Have You Ever Heard Of …
Born 2/23/01 near Liège, Belgium
Died 12/19/71 Brussels, Belgium
D’Arkor was a lyric tenor typical of the French School, with a facile top, a bright, lovely timbre, good breath control, and expressive use of voix mixte and falsetto, all in service to the text. His diction was exemplary!
Let’s begin with an aria you have probably never heard, from an opera that is likely unknown to you, by a composer of whom you may know nothing! Here is our tenor singing “Ah quel plaisir d’être soldat”(“Ah, what a pleasure to be a soldier”) from La Dame Blanche by French composer François-Adrien Boieldieu.
He made his operatic debut in 1925 as Gérald in Delibes’ Lakmé at the Liège Théatre Royal.
In 1930, he joined the Théatre de la Monnaie (Brussels) and remained there as a leading tenor until 1945. For the next 20 years he was Director of the theater at which he debuted. In his career, he sang mostly French opera, occasionally Mozart, and recorded 25 discs for Columbia Records UK from 1930 to 1932, plus a five-disc recording of highlights from Thomas’ Mignon with Germaine Cernay, conducted by Maurice Bastin.
D’Arkor’s repertoire consisted of 80 roles, including those from Italian opera, such as the Duke in Verdi’s Rigoletto, and from German opera, such as Lyonel in Flotow’s Martha, all sung in French.
To close this post as we began, let’s listen to an aria you probably have never heard, from an opera that is likely unknown to you. Here is André D’Arkor singing the Aubade from Édouard Lalo’s Le Roi d’Ys.