Frank van Aken

Already as a child, Van Aken sang in a church choir, and from age 17, he studied voice in Utrecht, in Den Haag and finally with James McCray. He made his debut in 1995 in Enschede with the Nederlandse Reisopera as Macduff; the same year, he was already Cavaradossi in Rome. After guest appearances in Novi Sad, Amsterdam and Rotterdam, he was a member of the Staatstheater Meiningen in 1996, and of the Deutsche Oper am Rhein (in Düsseldorf and Duisburg) from 1997 to 2000. Then after a few years as a freelancer, he joined the troupe of the Frankfurt opera in 2006, and stayed for more than ten years.

Guest appearances in Munich, Stuttgart, Strasbourg, Oldenburg, at the Vienna Staatsoper, the Bayreuth Festival, the Teatre del Liceu in Barcelona, La Scala, the Metropolitan Opera, the Teatro Regio in Torino, in Dresden, Athens, Mannheim, Wiesbaden. Surprising! Because although his voice was certainly good, his technique was certainly not, and he had a really, really bad wobble. His career petered out in the early 2020s.

His repertory included Aegisth, Herodes, Siegmund, Erik, Parsifal, Tristan, Tannhäuser, Aleksej (Igrok/The gambler), Laca, Max, Tambourmajor, Shujskij, German or Luigi.

He married the soprano Eva Maria Westbroek.

Reference 1: Kutsch & Riemens, reference 2: Van Aken's website

I wish to thank Rafael Vázquez for the recordings and pictures.