“As for stardom, God forbid it.” [1] This is a striking statement from a man who chose the stage as his profession and has appeared before audiences around the world for decades. Yet this sentence, spoken in a 1994 interview, may well be one of the keys to understanding Kolos Kováts, the Kossuth Prize–winning bass. According to one oft-cited distinction, there are two kinds of opera singers: one who raises his voice in the theatre cafeteria, and another who does so on stage. No one has ever heard Kolos Kováts speak loudly. He built his national and international career quietly, step by step, with an almost self-evident naturalness. For successive opera house directors – sometimes changing with notable frequency – he represented a solid foundation upon which an ensemble could reliably be built. He has perhaps never cancelled a performance; on the contrary, thanks to his thorough preparation, he has rescued numerous productions. Most recently, at nearly seventy years of age, he stepped in as Sarastro in the new production of The Magic Flute at the Erkel Theatre. His beautiful voice and innate musicality are gifts, but his impeccable vocal technique is clearly the result of sustained and disciplined work. Kováts’s more than half-century-long career has been free of loud scandals; his name is nowhere to be found on the covers of tabloid magazines. Quietly, he has served – and continues to serve – Hungarian culture from Moscow to New York.
Kolos Kováts was born on 31 January 1948 in Mohács. Shortly thereafter, the family moved to Siklós, where his father – who was imprisoned for several years due to his involvement in the events of 1956 – worked as the chief physician of the local hospital. “I was eight years old when I accidentally found, among my grandparents’ belongings, an old, unused horn gramophone. There was only a single pre-war record on its turntable, and since there was nothing else, I listened to it until it was completely worn out. In order to make this nerve-rackingly loud activity of mine more tolerable for those around me, my parents bought me opera records that also suited their own taste” [2], the artist recalled in his inaugural lecture at the Hungarian Academy of Arts in 2022. From 1957 onwards, Kováts continued his primary education in Pécs, at a science-oriented secondary school. He enjoyed singing in front of his classmates, and the school almost “expected” the seventeen-year-old to apply for the third Ki mit tud? (Who Knows What?) talent competition, which at the time captivated the entire country. Kováts ultimately won second prize with King Philip’s famous aria, but the competition yielded an even more significant outcome for his future career: it was there that his voice was discovered by Dr. Andorné Gáspár, née Auguszta Slezák, a singing teacher in Pécs and the niece of the legendary Moravian tenor Leo Slezak, who undertook to become his first professional vocal instructor.
After completing his secondary-school final examinations in 1966, and barely eighteen years of age, Kováts was admitted to the Franz Liszt Academy of Music following an audition, on the recommendation of Miklós Forrai and Miklós Lukács, then director of the Hungarian State Opera. His principal teacher became Mrs Ferenc Révhegyi. “On the very first day of the entrance examination, an elderly lady approached me. Everyone called her simply Aunt Olga. Her age was offset by a red coat, a white hat, and countless jangling bracelets. Grasping my arm, she whispered into my ear in an unmistakably authoritative, veiled bass voice: ‘My boy, you will be my student – do not let yourself be tempted away.’ (…) I could have studied with another teacher, but I remained her pupil until the end of her life. I never regretted it. I trusted her, for she was the first to lay a hand on me without any connections whatsoever, guided solely by professional considerations.” [3]
By completing the five-year programme in a condensed format, Kováts graduated in four years. At his 1970 graduation performance, he appeared as Raimondo in Lucia di Lammermoor and as King Philip II in Don Carlos. “Kolos Kováts, a student of Révhegyi, is among them. (…) It can be stated with complete confidence that this bass voice is one of the most exceptional vocal materials to have emerged from the Academy in the past two decades. If his stage presence matures (his voice already has), if the beauty and fullness of his singing develop into a world-class phenomenon equal to these same qualities of his voice, then he may achieve international stature. We hope this will indeed be the case” [4], wrote András Rajk following the examination concert.
Since the death of Mihály Székely in 1962, the Hungarian State Opera had been in need of –and actively searching for – a successor who might fill the place of the legendary artist both within the institution and in the hearts of the audience. Miklós Lukács and chief stage director András Mikó held leadership positions not only at the Opera House but also taught at the Academy of Music, where they worked deliberately to strengthen the theatre’s ensemble. During the 1970s, four young Hungarian basses were entrusted with leading roles: alongside Ferenc Begányi, László Polgár, and József Gregor, Kolos Kováts was among them.
In the summer of 1970, the newly graduated opera singer and certified voice teacher was engaged by the Hungarian State Opera as a scholarship soloist, and one year later became a full member of the company. His first roles were in contemporary Hungarian operas: the Priest in Sándor Szokolay’s Hamlet (4 October 1970) and the Voice of the Lord in György Ránki’s Ember tragédiája (The Tragedy of Man) (6 December 1970). Between these two debuts, the 3rd International Ferenc Erkel Singing Competition was held in Budapest, which Kováts won; only a few weeks later, he returned from Karlovy Vary with second prize at the 5th Antonín Dvořák International Singing Competition. Shortly thereafter, his international career – simultaneously taking shape in both East and West – was propelled by two further major successes: first prize at the 6th Rio de Janeiro International Singing Competition (1973) and second prize at the 5th International Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow (1974).
Alongside smaller assignments, in his very first season Kováts was already entrusted with the Guardian in La forza del destino and Fafner in Siegfried (in the course of his career, this would remain one of only two Wagner roles he ever sang, the other being King Henry the Fowler in Lohengrin). In the following season, his repertoire expanded to include Gremin in Eugene Onegin, Sarastro in The Magic Flute, and Dosifey in the newly refurbished production of Khovanshchina – all this at an age of barely twenty-four. Miklós Lukács and András Mikó, who thought in terms of a permanent ensemble and a true repertory theatre, placed significant demands on young artists, carefully shaping their role profiles through deliberate and considered casting. Although in December 1972 Kováts was cast as King Pomade in György Ránki’s children’s opera, buffo roles subsequently disappeared from his repertoire for a long time. “Broad, exuberant stage comedy does not suit me. I feel much closer to static figures – operatic kings and high priests”, he told Marianne Gách in an interview [5]. Fortunately, by the mid-1980s his repertoire did come to include two splendidly comic – or at least comic-leaning – roles, both considered dream parts for any bass: Mephistopheles in Faust and Basilio in The Barber of Seville. That Kováts Kolos possessed – not only irony, but also self-irony – was vividly demonstrated in the summer of 2007, when, at the gala held prior to the temporary closure of the Erkel Theatre, he appeared in a snow-white suit and sang Count Rodolfo’s aria from Bellini’s La sonnambula while riding a bicycle, simultaneously displaying his magnificent legato and formidable lung capacity.
It was not only Kováts himself who felt that “static figures” best suited his vocal and stage persona; the successive leaderships of the Opera House shared this view. The backbone of his repertoire consisted of Verdi’s major bass roles: alongside La forza del destino and Don Carlos, these included Pagano in I Lombardi, Don Silva in Ernani, Fiesco in Simon Boccanegra, Ferrando in Il trovatore, Zaccaria in Nabucco, Banquo in Macbeth, and the bass solo in Verdi’s Requiem, which he has performed for decades both at the Opera House and in numerous concerts at home and abroad. As a salaried member of the theatre, he naturally sang every role assigned to him, from Claudio Monteverdi to Sándor Szokolay: Italian roles (among them Oroveso in Norma, Raimondo in Lucia di Lammermoor, King Henry VIII in Anna Bolena, Alvise in La Gioconda, Colline in La bohème, and Timur in Turandot), Russian roles (following Eugene Onegin and Khovanshchina, Pimen in Boris Godunov, and decades later the title role itself), and, of course, Mozart – after Sarastro, the Commendatore in Don Giovanni.
Although Kováts Kolos encountered major Hungarian roles – King Andrew II and later Tiborc in Bánk bán – only in the later phase of his career, there is one part which, as with several other Hungarian basses, became a cornerstone of his artistic life: Duke Bluebeard in Béla Bartók’s A kékszakállú herceg vára (Bluebeard’s Castle). Between 1987 and 2005, he sang the role on nearly seventy evenings at the Hungarian State Opera and on the company’s tours, appearing in three different productions directed by András Mikó, András Békés, and Viktor Nagy. Remarkably, this is one of the few roles in which he did not make his debut in Budapest but abroad – specifically at La Scala in Milan, where he first appeared as Bluebeard in 1978. Bartók’s opera entered the international operatic and concert repertoire with explosive force around the centenary of the composer’s birth. From 1981 onwards, opera houses and concert halls across the world sought to perform the masterpiece – preferably in an “authentic” manner, that is, with Hungarian artists. There are few European countries in which Kováts Kolos’s Bluebeard was not seen or heard between 1978 and 2006; he also sang the role in New York, Los Angeles, Tokyo, and even Cairo.
For a long time, whenever Bartók’s opera was programmed, it was almost taken for granted that either László Polgár or Kolos Kováts would be invited to sing the title role. Yet the bass’s international career had begun considerably earlier, as early as 1968. Whenever the Hungarian State Opera went on tour, it was natural for the company to bring along its strongest artists, in order to present the finest achievements of Hungarian operatic performance on the international stage. After his successes at the Rio de Janeiro and Moscow singing competitions, Kováts’s voice attracted widespread attention, and from the 1970s onwards individual international invitations became increasingly frequent. These engagements included full operatic roles, appearances in concerts, and solo aria and song recitals. He belonged to a generation of singers whom the state – after careful consideration and in accordance with well-weighed interests – was increasingly willing to allow to work beyond the Iron Curtain.
The bass was also fortunate in that the peak of his career coincided with the golden age of sound recording and record production. As a result, thanks to film and audio recordings, a nearly complete picture of his art has been preserved for posterity. Numerous recordings are held in the archives of MTVA (Hungarian Media Services and Support Trust Fund), and his discs were released not only by Hungaroton but also by the prestigious DECCA label. “I consider my artistic development complete, and I wish to remain active only as long as I am invited to undertake tasks through which I am still able to offer a genuine artistic illusion,” he wrote about himself when applying for membership in the Hungarian Academy of Arts.
Kováts Kolos is a reticent artist and a reserved human being. Even in Bartók’s great drama of masculine self-revelation, he brought the musical notation to life above all else with his singular voice, rather than telling his own story. Who he is as a person he keeps within four walls, as an inscrutable secret. “People do not usually recognize me in the street, and I do not miss it – in fact, it would trouble me greatly. I lead a rather civilian life. For the audience, the theatre ends when the curtain falls. The piece does, of course, continue to live on within me; I brood over what I did well and what I did not, but from that point on it concerns only me. To be honest, once the curtain has fallen – although I respect admirers – I do not seek them out”, he told a reporter of Operaélet [6]. Kováts Kolos’s loyalty is legendary. For more than half a century now, he has served the Hungarian State Opera and Hungarian musical culture. In his inaugural address at the Academy, he characterized himself as follows: “I have been married once; I have a wife, a child, a grandchild, and one place of employment. I also have a sense of humor, because without it I would not even be able to tolerate myself.” [7]
[1] Operaélet, January–February 1994. Katalin Ráksi: Portré Kováts Kolosról.
[2] Lecture entitled 50 év a Magyar Állami Operaház szolgálatában (50 Years in the Service of the Hungarian State Opera), delivered at the Vigadó Concert Hall, Budapest, 8 September 2022.
[3] Ibid.
[4] Népszava, 10 July 1970, p. 2. András Rajk: Operavizsga az Erkel Színházban
[5] Film Színház Muzsika Évkönyv, 1972, p. 25. Marianne Gách: Az első interjú
[6] Operaélet, January–February 1994. Katalin Ráksi: Portré Kováts Kolosról
[7] Lecture entitled 50 év a Magyar Állami Operaház szolgálatában (50 Years in the Service of the Hungarian State Opera), delivered at the Vigadó Concert Hall, Budapest, 8 September 2022.
[2022]