she would say, “Sure. Cool. Done”. In the recording booth, I was playing a role of ears. I was aiming for different versions so we could pick which we preferred at a later date.’
Who is Jakub Józef Orliński as a performer?
Thoroughness is at the root of Orliński’s work. ‘Preparation is absolutely crucial. Because if you’ve prepared well, you can explore even more while performing. You can really feel the freedom of letting go and trying things,’ he says. ‘You learn how to be a logical singer so that by your voice and your breaths you can lead the whole orchestra.
'It means that if you do a rallentando at the end, the players know exactly where to put the chord below you because it’s logical. I’ve learned by experience to be free but also to be precise, and then if you have good musicians who listen to you, it’s like magic. That’s how you can really make music every single time and it doesn’t get boring. It’s still so alive. And oh my gosh, I love it. It’s exciting.’
Orliński the breakdancer
Given that music clearly gives Jakub Józef Orliński the emotional and intellectual challenges he craves, how does the demanding discipline of breakdancing fit into his life? ‘It’s super-important. To maintain the good shape of my voice, I also need to keep myself in good shape. I have to practise for my voice and my body,’ he says. ‘For example, even though Orfeo ed Euridice is a very short opera, I’m on stage for the entire time. No going out, no drinking water. You have to start the opera with a lot of energy, but you have to finish the same way.’
I’m reminded again of the dancer in red, spinning seemingly effortlessly but presumably using a huge amount of energy. ‘As the curtain was going up, I was already dancing like crazy in the middle,’ he recalls. ‘It was very difficult because I was doing all these flips and tricks and just had the overture before having to sing.’ None of it, however, was a gimmick – his breakdancing indicated that, possibly, Orfeo had descended into madness.
And that authenticity is surely Orliński’s secret. ‘I truly trust that if you as an artist believe in what you do and what you present to the public, then you send this honest energy,’ he says. ‘The audience knows that you are the character, and that you’re living the story. All the tools we use as singers – a pianissimo, a ritenuto, an accelerando – are not party tricks. As you long as you treat them as meaningful, you will touch people. You have to be honest with the art.’
Gluck’s ‘Orfeo ed Euridice’ is out on Warner Classics on 26 April 2024.
