Week 9 at the Met

It’s another Monday and the start of another week of streaming opera productions from the Metropolitan Opera in New York. Week 9 at the Met features a legendary performance from the 1980s, Verdi set in Las Vegas and Thomas Adés adapting Shakespeare.

Just a quick reminder that each production becomes available for streaming at 7:30 PM EDT/4:30 PM PDT and remains available for streaming for 23 hours. To stream any production, just go to the Met Opera website. Here is the line-up for Week 9 at the Met.

Monday, May 11 – Massenet’s Werther

Conducted by Alain Altinoglu, starring Lisette Oropesa, Sophie Koch, Jonas Kaufmann, and David Bižić. This production was part of the 2013-2014 season.

Goethe’s The Sorrows of Young Werther was the inspiration for this opera which had its world premiere in 1892 in Vienna. It is not the first opera inspired by Goethe’s novel: Rodolphe Kreutzer wrote one in 1792 as did Vincenzo Pucitta in 1802.

Werther tells the story of a young man who spends some of his time writing poetry and imagining life as he thinks it should be. He falls in love with the daughter of a man who manages a large estate. Things don’t always measure up to his ideal of the world and the title character contemplates suicide. That’s just the first half.

In his New York Times review of this production, Anthony Tomassini said, “To be a great Werther, a tenor must somehow be charismatic yet detached, vocally impassioned yet ethereal. Mr. Kaufmann is ideal in the role. He sings with dark colorings, melting warmth, virile intensity and powerful top notes. There is a trademark dusky covering to his sound that lends a veiled quality to Mr. Kaufmann’s Werther and suits the psychology of the character.”

Tuesday, May 12 – Thomas Adès’s The Tempest

Conducted by Thomas Adès, starring Audrey Luna, Isabel Leonard, Alek Shrader, Alan Oke, and Simon Keenlyside. This production is from the 2012-2013 season.

Alex Ross, writing for The New Yorker, said of Adés’ opera (one of at least fifty operas based on Shakespeare’s play), “The Tempest is the opposite of a disappointment; it is a masterpiece of airy beauty and eerie power. As if on schedule, Adès, at thirty-two, is now the major artist that his earliest works promised he would become.”

The Tempest had its world premiere in London in 2004. Between that premiere and its debut at the Met in 2012, there had already been four other productions. Few contemporary operas get that many productions in so short a period of time.

On a personal note, this opera was already compelling because Adés wrote it, but I want to also single out the participation of Isabel Leonard. Every filmed performance I see her give is utterly compelling. From Dialogues des Carmélites to the recently streamed Marnie by Nico Muhly, she sings beautifully and is mesmerizing.

This production was directed by Robert Lepage, who also directed L‘amour de Loin which was part of last week’s schedule of streamed operas.

Wednesday, May 13 – R. Strauss’s Ariadne auf Naxos

Conducted by James Levine, starring Jessye Norman, Kathleen Battle, and Tatiana Troyanos. This production is from the 1987-1988 season.

Obviously having Norman and Battle in an opera together is reason enough to watch Ariadne auf Naxos. But here’s some trivia you might not know: Barbara Bonney (in her Metropolitan Opera debut) and Dawn Upshaw play nymphs in this production.

The production itself dates to 1962 and this 1987-1988 was a remounting of that production.

Thursday, May 14 – Britten’s Peter Grimes

Conducted by Sir Donald Runnicles, starring Patricia Racette, Anthony Dean Griffey, and Anthony Michaels-Moore. This production is from the 2007-2008 season.

John Doyle, best known for his minimalist productions of Stephen Sondheim musicals, made his Met Opera debut with this production of Peter Grimes. Griffey, having sung this opera a few times before this production, finally found his way into a lead role at the Met.

The title role was written by Benjamin Britten for his partner, Peter Pears. In the mid 60s, Jon Vickers’ performance has been considered definitive for quite some time. Anthony Tomassini, once again writing in the New York Times, found some unique qualities in how Griffey tackled the part: “Mr. Griffey, even though his voice has heft and carrying power, is essentially a lyric tenor. And it is disarming to hear the role sung with such vocal grace, even sweetness in places. Every word of his diction is clear. You sense Grimes’s dreamy side struggling to emerge. The moments of gentleness, though, make Mr. Griffey’s impulsive fits of hostility, his bursts of raw vocal power, seem even more threatening.”

Friday, May 15 – Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor – Viewers’ Choice

Conducted by Richard Bonynge, starring Joan Sutherland, Alfredo Kraus, Pablo Elvira, and Paul Plishka. This production is from the 1982-1983 season.

Joan Sutherland made her Metropolitan Opera debut in 1961 in Lucia di Lammermoor. When she performed the role in 1959 at the Royal Opera House at Covent Garden it launched her international career. This production marked the last time Sutherland would perform the role at the Met.

Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor is a textbook example of everything opera can do well: great music, the opportunity to hear amazing singing and drama of the highest order.

Saturday, May 16 – Verdi’s Rigoletto

Conducted by Michele Mariotti, starring Diana Damrau, Oksana Volkova, Piotr Beczała, and Željko Lučić. This production is from the 2012-2013 season.

Verdi’s three-act opera had its debut in 1851 in Venice. It was a triumphant opening and Rigoletto is considered to be amongst the composer’s masterpieces.

Enter director Michael Mayer who won a Tony Award for his direction of the original production of Spring Awakening. He came up with the idea of a “Rat Pack Rigoletto” and moved the action to Las Vegas in the early 1960s.

While reviews were mixed for the production, Mayer was prepared for whatever reaction was going to come his way for his production as he told the New York Times prior to the first performance. “I’ve been warned, but some people have said if you get booed at the Met or at La Scala, you know you’re doing something right. In any case, to employ a pun: hopefully the booze I will have ingested prior to that moment will make the boos I hear a little dimmer.” 

Sunday, May 17 – Verdi’s Nabucco

Conducted by James Levine, starring Liudmyla Monastyrska, Jamie Barton, Russell Thomas, Plácido Domingo, and Dmitry Belosselskiy. This production is from the 2016-2017 season.

Audiences first heard Verdi’s Nabucco on March 9, 1842 at La Scala in Milan. The composer said of his work, “This is the opera with which my artistic career really begins. And though I had many difficulties to fight against, it is certain that Nabucco was born under a lucky star.”

In 2016, Plácido Domingo tackled the title role, written for a baritone, in this opera. He would also perform the part in 2017 with the Los Angeles Opera. He’s spent some time inhabiting Nabucco and reviews were generally positive for his work.

The story is a mix of history, love story and politics. But what most people remember about this particular Verdi opera is the work of the chorus, as evidenced by Zachary Woolfe’s review in the New York Times. “Nabucco is defined by its choruses, much as Rossini’s Guillaume Tell, at the Met earlier this season, is. The company’s ensemble, under the direction of Donald Palumbo, rose to the occasion with massed yet transparent, shimmering singing.”

Nabucco ends Week 9 at the Met. We’ll let you know what Week 10 at the Met looks like next week.

Photo: A scene from Thomas Adés’ The Tempest (Photo by Ken Howard/Courtesy of the Metropolitan Opera)