There are moments when music doesn't sound—it is born. A breath slowly filling with words, a silence that suddenly speaks. This is where Klassiek Centraal's encounter begins, in the context of the Music Chapel Festival at Flagey, with a voice like that of Oleg Volkov.
There are voices you hear, and voices you meet. Oleg Volkov belongs to the latter category: not a chance appearance, but a presence that gradually settles in your ear, like a conversation partner who doesn't just sing but also responds. His words breathe something of both the displaced and the homecoming, an echo of the polyphonies of the Russian South, a youth woven through with music and tradition, a spirit shaped in the quiet laboratories of linguistics. Now, in Brussels, his voice becomes an instrument, a question, a horizon.
A calling that is chosen and chooses
His love of language and communication is no accident. With a master's degree in linguistics and translation, he has learned to listen to the layers beneath words. "Everything begins with communication," he repeats. "In music, as in language, there is always a message that must reach someone. My task is to discover what my character carries, and to find the keys so that the audience can receive it." He himself describes this as a mysterious interplay: he not only chooses his path, but his environment chooses him too; the voice, the artwork, the audience—everything carries him toward his natural place. Opera and concert, experiment and tradition: he inhabits them all, formerly a member of the "Jeune Ensemble" of the Opéra national du Rhin, now a voice that continues to unfold.
The singer as translator of the soul
What drives him always begins with language. "For me, everything starts with communication." Correct pronunciation is merely the foundation; it's about grasping psychological layers, cultural nuances, emotional resonance. For Volkov, music is not decoration: it is a conversation with someone who may be searching, may want comfort, may want nothing but clarity. "As an interpreter, we don't really translate: we interpret." This is how he explains how his translation and interpretation practice forms the core of his artistic philosophy: music is exchange, a touching of the soul, not passive reproduction.
Every text—Hofmannsthal, Maeterlinck, Mahler—carries a breath that must not only be heard but felt. From an early age, he experienced the power of music while working as an interpreter at the Sochi 2014 Olympic Games. "People encouraged me, as if they heard something I didn't yet know about myself," he tells us. "It's as if the audience sometimes chooses your path, calls you, invites you to sing, to 'light stars' as Mayakovsky says."
Coming home at L'Opéra du Rhin
When he speaks about the "Jeune Ensemble" of the Opéra national du Rhin, his voice softens. "For me, the Opéra national du Rhin will always remain my alma mater." There he discovered freedom as a gift you never let go of: the freedom to try, to fall, to explore. To push boundaries, vocally and dramatically; to experiment alongside classical traditions. "That place offered me far more than a workspace: it gave me friends, guides, life partners. I am particularly grateful for the trust and support of Alain Perroux, Claude Cortese, and Sandrine Abello. They are my people," he says. "Those who go their own way, create, share, and bring light into the lives of others." Tradition is not a mausoleum. Tradition breathes. The deep vocal tradition of South Russia, the polyphonies of Cossack culture: roots that carry him, breath that shapes him. "The vocal tradition is above all an oral tradition, passed directly from one singer to another," he explains. No written word, no doctrine, but listening. Not imitation, but feeling.
In Europe, he adds new worlds of sound, rhythms of speech, ways of silence. "Every culture has its own breath, its own tensions, its own language of colors and pain," he says. This mix makes his voice unique: an echo of the distant, woven together with the near, a dialogue between past and present.
The Music Chapel: atelier of inner growth
The Music Chapel: studio of inner growth
In Waterloo, at the Muziekkapel Koningin Elisabeth, Volkov discovers another form of homecoming: a studio of inner growth, a place where you are not led, but stripped bare. "Here I meet people who inspire me deeply," he says, his eyes gleaming at the names of José van Dam, Sophie Koch, Stéphane Degout, Olivier Reboul, Kira Parfeevets, Sophie Reynaud, Marie Dachary, Julie Deilbart, Lionel Bams, Thomas Hampson, Sabine Devieilhe.
"It's a place where you grow at your own pace, but never alone. Nobody says: 'Do it this way.' Rather: 'Understand why it must resonate within you.'" Mentorship, stage experience, observation—they merge into a circulation of trust. "It's an environment where trust circulates naturally—and in such a climate, you surprise yourself by going further than you thought possible."
The Three Movements of a Role
Approaching a new role is a ritual. First dissection: phonetics as a microscope, rhythm as a backbone. Then archaeology: centuries, customs, political contexts that shimmer beneath the score. Finally, the living laboratory of rehearsal. "That's exactly where the real balance emerges between music, text, and theater," he says. Here, the ideas of conductor, director, composer, librettist, and singer flow together into one breath. "Rehearsals are pure communication," he smiles. His technical philosophy is simple: "For the voice to be free, the body must be stable." Sleep, movement, breathing, nutrition, mental balance. "I use gravity as my anchor point. It's a constant, reliable force that never disappoints," he explains with a laugh. His discipline is not strict, but natural: a breath that resonates with the voice itself.
Mahler: Where Music is Life
On December 6th, he steps into the universe of Mahler, a world that many never enter in their lifetime. "What touches me in 'In diesem Wetter,' as in all his music, is that beauty of rare intensity. With Mahler, music doesn't imitate life—it *is* life. It's a moment where everything comes together: technique, emotion, text, breath," he says. He maintains the subtle balance between engagement and distance. "We'll see each other on December 6th at Flagey," he smiles.
Returning as Growing
"All the roles I've already sung, I'd love to sing again." Repertoire is not a list, but a life cycle: returning deepens, revisiting reveals new facets of the same mysterious being that a character is. "Returning to a role is like meeting old friends: familiar, but enriched by experience, voice development, personal growth," he says. Contemporary repertoire offers both challenge and opportunity: "Some works continue to challenge me—and there's never enough time to dive into everything."
The Singer Who Reinvents the Words
Oleg Volkov doesn't just sing, he translates—not from one language to another, but from one human being to another. His combination of intellect, emotion, and physical command makes every performance a carefully considered, living interpretation. His creed is etched unwaveringly within him:
Singing is not repeating.
Singing is discovering.
Singing is reinventing the words at the moment they are born.
His ideal? To sing as if he were inventing the language itself on the spot—words that are born in that very moment. And so the breath of a voice returns to the silence of its origin, and one feels, between the silences, that this voice has only just begun to speak.
Saturday, December 6th, 8:15 p.m., in "In diesem Wetter" from Gustav Mahler's "Kindertotenlieder" (1860-1911) with Brussels Philharmonic conducted by Kazushi Ono.
See also https://klassiek-centraal.be/music-chapel-festival-2025-de-vier-elementen-in-klank-en-geest/
