Life
Mario Frangoulis was born in Rhodesia, today Zimbabwe; most sources give 1966, some 1967. When he was about four, his Greek parents sent him to Athens to live with his aunt and her husband, because of the unsettled situation in the region, and he grew up there. He has recalled that the first songs he performed were Greek folk songs. In the mid-1980s he went to London’s Guildhall School of Music and Drama to train as an actor.
In London, Cameron Mackintosh cast him as Marius in the West End production of Les Misérables, and he later played Raoul in The Phantom of the Opera. He then turned to opera: his official biography lists private study with the tenors Carlo Bergonzi and Alfredo Kraus in Italy and further training at the Juilliard School in New York.
In 1997 he made his Greek stage debut at Karolos Koun’s Theatro Technis, first in Happy End and then, that summer, in Aristophanes’ Όρνιθες (The Birds). In 2000 he sang Tony in West Side Story at La Scala in Milan. Ancient drama remained part of his work: he played Dionysus in Euripides’ Βάκχες (The Bacchae) in 2001 and Achilles in Αχιλληίς (Achilleis), a production drawn from Aeschylus, at ancient Epidaurus in 2004. He has since performed widely in Greece and abroad.
Works
Frangoulis moves between opera, musical theatre, Greek art song and international classical crossover. In Greece, two early collaborations defined him. In May 1998 he sang in Mikis Theodorakis’s Το Άξιον Εστί (Axion Esti), the setting of Odysseas Elytis’s poem, at the Odeon of Herodes Atticus, with the composer himself conducting; he later called that evening a milestone in his career. In September 2000, at the same theatre, he sang the title role in Giannis Markopoulos’s Ερωτόκριτος (Erotokritos), a musical work based on Vitsentzos Kornaros’s seventeenth-century Cretan romance, directed by Nikos Koundouros, with Tzeni Drivala as Aretousa.
Internationally, Peter Gelb of Sony Classical brought him to a wider public, and the album Sometimes I Dream (2002) introduced his voice to classical crossover audiences. His official biography reports that he was voted best male classical crossover artist in 2011, and he has shared stages with Plácido Domingo, José Carreras and the Boston Pops. His Greek recordings form a separate path. Κιβωτός (The Ark, 2016) is a duets album with the singer Giorgos Perris. Γαλάζια Λίμνη (Blue Lake), released by Minos EMI/Universal in February 2019, was shaped with the lyricist Lina Nikolakopoulou, who supervised the album artistically; Aris Davarakis also wrote lyrics, Petros Klampanis wrote the orchestrations, and Frangoulis composed the music for most of the songs.
Legacy in Greece today
Frangoulis shows a Greek career built across languages and stages: London musicals, Italian operatic training, ancient drama at Epidaurus and concerts at the Odeon of Herodes Atticus and the Athens Concert Hall. For learners, his Greek-language album Γαλάζια Λίμνη (Blue Lake, 2019) is a practical listening resource. Choose two songs from it and listen to each one twice. The first time, note only the instruments you hear; the second time, describe the voice and the mood in Greek, for example: Στο πρώτο τραγούδι η φωνή ακούγεται πιο τρυφερή, ενώ στο δεύτερο η ενορχήστρωση είναι πιο έντονη (In the first song the voice sounds more tender, while in the second the arrangement is more intense). These model sentences are our own and are not lyrics. Compare your description with a partner’s.
Did you know?
- In The Birds in 1997, the choreographer Zouzou Nikoloudi, in his words, taught him how to fly.
- He has named Χάρτινο το φεγγαράκι (The Paper Moon) by Manos Hadjidakis as a favourite song.
- In 2018 he said his unfulfilled dream was to sing Verdi’s Otello at La Scala.
- He has said the warmest audiences he has met are in Greece and Japan.
Key works
| Greek title | Title | Year |
|---|---|---|
| Όρνιθες | The Birds — stage role, Theatro Technis | 1997 |
| Το Άξιον Εστί | Axion Esti — with Theodorakis conducting | 1998 |
| Ερωτόκριτος | Erotokritos — title role, Markopoulos | 2000 |
| Sometimes I Dream | Sometimes I Dream — album | 2002 |
| Κιβωτός | The Ark — duets with Giorgos Perris | 2016 |
| Γαλάζια Λίμνη | Blue Lake — Greek album | 2019 |
A line to remember
Το «Άξιον Εστί» στο Ηρώδειο, με τον ίδιο τον Μίκη στο πόντιουμ, το Μάιο του 1998 υπήρξε ορόσημο στην καριέρα μου.
To «Áxion Estí» sto Iródio, me ton ídio ton Míki sto pódium, to Máio tou 1998 ypírxe orósimo stin kariéra mou.
Axion Esti at the Herodeion, with Mikis himself on the podium, in May 1998, was a milestone in my career.
