Opera tenor declares: I am just a boxer

Opera tenor declares: I am just a boxer

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norman lebrecht

October 06, 2016

Dutch National Opera has kicked off a video campaign, You Don’t Know Opera, aimed at persuading young people that opera should be part of their lives and that opera people are, really, quite normal.

The first release introduces Frank Engel, professional tenor and amateur boxer.

Book your ringside seat here:

paul-newman-boxing-ring

Comments

  • Maria says:

    A useful secondary skill when dealing with certain sopranos, and perhaps the odd conductor?

    • John Borstlap says:

      Boxing singers defend themselves physically against Regieoper requirements, unless boxing is one of them.

  • Assimilate This says:

    Didn’t turn me on. But then, I’m not into sweaty male torsos.

  • Pianofortissimo says:

    A real Heldentenor.

  • JackyT says:

    Whoever thought this was a good idea needs their head examining. A more incongruous juxtaposition I’ve never seen. How to put people off opera for life, I’d call it. Beautiful singing too, what a shame!

  • David Osborne says:

    “Now the Great Bear and Pleiades” in an ad? OK, great, why not? Makes a change from Nessun Dorma.

  • John Borstlap says:

    It’s the new Holland, after the last round of drastic subsidy cuts of cultural institutions. Now the suspicious masses have to be lured into what has remained of culture, and since opera offers the greatest populist suspicion, the information that singers are like boxers must be quite reassuring.

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