The 2010 Royal Variety Performance of Les Miserables, Alfie Boe sings What Have I done. I love this song, and I think Alfie Boe has the most amazing voice I've heard in a long time!
Of course he was hurrying, they only had a certain amount of time to get through the songs they were doing. I liked Hugh's portrayal, but you cannont beat Alfie in my opinion.
NBC Universal has been blocking clips from the 25th Les Mis dvd since mid January. The only ones you'll find now are clips shot by audience members -- and even some of them have been taken down. Fie on them!
Ok He is definietly an amazing singer, but to me the first part is very annoying. The way he puts emphasis on certain words is just too much! Maybe it is because I heard Colm Wilkinson's version first, but the way Colm goes through that first part and switches to that different tone in the second part is just genius! Alfie is just a bit too much opera for me. Colm is just heaven in the emotional department as he shows all facets of his emotions with more subtlety.
You'll notice there is no orchestra, it's just a track over the sound system. Alfie is, essentially, singing this karaoke style. He doesn't have a lot of give here. The whole Variety performance was like that. As for Jackman....
I agree Boe's voice is excellent, especially in this role. He started with opera and you can tell! Mostly singers don't mix between opera and musicals because of risk of damage to the cords(vocal). Thank heavens for us he got tired of just opera. As he says, it's alot of standing. I love opera too, however!
I love Alfie. He has a beautiful tone to his voice, not to mention exquisite eye candy. Hugh Jackman on the other hand is no slack! His acting was superb and his voice is quite remarkable. Alfie auditioned and Jackman won the role. That's show biz! What I like is that Boe wasn't bitter. He is not only musically brilliant, but he has class.
It's for the best honestly. He's a better singer than Jackman definitely, but it wouldn't matter, cause in those conditions no one would sound world class. Better to go with the veteran who is used to the rigors of a film schedule, and also has enough singing experience that his voice wouldn't be damaged or anything. And that's not just speculation: the bishop is on screen for like 2 minutes, and is an easy role that any male voice type can sing. Wilkinson didn't sound like anything special in it. But when he sang bring him home at this concert around the same time, he sounded basically like himself. So it's not that he aged or anything, it was just Hoopers stupid live recording
yes ... there are great singers who ve played this role... but Alfie is beyond humanity..... whoever say there is a better Valjean singingwise , is just a fanboy.
yes ... there are great singers who ve played this role... but Alfie is beyond humanity..... whoever say there is a better Valjean singingwise , is just nonsense
I’m sorry, but he did much better than hugh. this is my opinion so it’s ok if you disagree but hugh DIDNT DRINK WATER FOR 36 HOURS!! that’s BOUND to mess up your voice. AND THIS GUY SOUNDS SO MUCH CLEARER THAN HUGH!! HE SHOULD HAVE BEEN VALJEAN!! again this is my opinion, the choices made in the movie was just awful, hugh is a great actor it’s just that he wouldn’t have been *so* much better if he wasn’t in that movie, it did not do him justice. he tried, but it flopped BAD 😬
So, you know how in Phantom, the phantom is supposed to have this voice that entrances everyone that hears it and can basically turn you to jelly? And that that sort of thing is hard to translate to real life? Alfie Boe is the closest I've heard to a real voice that captures that. He is amazing.
I love how Alfie Boe injects emotion and passion into his performance. No doubt he's one of the best. However, with emotion, calmness and contemplation is also necessary. That's why I think Colm Wilkinson's performance was a tiny bit better. But not by much. Boe is an extremely close second.
I guess that's up to personal preference. While the Colm Wilkinson version is amazing, I actually like the anger better in this version. Even the contemplative part is lined with this feeling that he still doesn't think he deserves this second chance because he is too angry at himself and the world. I like seeing what different singers bring to this song, it completely changes based on the emotion they put into it :)
Wanna know why I like Les Mis after glossing it over for so long? This guy. On this song. Never has a musical punched me through the screen more than “WHAT have I done- SWEET JESUS- what have I done? Become a THIEF in the night- become a DOG on the RUN.”
"They" took the 25th Anniversary off of RU-vid. Any help from anyone to guide me to a post of the entire...THING? THANK YOU to anyone who may assist me in finding this. Boe was AMAZING!
@JoJoBee19 Had looked but couldn't spot the mike. All the reviews/comments say he's a completely different Valjean, and stunning in it. Maybe people should beg Cameron to film the current show. Or at least tape it for a cast album (full show, if I wanted excerpts there's the 25th dvd). Would be a crime not to have a record of such an amazing performance.
Did you know that Alfie was at one point in the running to play Jean Valjean in the Les Miserablés movie? They eventually gave it to Hugh Jackman - who did a good job - because they wanted someone who actually had experience in movies, something Alfie lacked, but maybe someday...
Dear Mr. Tom Hooper...fine director that you are, you and your director of casting made a HUGE mistake when you did your film version of this. The End.
@JoJoBee19 Yeah, I think the music's a pre-record, too. Does make it more impressive, bc Alfie had to sing and act while listening for those cues. Is he even miked himself, personally? Bc you can hear his voice filling the theater, you can hear it bouncing back. Love what a real, trained opera singer can do with this song.
I think thats the difference between live musical and musical films. In the film, Hugh can sings in whatever tempo he wants, as there's just a pianist playing according to his tempo and orchestra music comes in during editing, and i agree there's a lot of depth in the protrayal. But for live musical i think he gotta consider the whole orchestra, being in sync, so sort of less free style. The protrayal is very different as compared to the film, alfie protrays a more angry and confused valjean.
Also good, but Alfie Boe is the best. Colm Wilkinson is probably the best-known Jean Valjean though. He was a cameo in the movie. He played the priest.
I will always have a special place in my heart for Colm Wilkinson, considering that he was the original, and even Hugh Jackman, because that was the first time I had ever been introduced to Les Miserables. And while I agree that Alfie Boe can be a bit over-emotional at times, I am now 99.99% sure that he is my favorite Valjean, he has the voice I wish I could have, and that makes him the Valjean I'd want to be to a certain extent. I'd still incorporate my own style and interpretation to it, given the chance. That is expected from an artist of any kind.
To all the people saying it seems rushed. The movie version was slowed way down. This is about the speed this song is usually at. I was surprised at first too, having fallen in love with Les Miserables through the movie first.
This is a real man, not just performing but inhabiting a role. He is surely one of our greatest living performers. Keep all your silly 'pop' singers. Alfie is King!
I won't ever understand why people complained so much about Crowe, who I felt was a really good Javert (although nobody will ever quite compare to Quast in my eyes), but hardly anyone had anything bad to say about Jackman (who acted the part very well, but whose 'Bring Him Home' were three of the most cringe-worthy minutes I've ever had to endure in a cinema).
One, this is a track so Alfie has a lot less flexibility, even during the recitatives. Two, the revisions made around the 25th anniversary performances brought up the tempo of a lot of songs, including this one. Notably, look up more recent versions of Look Down/Prologue which has a new percussive beat and is very much faster from the original song.
By far the best voice to sing Jean Valjean...the background of this role is operatic..and so should be the sound of this role...except for the high scream at the very beginning in the prologue(which Alfie sang as a glorious high C), all the other high notes should be sung and not screamed or belted... the tonal quality Alfie brought to this role is just what was the intention of Schönberg and Boublil as they created the role, therefore his voice is the best possible one to cast.
