Kobie van Rensburg.(Sound Bites)(performs in Rodelinda)(Opera Review)

Kobie van Rensburg first captivated Paris audiences last June with his fine performance in Traetta's Antigona, with Christophe Rousset at the Chatelet. That first glimpse served notice that this was no white-toned, thin-voiced early-music specialist. He was back in the City of Light in September to rehearse Monteverdi's Orfeo with Jean-Claude Malgoire, and this month he makes his Met debut as Grimoaldo in Rodelinda.

"I think a simple love of music in general always animates me to try out new things, and to go in different directions and see what's possible with the voice," says van Rensburg, who, when we spoke, had just returned from a performance as Tamino at Munich's Staatstheater, where he is a full-time company member. "But I really like eighteenth-century music for the virtuoso aspect of it. You can embellish arias and give the music your own personal note. In music of the seventeenth century, I'm attracted to the drama. There are no big arias--it's a continuous drama coming from the libretto.

"I don't think the human voice has changed much in the last four hundred years. Our way of wanting to listen to it has changed. The early-music movement as we know it today is fueled by the recording industry, and ...