Buff baritones and taut tenors
Opera singers find they have to train more than their voices to get roles
Move over firefighters. Opera singers are the new hunks in town.
Increased competition for scarce entertainment dollars, the introduction of HD videos and rising demand for action onstage are causing a sea change in operatic circles.
Websites such as Barihunks and Hunkentenor are devoted to promoting both the physiques and singing talents of opera stars.
It’s one of the reasons you’ll find tenor Adam Fisher dripping with sweat four mornings a week at a west-end YMCA.
He has run the 20 minutes from his home to work out with weights for an hour before running back home and slogging through a six-hour opera rehearsal. He also does yoga every other day for flexibility.
“People are used to the Broadway level of perfection, where singers are fit and good-looking,” says Fisher, who appears in Toronto Operetta Theatre’s La Vie Parisienne, opening May 2. “Opera is making every effort to catch up to that.”
This is partly because the modern audience refuses to suspend disbelief when a singer fails to physically suit the role.
In 2004, soprano Deborah Voigt lost a role with the Royal Opera House due to her weight. The incident sparked a debate about superficial values encroaching on the musical purity of opera. Voigt ultimately slimmed down and was recast with the opera company.
Guillermo Silva-Marin, artistic director of Toronto Operetta Theatre, insists this is not about being superficial or dumbing down opera in any way.
“There is a demand for this. The general consensus is that theatrical truth must be paid attention,” he says.
“A consumptive Mimi doesn’t make sense if the soprano looks a little too robust.”
Silva-Marin calls the widespread belief that singers need heft for strength a fallacy and notes a need for performers to be healthy and agile.
“I have just asked two of my soloists to do cartwheels, after performing a cancan,” he says.
He admits to having quietly taken singers aside and advising them to lose weight and get healthy. These are performers he’d love to cast, but singing chops alone won’t win them a part.
Marshall Pynkoski, co-artistic director of Opera Atelier and a former ballet dancer, says the belief that you need to be hefty to succeed in opera has been debunked by medicine and science.
“It is muscular control, not weight, that supports strong singing,” he says.
Pynkoski keeps free weights at the rehearsal hall so singers can work out at every opportunity and he acts as a personal trainer to many. He also practises what he preaches by working out three times a week at the YMCA.
“No one is at their best pulling 100 extra pounds,” he says, “I want (singers) to be strong, to be their best.”
He adds that, “Most of the audience doesn’t know if the voice is good or bad. But they know if they have an exciting time.
“We have to make this rarefied art form into excellent storytelling for the audience. People are looking for something else, something more.”
Although he wishes opera was all about singing, baritone Vasil Garvanliev noticed a huge change about five years ago.
“A lot of people today are casting with their eyes,” says Garvanliev, who lifts weights to improve his strength and endurance. He worried about taking his shirt off for Opera Atelier’s Der Freischütz, but is so comfortable with his body now that he’s preparing to be photographed nude for an art show. He is also one of the “it” guys on Barihunk.
Meanwhile, tattoos haven’t hurt Aaron Ferguson’s career.
“Opera is casting more and more like film. You have to look the part physically,” says Ferguson, who got to show off his abs in Der Freischütz. “It’s a big advantage having the option of looking physically intimidating.”
Women are taking part in the opera fitness challenge, too.
Soprano Wallis Giunta worked out with a trainer for two months before she appeared this winter in the Canadian Opera Company’s La clemenza di Tito as a character who ran on the spot in athletic gear for most of the opera.
Singers know it’s no longer enough to “park and bark,” says soprano Rihab Chaieb.
“You can’t just sing anymore. Directors won’t hire someone who is too fat for the part or who can’t move.”
She remembers seeing Romeo and Juliet as a teenager when the two leads couldn’t embrace because “their bellies were so big.” Now a member of the COC’s Ensemble Studio, Chaieb runs five kilometres three times a week and also does yoga for flexibility.
When people see her slim frame, Chaieb often hears, “You don’t look like an opera singer.”
But she is.