Nightly Opera Streams, April 19–25

This week of free Nightly Opera Streams celebrates virtue, freedom, and the power of the human spirit. Explore the remarkable lineup with this helpful guide.

View the Playbills from the original performance dates for each stream, including synopses, program notes, and more.

As part of the virtual edition of the HD Live in Schools program this past fall, more than 30 students from across the country came together to sing this uplifting chorus from Beethoven’s Fidelio, which is streamed this week in a 2000 telecast.

The Met’s Dialogues des Carmélites production by John Dexter is one of the company’s most successful and admired stagings. Learn about how it came to be.

Before the 2008 Met premiere of his Satyagraha, acclaimed American composer Philip Glass spoke about Gandhi as an opera subject and why his message still resonates today.

A gun-slinging heroine. A romantic tale of the Wild West. The first great opera with an American setting. Learn more about Puccini’s La Fanciulla del West with our In Focus podcast.

In this highlight from the Met’s At-Home Gala last spring, the Met Orchestra came together through nearly 50 individually recorded videos to perform the Prelude to Act III of Wagner’s Lohengrin, conducted by Yannick Nézet-Séguin.

Elīna Garanča, in the trouser role of Sesto, sings an excerpt from the celebrated aria “Parto, parto,” from Mozart’s penultimate opera, La Clemenza di Tito.

Tenor Tony Stevenson and fight director B. H. Barry joined Executive Stage Director Paula Suozzi for a virtual discussion about La Fanciulla del West and took questions about the opera from students. 

Amid the chaos of the French Revolution, an order of nuns commit the ultimate act of martyrdom, giving opera one of its most devastating and unforgettable final scenes. Learn more about Poulenc’s Dialogues des Carmélites with our In Focus podcast.

Satyahgraha, Philip Glass’s landmark 1980 work about Gandhi and the development of his philosophy of nonviolence had its Met premiere in 2008. This audio slideshow offers a glimpse of the imaginative design of Phelim McDermott and Julian Crouch’s production.

Marcello Giordani, who passed away in October 2019 and is featured in this week’s stream of Puccini’s La Fanciulla del West, was one of the Met’s brightest star tenors in recent decades.

In this excerpt from the jubilant final scene of Beethoven’s Fidelio—streamed this week in a 2000 telecast with Karita Mattila and Ben Heppner—the political prisoner Florestan has been freed thanks to the bravery of his wife Leonore, and the crowd sings her praises.

Before appearing as Sesto in La Clemenza di Tito in 2012, mezzo-soprano Elīna Garanča spoke about singing Mozart’s sublime music, her character’s conflicting emotions, and the challenges of playing a man.

Before the 2008 Met premiere of Philip Glass’s Satyagraha, Ela Gandhi spoke about the idea of satyagraha and her grandfather’s incredible legacy.

Wagner’s sweeping, Romantic epic has received more Met performances than any of the composer’s other works, beginning in the company’s very first season and featuring many of opera’s finest Wagnerian singers over the ensuing 135+ years.

Innovative artists tell the story of Gandhi and his philosophy of non-violence in the Met-premiere production of Philip Glass’s opera.

Yannick Nézet-Séguin brought his first season as Met Music Director to a close with Dialogues des Carmélites in May 2019. As he prepared to lead Poulenc’s powerful opera of faith and martyrdom, he spoke about what makes this masterpiece of 20th-century music unique.

In this climactic moment from Act I of Verdi’s Simon Boccanegra, streamed this week in a telecast from 1984, Boccanegra (sung by baritone Sherrill Milnes) realizes that Amelia (sung by soprano Anna Tomowa-Sintow) is his long-lost daughter.

The operas of Giuseppe Verdi have been performed around 5,700 times at the Metropolitan Opera, more than those of any other composer by a wide margin.

With a 51-year Met career including nearly 1,700 performances, bass Paul Plishka is one of the company’s most beloved artists.

The 1910 world premiere of Puccini’s La Fanciulla del West at the Met was an enormous event for the then-young company. This Playbill article from the 2010 performances of the opera takes a look at that historic occasion from a century on.

Enjoy on-demand access to the Met's entire catalog of more than 800 complete performances on all your favorite devices with our subscription streaming service. Start your seven-day free trial today.