Stream Saint-Saens’s biblical epic with Elina Garanca and Roberto Alagna in the title roles from the MetOpera stage on June 24, 2020
Roberto Alagna and Elina Garanca in Saint-Saëns’s “Samson et Dalila.” Photo: Ken Howard / Met Opera
Darko Tresnjak’s production of sensual French Grand Opera by Camille Saint-Saens on the biblical story of Samson et Davila can be streamed from anywhere on June 24, 2020 from 7.30 pm. The stream is available for 23 hours.
The explosive duo of tenor Roberto Alagna, Samson and soprano Elina Garanca, Dalila, and the rest of the powerful cast in this brave production make for an exciting opera night. Tellingly, it opened the 2018-2019 season of MetOpera on a very high note.
Darko Tresnjak, a 2014 Tony Award Winner for best direction of a musical, debuts at the Met Opera with a monumental staging that brings us to ancient Gaza of 12th century BC from the Old Testament’s Book of Judges. Sensual music, an electrifying performance, and vivid stage design promise a memorable experience for every opera fan.
Love, idealism, and ruse in a thrilling drama by Giacomo Puccini
Bring the Metropolitan Opera’s magnificent experience to your home by streaming the historic December 1978 performance with Luciano Pavarotti; watch from anywhere on Thursday, June 4, 2020
Sonya Yoncheva as Tosca and Željko Lučić as Scarpia / Photo: Ken Howard / Metropolitan Opera
MetOpera offers the archival recording of Puccini’s masterpiece with the star-studded cast delivering a passionate tale. This memorable performance features riveting soprano Shirley Merrett in the title role, tenor Luciano Pavarotti as her lover Cavaradossi, and baritone Cornell MacNeil as Scarpia. The opera was recorded on December 19, 1978.
From its premiere in the early 1900s, Puccini’s Tosca has triumphantly entered the repertoire of every opera house. Eagerly anticipated by the fans, the opera is a highlight of the MetOpera season.
The most recent production of Puccini’s Tosca by Sir David McVicar at the Met Opera, which has staged in the 2017-2018 season, offered a grand theatrical experience for the opera fans. The set and costume design for this production was done by John Macfarlane, who as a painter added to the depth of the characters through the rich design of the decorations and the period costumes. McVicar’s production which a review by AP describes as “similar to Zeffirelli’s”. It replaced a spare modern staging of Tosca by Luc Bondy which was not warmly received by the Met opera buffs.
360° View of the Sistine Chapel in Vatican City in the time of social distancing
Sistine Chapel, Vatican / photo by Patrick Landy (FSU Guy)
One of the most popular sites of the Musei Vaticani complex, the Sistine Chapel stuns its visitors with Michelangelo’s frescoes and stories of the sacred rituals, such as Papal Conclave of the Cardinals conducted within its walls from 1492. Completely restored in the years from 1979 to 1999 to its original vibrant colors, the Chapel was visited daily by more than 20,00 people. Pope John Paul II said about the chapel that “The truth of our faith speaks to us here from all sides”.
As humanity stays at home in the face of the global coronavirus pandemic, it is particularly uplifting to revisit albeit virtually the historic places that withstood prior global disasters like plague epidemics and the wars. The Musei Vaticani offers a virtual tour of the Sistine Chapel with closeups of frescoes and an unobstructed view of the room without any distraction by the guards or the unavoidable neck craning to see the ceiling.
The Sistine Chapel in the Vatican was built in 1477-1480 by Pope Sixtus IV for whom the chapel is named. In fact, the old Cappella Magna that stood on that site from the mid-14th century was restored by the best artists of that time like Sandro Botticelli, Pietro Perugino, Pinturicchio, Domenico Ghirlandaio, and Cosimo Rosselli. From that time until this day the Chapel is used for special ceremonies of the close circle of the Pope and as a place where the Papal Conclave of Cardinals meets to elect a new Pope.
Interestingly, the dimensions of the Chapel are the same as the Temple of Solomon according to the description in the Old Testament, the Book of Ezekiel. The Temple of Solomon was the first temple built by the Hebrews in 832 BCE under King Solomon. It was destructed by Nebuchadnezzar IIafter the Siege of Jerusalem of 587 BCE.
Michelangelo spent from 1508 through 1512 on painting the ceiling of the Chapel on the commission by Pope Julius II. Because at the time Michelangelo was preoccupied with sculptures and was reluctant to commit to such an enormous undertaking, Pope Julius granted him full freedom in selecting the scenes and figures to paint thus convincing him to take on the project. The resulting frescoes are considered to be the triumph of the artistic expression in Western civilization. The ceiling is populated with more than 300 figures starting from Christ’s ancestors including Adam and Eve, the scenes from the Garden of Eden and the Great Flood all the way to Christ’s followers, prophets, and sibyls.
Michelangelo’s mastery brings us the “faces of our time: anxiety masked by domesticity, women at work at household duties, men staring out blankly at an opaque fate” in the words of A.Gopnik in The New Yorker review of the exhibit of the photographs of the frescoes at the Oculus in New York City.
Do your best imagining yourself walking through the grand doors of the Chapel by taking the virtual tour. And while it’s definitely not the same as being surrounded by the great art at the place for which it was created, you can still connect with history and art. Their meaning may even become more apparent and better understood.
The Metropolitan Opera production of Verdi’s masterpiece about a court jester Rigoletto
Stream from anywhere on Saturday, May 16, 2020
A scene from Rigoletto by Verdi at the Metropolitan Opera; photo by Marty Sohl
Rigoletto in Las-Vegas? Verdi’s extremely popular opera set to a powerful play by Victor Hugo seems to be destined for any epoch and impervious to the time and place transformations. With an ever-relevant fable and beloved arias widely familiar to opera fans and recognizable to those new to the genre, this opera is a time-tested favorite of every opera house.
Shifted to Las Vegas in the 1960s, Michael Mayer’s 2013 production of Rigoletto gets a modern look while telling the same centuries-old story of corruption, evil, and love. While the power of the old man curse put at the center of the tale seems less believable in the 20th century, the dirty intrigues and the ruthlessness of the lonely figures doing shady business look rather plausible.
For the free streaming on Saturday, May 16, 2020, Met Opera selected the production performance on February 16, 2013 with Zeljko Lucic as Rigoletto, Diana Damrau as Gilda, Piotr Beczala as Duke; Michele Mariotti conducts.
