Aix Festival: Paul-Antoine Bénos-Djian, a countertenor in melancholy mode

In 2018, the French countertenor appeared in the shadow of Philippe Jaroussky, whose Academy he was following (Vivaldi promotion), at La Seine musicale, before singing under his direction in the opera Il Primo Omicidio, by Alessandro Scarlatti , then in Giulio Cesare, by Handel , staged by Damiano Michieletto, at the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées in 2022. Warm timbre, radiant vocality, the ardent temperament of Paul-Antoine Bénos-Djian, his ease across the entire tessitura, immediately placed him on the list of the most promising singers.

A child master, the Montpellier native trained at his city's conservatory. He shared a music theory class with mezzo-soprano Marianne Crebassa, but it was with a percussion program that he earned his diploma. Paul-Antoine Bénos-Djian took his first real singing lessons when he already held a degree in public law, after auditioning at the Centre de musique baroque de Versailles, which he entered at the age of 22: "I had an instinct, but no technique," explains the former student of Isabelle Desrochers, who continued his training at the Paris Conservatory.

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