He was born in 1990 in Warsaw.[1] After singing in a choir as a child, as a teenager Orliński joined a nine-member male vocal group and was chosen to sing countertenor parts in some Renaissance music.[2] He also became a fan of The King's Singers, who inspired him to take his interest in the genre further.[2]
In 2017, he sang the role of Ottone in Handel's Agrippina with Carnegie Hall's La Serenissima: Music and Arts From the Venetian Republic. He took part in the Karlsruhe Handel Festival where he sang Vivaldi's Nisi Dominus and excerpts from Handel's Dixit Dominus. In the same year, he made his debut appearance at the Festival d'Aix-en-Provence in Cavalli's opera Erismena.[9] His performance of Vivaldi's Vedrò con mio diletto from the opera Giustino received over 11 million views on YouTube by 2024.[10] Television appearances of Orliński, including the "Concert de Paris" at the Eiffel Tower and "Rebâtir Notre Dame de Paris", both with the Orchestre National de France and Victoires de la musique classique awards concert accompanied by the Opéra National de Lyon, have been broadcast to millions of viewers worldwide.[11]
He made his debut at the Frankfurt Opera in the 2017/18 season as the title character in Handel's Rinaldo.[12] In 2019, having been invited to perform Eustazio for the Glyndebourne Opera's production in Rinaldo, he was asked two weeks into rehearsals to take over the title role.[13][14][2]
Orliński's debut solo album, Anima Sacra, was released on the Erato label on 26 October 2018, with music by orchestra Il Pomo d'Oro conducted by Maxim Emelyanychev. It consists of Baroquearias by various composers from the Neapolitan School, including what is thought to be world premiere recordings of eight works.[15][16]
In 2019, he won the O!Lśnienie cultural award presented by Onet and the city of Kraków in the category of classical music and jazz.[17] In October, he won the Gramophone Classical Music Award in the category of Young Artist of the Year.[18] In 2020, he received the Paszport Polityki Award presented by the Polityka yearly in the category of classical music.[19]
A second album Facce d'amore, consisting of "a wide-ranging and well-chosen collection devoted to the many faces of love" from operas by Cavalli, Boretti, Bononcini, Scarlatti, Handel, Predieri, Matteis and Conti, prompted reviewer Brian Robins to commend the singer's "talents as a dramatic singer" and his stylish ornamentation, summing up his voice as "sweet-toned".[20]
In September 2020, he received the Best Singer of the Year title in Berlin awarded by the readers of the Opernwelt magazine.[21] He made his debut at the Metropolitan Opera, NYC, in December 2021 after having been chosen to play the role of Orpheus’s alter-ego in Matthew Aucoin’s opera Eurydice.[22][23]
In 2021, he received a Grammy Award nomination in the Best Opera Recording category for his performance in Handel: Agrippina conducted by Maxim Emelyanychev (Il Pomo d'Oro).[24] That year he also performed early music by Italian composers with Il Pomo d’Oro ensemble, conducted by Zefira Valova, at the Théâtre du Capitole in the southwestern French city of Toulouse.
Having taken the role of Gluck's Orfeo into his repertoire, he has sung in the opera in several venues; for the production by Matthew Ozawa at San Francisco Opera in November 2022, Orliński opened the opera dancing a break routine. One reviewer commented that he was "cast to perfection", and with soprano Meigul Zhang "sang and acted wonderfully, with piquant, youthful urgency".[27]
In 2023, he made a guest appearance in Kasia Nosowska's single Zimny (Cold) on her eighth studio album entitled Degrengolada.[29]
Personal life
Orliński is a champion break-dancer and is a member of the breakdancing collective Skill Fanatikz Crew.[30][31] He is known to occasionally combine breakdancing with opera.[32] He has also modelled for fashion brands such as Nike and Levi's.[13] In 2019, he took part in a photo shoot at the Royal Baths Park in Warsaw and subsequently appeared on the cover of the first edition of Vogue Poland Man magazine.[33][34] In 2022, he was the subject of an Arte documentary film Jakub Józef Orliński. Music for a While directed by Martin Mirabel.[35]