« JI don’t have a bad profile, I’m good-looking,” says Jakub Jozef Orlinski to the photographer at Point which makes him strike a pose. No bravado in this observation, just the strength of the evidence… and the insolent ease of a 30-something with 155,000 followers on instagram. The session takes place under the gold of the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées, where the Polish countertenor, international star of baroque singing, embodies Gluck’s Orpheus these days (with Eurydice Regula Mühlemann in the role).
An enchanted setting in addition to those unveiled on its social networks: the Royal Opera House in London (#Let’s Barock), the Metropolitan Opera in New York… Between two breakdance poses, he also posts, from the theater on avenue Montaigne, a What will I do without Eurydice ? to draw tears.
This eclecticism, Jakub Jozef Orlinski has always practiced it. As a child in Warsaw, he was as interested in painting and architecture (the professions of his parents and grandparents) as in ancient myths. From the age of 9, he sang in an amateur choir, but mostly listened to rap and discovered as a teenager a talent for breakdance, a discipline in which he won several prizes. At the same time, he joined the prestigious Frédéric Chopin Conservatory in Warsaw, then the Julliard School in New York. “Why wouldn’t it be compatible?” “, he asks when we are surprised by this unusual mixture. The young man is used to being where you least expect him: while in France Dominique Visse and Philippe Jaroussky have for decades reconciled the general public with the voice and repertoire of countertenors, he is a figure a pioneer on the Polish scene.
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Today, breakdancing is still part of her life. “I train once every two days, he explains, it’s good for my physical and mental health and after training, I’m bursting with ideas and energy. But extreme sports put the body to the test and that’s not always compatible with singing. There are movements that I can’t make before singing, muscles that I can’t contract if I want to find this or that sound within me…” But finding the beautiful sound is his strongest aspiration: “My passion , it’s lyrical singing, the rest is to make me happy… But the challenge of my life is to sing, again and again, and to become infinitely better. »
Stage ease
The fact remains that Orlinski’s sporting practice gives him an unusual ease on stage: “I seek the emotional state that suits each character, and mastering my body helps me a lot. It is my instrument. For example for Orpheus, it is particularly difficult, because playing sadness is boring. It’s an emotion that lacks relief, you have to develop a journey, a whole spectrum from lamentation to anger… a range of emotions that comes from a wounded love. Orpheus and Eurydice is – according to the singer – “the most beautiful of myths”: “I learned to think of it differently thanks to a contemporary opera, Eurydice by Matt Aucoin, which was written by playwright Sarah Ruhl from the perspective of Eurydice. Since I sang it in New York, I consider Gluck’s work differently, the two interpretations enrich each other. »
It is with the same artistic rigor that the singer approaches his recordings: his recent album of Polish vocals on Warner Classics, Farewells, testifies to a patient work of research and a real humility: “It is not true to say that everything is transposable for a countertenor voice. Sometimes I have to go through twenty or twenty-five tunes to find four that deeply suit my voice. There is work to find these works… They are diamonds, pearls. The reference to jewelry is no coincidence: after collaborations with Nike and Levi’s, he inspired a collection of jewelry from the PUN brand. Her name ? Eternal soulfrom the title of his sparkling disc of 18th century religious tunese century . Gold and the sacred: isn’t that the very spirit of Baroque?
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Orpheus and Eurydice by Gluck, directed by Thomas Hengelbrock, directed by Robert Carsen, with Regula Mühlemann and Elena Galitskaya. Until 1is october. www.theatredeschampselysees.fr