Tagged: The Metropolitan Opera

Joyce DiDonato's performance in the title role of Mary, Queen of Scots, "will be pointed to as a model of singing," full of  "plush richness and aching beauty," in this Met premiere production. Elza van den Heever is "a vocally burnished and emotionally tempestuous" Elizabeth (New York Times). Matthew Polenzani sings Leicester and Maurizio Benini conducts.

Saturday, January 19th, 1 to 4 pm.
Gaetano Donizetti: Maria Stuarda

Giuseppe Verdi's Il Trovatore returns to the Met in a revival the New York Times calls "rousing, satisfying, truly fun." Verdi’s intense melodrama includes some of the composer’s most memorable music. Patricia Racette is in the role of Leonora, Marco Berti sings Manrico, and Alexey Markov is the Count, with star mezzo Stephanie Blythe as the deadly gypsy Azucena. Saturday, January 12, 1 to 4 pm.

A co-production of the Metropolitan Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago, and the San Francisco Opera Association

Cast:

The Met offers a rare opportunity to hear Hector Berlioz’s vast epic, last performed at the Met in 2003. Deborah Voigt, Susan Graham, Bryan Hymel, and Dwayne Croft lead the starry cast, portraying characters from the Trojan War. Met Principal Conductor Fabio Luisi marshals the large-scale musical forces. Susan Graham's tones were burnished, her acting impassioned.

The New York Times calls Thomas Adès’s masterpiece “one of the most inspired, audacious and personal operas to have come along in years….and offers a superb cast, headed by the charismatic baritone Simon Keenlyside… Ariel is a dazzling creation and Audrey Luna conquers the role…Adès drew a textured, glittering and suspenseful account of his opera from the great Met orchestra.” The Financial Times lauds the performance’s “rare virtuosity… Keenlyside sang with sensitive force… [and] loomed and brooded magnetically.” The Associated Press praises Adès’s “magical score