New York, NY (February 20, 2019)—The Metropolitan Opera today announced its
2019–20 season, which opens on September 23 with a new production of the Gershwins’
classic American opera Porgy and Bess, last performed at the Met in 1990, starring Eric
Owens and Angel Blue, directed by James Robinson and conducted by David
Robertson.
Philip Glass’s Akhnaten receives its Met premiere with Anthony Roth Costanzo as the title pharaoh and J’Nai Bridges as Nefertiti, in a celebrated staging by Phelim McDermott and conducted by Karen Kamensek in her Met debut.
Acclaimed visual artist and stage director William Kentridge directs a new production of Berg’s Wozzeck, starring Peter Mattei and Elza van den Heever, and led by the Met’s Jeanette Lerman-Neubauer Music Director Yannick Nézet-Séguin.
In another Met premiere, Sir David McVicar stages the black comedy of Handel’s Agrippina, starring Joyce DiDonato as the conniving empress with Harry Bicket on the podium. The final new production, of Der Fliegende Holländer, boasts a stellar alignment of distinguished Wagnerian talents:
Valery Gergiev conducts Sir Bryn Terfel and Anja Kampe in a new staging by François
Girard, his first at the Met since his landmark 2013 Parsifal.
As a result of recent union negotiations, the Met schedule includes 16 Sunday
matinees, a first for the company. The number of Sunday performances will increase
further in the 2020–21season.
Dozens of favorite Met singers also bring their artistry to 20 repertory revivals
throughout the season, including Plácido Domingo and Anna Netrebko (who team up on
the Met stage for the first time in Adrian Noble’s production of Macbeth), Roberto
Alagna, Piotr Beczała, Joseph Calleja, Javier Camarena, Diana Damrau, Gerald
Finley, Elīna Garanča, Christine Goerke, Vittorio Grigolo, Quinn Kelsey, Ailyn
Pérez, Nina Stemme, and Sonya Yoncheva.
They perform alongside a range of impressive talents being heard at the Met for the first time, including Lise Davidsen, Anja Kampe, Camilla Nylund, Brenda Rae, and Michael Spyres.
Yannick Nézet-Séguin conducts three productions, two Met Orchestra concerts at
Carnegie Hall, and a New Year’s Eve Gala starring Anna Netrebko as three Puccini
heroines (Mimì in Act I of La Bohème and the title roles in Act I of Tosca and Act II of
Turandot).
He heads a remarkable 2019–20 roster of conductors, including Marco
Armiliato, Harry Bicket, Bertrand de Billy, James Gaffigan, Edward Gardner,
Valery Gergiev, Karen Kamensek, Antonello Manacorda, Vasily Petrenko, Sir Simon
Rattle, Carlo Rizzi, and David Robertson.
Gianandrea Noseda will conduct the third Met orchestra concert at Carnegie Hall. Sir Antonio Pappano trades the podium for the piano bench for a very special Met event, accompanying Diana Damrau in recital.The 2019–20 season is Peter Gelb’s 14th as the Met’s General Manager.
Performances of the New York Metropolitan Opera are heard Saturday afternoons, during its season, on WSKG Classical.