Great Performances at the Met — Season 10

Aired 11 January 2016 • 180 min

Soprano Anna Netrebko appears in her Met role debut as Leonora, the tortured heroine who sacrifices her own life for the love of the Gypsy troubadour. Dmitri Hvorostovsky sings Count di Luna, Yonghoon Lee is Manrico in his Met role debut as the title character, Dolora Zajick sings her signature role of the gypsy Azucena, and Štefan Kocán is Ferrando. Marco Armiliato conducts Sir David McVicar’s Goya-inspired production.

Aired 21 February 2016 • 180 min

For this production of Verdi's tragic opera, Aleksandrs Antonenko, one of the world’s leading interpreters of Otello, sings his first Met performances of the role, opposite Sonya Yoncheva as Desdemona and Željko Lučić as the villainous Iago.

Aired 13 March 2016 • 180 min

Richard Wagner’s early masterpiece Tannhäuser comes to Great Performances at the Met for the first time. James Levine conducts Tannhäuser in Otto Schenk's classic production, with Johan Botha in his Met role debut in the titular role. Eva-Maria Westbroek, Michelle DeYoung, Peter Mattei, and Gunther Groissbock. It is the production’s first Met revival in more than a decade.

Aired 10 April 2016 • 180 min

Alban Berg’s tragedy of a sexually irresistible woman who destroys the lives of everyone around her. Marlis Petersen stars and visual artist William Kentridge directs.

Aired 22 May 2016 • 180 min

The Met’s acclaimed new production of Bizet’s The Pearl Fishers (Les Pêcheurs de Perles), a rarity by the composer of Carmen that has not been staged by the company in a century.

Aired 12 June 2016 • 180 min

Hear Swedish soprano Nina Stemme sing the demanding title role of Puccini’s Chinese ice princess, with Anita Hartig as the angelic slave girl Liù and Marco Berti as Calàf. Paolo Carignani conducts Franco Zeffirelli’s spectacular 1987 production.

Aired 13 August 2016 • 180 min

Hear Kristine Opolais and Roberto Alagna as the ill-fated lovers in Puccini’s passionate adaptation of the classic novel about a free-spirited country girl. Sir Richard Eyre’s new production, conducted by Fabio Luisi, is set in the 1940s.

Aired 19 August 2016 • 180 min

Kristine Opolais brings her heartbreaking interpretation of the title role to the series for the first time. Roberto Alagna sings Lieutenant Pinkerton, the callous officer who crushes Butterfly's dreams of love. Debuting conductor Karel Mark Chichon leads a cast that includes Maria Zifchak as Suzuki and Dwayne Croft as Sharpless.

Aired 28 August 2016 • 180 min

The last opera in Donizetti’s Tudor trilogy, directed by Sir David McVicar, stars Sondra Radvanovsky as Elizabeth I and features Matthew Polenzani, Elina Garanca and Mariusz Kwiecien. Maurizio Benini conducts.

Aired 18 September 2016 • 180 min

Elektra, Richard Strauss’s blazing tragedy about an ancient Greek princess hell-bent on revenge, is the final opera production by the legendary director Patrice Chéreau who died in 2013. Esa-Pekka Salonen conducts an extraordinary cast headed by Nina Stemme as the obsessed and bloodthirsty title character.