Audiences are always going to be curious about a performer such as Maayan Licht. The Israeli-born sopranista is no shrinking violet, after all. Not for nothing is “Farinelli meets Freddie Mercury” a commonly used descriptor.

Speaking to Limelight on the day of his Australian debut performance at Sydney’s Great Synagogue, at the top of a four-city tour for Vladimir Fanshil and Eleanor Lyons’ Live at Yours series, Licht acknowledges audience curiosity about a male performer with a female soprano’s vocal range.

“It’s natural and I like the attention, of course,” he says. “But in the end, I’m here to serve the music. I believe that with my voice actually lets people enjoy beauty. It awakens people’s curiosity.”

Maayan Licht. Photo © Matthias Jung

Licht arrives in Australia with a repertoire designed to showcase the extraordinary possibilities of the high male voice, ranging from Vivaldi and Handel to Porpora and Riccardo Broschi – with Bizet’s Habanera from Carmen as a showy encore.

He has devoted years of training to exploring the “extremities of singing”. He sees his approach to the voice as scientific: an investigation into vibration, resonance and the way sound communicates directly...