Paulo Bitencourt
Paulo Roberto de Paula Bitencourt (Castro, Paraná, Brazil, December 20, 1966), better known as Paul Béthencourt, is a Brazilian singer, photographer and narrator.
Vocational training
As a boy, Paul Béthencourt dreamed of becoming a cartoonist. At the age of only thirteen, he worked as an illustrator at a newspaper and a large graphic arts and printing company in his hometown. However, in 1989, he went to Europe, having temporarily lived in Portugal, France, England and Germany, the following year arriving in Austria, where he settled.
In 1992, without any prior musical training, and competing with experienced young people from around the world, he passed the rigorous entrance examination for the Faculty of Solo Singing of the Conservatory of the City of Vienna, the same at which Joe Zawinul, for example, one of the greatest jazz figures, studied. Five years later, he passed the even more rigorous entrance examination for the Faculty of Opera, of the same Conservatory, graduating in 2000. In his final exam, he played Count Almaviva of the opera The Marriage of Figaro by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.
Professional activity
Still during his studies at the Conservatory of the City of Vienna, Paul Béthencourt sang in professionals choirs, with numerous performances in Austria, Israel, Italy, Japan and the United States, like the Concentus Vocalis Choir with the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, under the baton of Theodor Guschlbauer in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, the Arnold Schoenberg Choir with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, under the baton of Seiji Ozawa at the Vienna Konzerthaus and the Carnegie Hall in New York, and an independent production of Orpheus in the Underworld by Jacques Offenbach, with a one month tour throughout Japan.
As a soloist, Paul Béthencourt gave recitals at the Schubert Hall of the Vienna Konzerthaus, singing works of Heitor Villa-Lobos, and at the Bösendorfer Hall, in Vienna, interpreting Villa-Lobos and Oscar Lorenzo Fernández. He has performed in various theaters, including the Stadttheater Baden, Austria, and the Theater Akzent, in Vienna, playing The King, from the opera The Wise Woman by Carl Orff, The Father, from Hansel and Gretel by Engelbert Humperdinck, Figaro, from The Barber of Seville by Gioachino Rossini, and Guglielmo, from Così Fan Tutte by W. A. Mozart.
In 1995, Paul Béthencourt became part of the ensemble of the largest German-language theater, the Burgtheater, in Vienna, primarily as a singer, but in some plays also as an actor, like Die Dreigroschenoper by Bertolt Brecht, “Orpheus in the Underworld” by Jacques Offenbach, Ein Sportstück by Elfriede Jelinek, and Troilus and Cressida by William Shakespeare, this one under the direction of Declan Donnellan.
Self-taught on the guitar, in recent years Paul Béthencourt has been interpreting the classics of bossa nova, like the compositions of Antonio Carlos Jobim and many others, extending it also to the songs of Chico Buarque, for example.
Apart from being a singer, Paul Béthencourt is also narrator (voice-over artist) of corporate videos for international companies, like Plasser & Theurer, the TGW Logistics Group, Doka Group and Lyoness.
As a photographer, Paul Béthencourt’s main subjects are landscapes and street photography, but he has a predilection for portraits, having been hired to photograph, for example, the opera singer Elisabeth Kulman, during one of her performances at the Vienna Volksoper.
Featured in Austrian media
Paul Béthencourt never wanted to become an Austrian citizen, since Austria allows only a single citizenship and he, therefore, would have to forgo his Brazilian nationality. However, in 2012, he was the subject of a story by the largest quality Austrian newspaper, Der Standard, for being a prominent example of the contradictions in Austria’s immigration laws, which would prevent him from receiving the Austrian citizenship, although he, until then, had lived for twenty-two years in Austria and is in possession of a permanent residence for that country.
In 2013, Austria's biggest TV channel, ORF, aired a story on Paul Béthencourt, regarding the inconsistencies of Austrian immigration laws, this time focusing on the case of his son, who, despite having been born in Vienna in 2012 and the permanent residence of his father, will be a foreigner in Austria until reaching the age of six.