Adrian Eröd

Adrian Eröd's career was always centered in Austria: first, he sang in several provincial theaters (notably in Linz), in 2000 he came to the Vienna Volksoper, in 2003 to the Vienna Staatsoper. He had a nice light baritone voice, and was very good in operas like Barbiere or Il turco in Italia. In 2009, all of a sudden, he decided to sing – Loge!, in a new Ring production at the Staatsoper. This was of course insane; while he played the role excellently on stage, it was both too heavy and too high for him, vocally, and when singing it in actual performances, his voice was at risk at every second high note, and he cracked a lot of them. (The recording posted here is from a concert where he sang only this single selection, so it goes smoother, and he cracks only once.)

He didn't singe Loge too often (just nine performances in two-and-a-half years at the Staatsoper, plus a few in Budapest years later), but it didn't do him good. Though he never ventured into tenor territory again, he had severe vocal problems from then on. Nonetheless he continued to give interviews bursting with self-confidence, where he was like "so many people told me it would damage my voice if I sang Loge, and look, it didn't happen". Well, it did; at least, I never again heard this once charming singer come anywhere close to his former vocal self.