The Music Academy in the western city of Poznań, where he taught voice, described him in an obituary as an outstanding opera singer and a fine colleague, whose passing filled the music community with “a sense of deep sorrow.”
Bręk graduated with the highest honours from the Music Academy in Warsaw, where he studied with Jerzy Artysz. He was a prizewinner of several vocal competitions, including in Barcelona, Vercelli and Lisbon.
He was a soloist with the Warsaw Chamber Opera, the National Opera in Warsaw and the Grand Opera in Poznań, where he appeared in such roles as the title part in Mozart’s Don Giovanni, Count Almaviva in Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro, Don Profondo in Rossini’s Il viaggo a Reims, and the Abbot in Britten’s Curlew River.
He also scored successes in vocal-instrumental works, such as Karol Szymanowski’s Stabat Mater, Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, Mahler’s Des Knaben Wunderhorn, Bach’s St. John Passion and Fauré’s Requiem. He was often invited to take part in first performances of works by contemporary composers as well as in song recitals.
His discography comprised 30 CDs, one of which, recorded with the Warsaw Philharmonic and Chorus under Antoni Wit and featuring Szymanowski’s Stabat Mater, won a Grammy nomination in 2009.
(mk/gs)