Thursday, March 19, featured the week’s most recent addition: a 2018 version of La Traviata, another composition by Verdi, conducted by Yannick Nézet-Séguin.

Conducted by Marco Armiliato, the opera stars Anna Netrebko, Dolora Zajick, Yonghoon Lee and Dmitri Hvorostovsky. Third in the lineup was a 2015 performance of Verdi’s Il Trovatore, which follows the chaotic chain of events sparked by the execution of a gypsy. (The popular Broadway musical Rent is a loose adaptation of Puccini’s opera.) Next up was the Met’s 2008 version of Puccini’s La Bohème, conducted by Nicola Luisotti and starring Angela Gheorghiu and Ramón Vargas as Mimi and Rodolfo, two young bohemians living in Paris’ Latin Quarter in the 1840s. Starring Elīna Garanča in the titular role, the tragic opera chronicles the downfall of soldier Don José (Roberto Alagna) after he encounters a fiery, enigmatic gypsy named Carmen. The series began Monday, March 16, with a 2010 performance of Bizet’s Carmen, conducted by Met Music Director Yannick Nézet-Séguin. “We’d like to provide some grand opera solace to opera lovers in these extraordinarily difficult times,” says Met General Manager Peter Gelb in a statement. Now, the institution is serving them up to all fans craving content from the comfort of their own homes.

These archived performances, which have been played in select venues (primarily movie theaters) via satellite transmissions since 2006, “was developed as a way to reach existing audiences and to introduce new audiences to opera through new technology,” according to the Met Opera’s website. Last Friday-a day after canceling all performances through March 31-New York’s Metropolitan Opera announced that it would be taking some of its offerings virtual, kicking things off this week with daily free streamings of its Live in HD series. Barred from admitting visitors in person, museums and other institutions around the globe have come up with creative ways of keeping their patrons engaged. In cities like New York, mandated closures have now shuttered some of the largest tourist attractions around, deterring vulnerable individuals from entering their doors.īut social distance doesn’t have to mean cultural distancing. Amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, many are avoiding public gatherings and ensconcing themselves in their homes-measures crucial to slowing the spread of disease.

Met opera streaming