What you need to know:
The former Vienna Opera singer Johannes Pietsch won the Eurovision Song Contest last night with a quiet ballad, Wasted Love.
Using the stage name ‘JJ’, he produced a clear falsetto tone and accomplished stage intelligence. In style and training he was a cut above the rest (not that this matters a whit amid the Eurovision excesses). The contest as a whole was unusually subdued.
JJ Pietsch has appeared at the Vienna Staatstoper 11 times in the Magic Flute, 3 times in Billy Budd, once in Macbeth and 8 times in a Mahler adaptation, Von der Liebe Tod, by Calixto Bieito. He usually sang countertenor.
Pietsch, 24, was born in Vienna to a Filipina mother and a father who worked in IT.He spent most of his childhood in Dubai. Returning to Vienna in his teens, he studied music and art at MUK, the private Music and Arts University of the City of Vienna.
Bogdan Roscic, director of the Vienna State Opera, posted congratulations: ‘From The Magic Flute to winning the Eurovision Song Contest—that’s a story that could only happen in Austria. But anyone who can keep their nerve on the stage of the Vienna State Opera can also handle a performance in front of 150 million people. JJ did a fantastic job. On behalf of all my colleagues, I congratulate him wholeheartedly.’
The post Surprise? Vienna Opera singer wins Eurovision appeared first on Slippedisc.
