Metropolitan opera opening september 1966 что это
Метрополитен-опера является одним из ведущих оперных театров и популярной достопримечательностью Нью-Йорка. Наряду с Венской государственной оперой и миланским Ла Скала, Метрополитен-опера входит в тройку самых престижных оперных площадок мира.
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Видео: Метрополитен-опера. 2016-17 Сезон
Основные моменты
В Метрополитен-опере в разное время на сцену выходили гениальные артисты, имена которых навечно вписаны в славную летопись театра. С 1903 года и вплоть до окончания карьеры здесь выступал легендарный Энрико Карузо. В 1910 году восхищенные зрители тепло принимали нашего именитого соотечественника, оперного и камерного певца Федора Шаляпина. С труппой «Русского балета» сюда приезжал Сергей Дягилев. На знаменитой сцене Метрополитен-оперы танцевала и Анна Павлова. В сокровищницу театра неоценимый вклад внесли Мария Каллас, Пласидо Доминго, Монсеррат Кабалье и другие выдающиеся исполнители.
История театра
Оперная труппа была основана в Нью-Йорке в 1880 году на средства акционерного общества Metropolitan Opera House Company. Среди меценатов были семьи Морган, Астор, Вандербильт и другие. Она располагалась в здании на Бродвее, построенном известным американским архитектором Кливлендом Кейди. В августе 1892 года оно было сильно повреждено пожаром, однако в кратчайшие сроки восстановлено. И хоть акустика в нем не отвечала необходимым требованиям, театр переехал в новые помещения только в 1966 году. Хор и музыканты работали на постоянной основе, а солисты и дирижеры приглашались по контракту. Судьба же старого здания сложилась незавидно: его снесли. Хотя могли бы сохранить – для истории…
Официальное открытие Метрополитен-оперы состоялось 22 октября 1883 года постановкой оперы «Фауст» Шарля Гуно. Первые годы прошли под знаком немецких композиторов. В конце XIX века спектакли по произведениям Вагнера сменили итальянские сезоны. В начале XX века в репертуар были включены произведения французских и русских классиков. Среди них оперы Петра Ильича Чайковского, Модеста Петровича Мусоргского и Николая Андреевича Римского-Корсакова.
Русский художник Сергей Юрьевич Судейкин оформлял постановки театра с 1924 по 1931 годы. Более 30 мировых премьер прошли именно в Метрополитен-опере. Среди наших соотечественников на его сцене выступали Галина Вишневская и Анатолий Соловьяненко, Елена Образцова и Любовь Казарновская, Мария Биешу и Дмитрий Хворостовский, Галина Горчакова и Ольга Бородина, Анна Нетребко и многие другие. С 1940 по 2004 год из зрительного зала велись радиотрансляции. В 1995 году здесь оборудовали систему синхронного перевода на английский, немецкий и испанский языки, что стало нужным и своевременным решением, учитывая возрастающую популярность этой оперной площадки.
Архитектура здания и внутреннее убранство
Метрополитен-опера находится в Линкольновском центре исполнительских искусств на Манхэттене (сокращенно Линкольн-центр) – в комплексе, который объединяет 12 зданий, предназначенных для проведения культурных мероприятий.
Автором проекта является американский архитектор Уоллес Кей Харрисон. Это пятиарочное сооружение в неоитальянском стиле прекрасно гармонирует с архитектурой всего комплекса. Здание (не в пример прежнему на Бродвее) отличается замечательной акустикой.
Основная сцена – 80 футов, оборудование для которой изготовили немецкие мастера (фирма «Герритс», коммуна Умкирх, ФРГ). Есть и две дополнительные сценические площадки. Оркестровая яма вмещает 110 музыкантов, но во время балетных спектаклей она уменьшается и добавляется еще один ряд – тридцать пятый. Огромный зрительный зал в пять ярусов рассчитан на 3900 мест. Его убранство поражает богатством: потолок покрыт сусальным золотом, 11 хрустальных люстр в стиле модерн создают великолепную освещенность, позволяющую видеть происходящее на сцене даже из самых дальних точек. Еще одна визитная карточка знаменитого театра – роскошный занавес, весящий несколько сотен килограммов. Он расшит золотом и чистым шелком.
Фойе Метрополитен-оперы украшено знаменитыми фресками Марка Шагала. Их размер 9 на 11 метров, они хорошо видны с улицы через огромные арочные окна. Любопытно, что эти произведения были проданы частному лицу за 20 миллионов долларов, с условием, что они будут находиться в здании театра, то есть покупка больше напоминает меценатскую помощь. В вестибюле размещены скульптуры работы Аристида Майоля и Вильгельма Лембрука. Здесь же можно посмотреть портреты знаменитых артистов.
Как приобрести билеты, стоимость
Поход в оперный театр, особенно такой знаменитый на весь мир, для каждого приезжающего в Соединенные Штаты туриста становится незабываемым событием на всю жизнь. Сезон здесь длится с сентября по апрель. Постановки идут каждый день. В мае и июне труппа отправляется на гастроли. В июле в Нью-Йорке проходит фестиваль Метрополитен-опера. В парках организованы бесплатные постановки, которые пользуются огромной популярностью и собирают толпы поклонников.
Билет удобно приобрести в Интернете на официальном сайте Метрополитен-оперы, распечатать на принтере и тем самым избавить себя от необходимости толпиться у кассы. Для жителей Нью-Йорка предлагается годовой абонемент. Самые дешевые билеты обойдутся от 17 до 35 долларов за одно стоячее место, которых всего 175. Только надо учитывать, что постановка длится около трех часов, и не каждый, наверное, сможет столько выдержать на ногах. Но, как говорят в народе, искусство требует жертв, поэтому истинные его ценители даже не замечают, как пролетает время за просмотром спектакля.
Можно найти и недорогие сидячие места от 25 долларов, тем более что современная акустика позволит насладиться постановкой в полном объеме, ничего не упустив.
Самые дорогие билеты – на первые ряды амфитеатра, они стоят около 500 долларов. Места здесь расположены на одном уровне со сценой и в непосредственной близости от нее.
Билеты в партере обойдутся в 350 долларов. Пенсионерам и студентам предоставляются скидки. Любопытно, что встречаются посетители одетые как в вечерние наряды, так и в джинсы. То есть строгого дресс-кода в Метрополитен-опере не существует. На официальном веб-ресурсе также публикуется информация, раскрывающая содержание и историю постановок, какие солисты в них участвуют.
При Метрополитен-опере есть магазин, он предлагает сувенирную продукцию и диски. Верхнюю одежду можно сдать в гардероб, это вам обойдется в 3 доллара, гарантируется полная сохранность.
Некоторые ложи в театре оборудованы собственным баром и гардеробом.
Как доехать
Многие предпочитают добираться до Метрополитен-оперы на такси или личном автомобиле, однако выезжать нужно заранее, чтобы не опоздать на спектакль из-за пробок. Заторы не страшны, если выбрать старое доброе метро. Дорога из Бруклина займет около получаса, выходить следует на остановке 66 St. Lincoln Street Station.
В расположенных рядом ресторанчиках до начала представления вам предложат бокал шампанского. Настроиться на театральный лад поможет богатое убранство интерьера здания, любоваться которым можно бесконечно.
The Metropolitan Opera is a vibrant home for the most creative and talented singers, conductors, composers, musicians, stage directors, designers, visual artists, choreographers, and dancers from around the world.
Since the summer of 2006, Peter Gelb has been the Met’s general manager—the 16th in company history. Under his leadership, the Met has elevated its theatrical standards by significantly increasing the number of new productions, staged by the most imaginative directors working in theater and opera, and has launched a series of initiatives to broaden its reach internationally. These efforts to win new audiences prominently include the successful Live in HD series of high-definition performance transmissions to movie theaters around the world. To revitalize its repertoire, the Met regularly presents modern masterpieces alongside the classics. Starting with the 2018–19 season, Yannick Nézet-Séguin took the musical helm of the company as the Met’s Jeannette Lerman-Neubauer Music Director.
The Metropolitan Opera was founded in 1883, with its first opera house built on Broadway and 39th Street by a group of wealthy businessmen who wanted their own theater. In the company’s early years, the management changed course several times, first performing everything in Italian (even Carmen and Lohengrin), then everything in German (even Aida and Faust), before finally settling into a policy of performing most works in their original language, with some notable exceptions.
The Metropolitan Opera has always engaged many of the world’s most important artists. Christine Nilsson and Marcella Sembrich shared leading roles during the opening season. In the German seasons that followed, Lilli Lehmann dominated the Wagnerian repertory and anything else she chose to sing. In the 1890s, Nellie Melba and Emma Calvé shared the spotlight with the De Reszke brothers, Jean and Edouard, and two American sopranos, Emma Eames and Lillian Nordica. Enrico Caruso arrived in 1903, and by the time of his death 18 years later had sung more performances with the Met than with all the world’s other opera companies combined. American singers acquired even greater prominence with Geraldine Farrar and Rosa Ponselle becoming important members of the company. In the 1920s, Lawrence Tibbett became the first in a distinguished line of American baritones for whom the Met was home. Today, the Met continues to present the best available talent from around the world and also discovers and trains artists through its National Council Auditions and Lindemann Young Artist Development Program.
Almost from the beginning, it was clear that the opera house on 39th Street did not have adequate stage facilities. But it was not until the Met joined with other New York institutions in forming Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts that a new home became possible. The new Metropolitan Opera House, which opened at Lincoln Center in September 1966, was equipped with the finest technical facilities.
Many great conductors have helped shape the Met, beginning with Wagner’s disciple Anton Seidl in the 1880s and 1890s and Arturo Toscanini, who made his debut in 1908. There were two seasons with both Toscanini and Gustav Mahler on the conducting roster. Later, Artur Bodanzky, Bruno Walter, George Szell, Fritz Reiner, and Dimitri Mitropoulos contributed powerful musical direction. Former Met Music Director James Levine was responsible for shaping the Met Orchestra and Chorus into the finest in the world, as well as expanding the Met repertoire. He led more than 2,500 Met performances over the course of his four-and-a-half decades with the company. When Yannick Nézet-Séguin assumed the role of Music Director in September 2018, he became just the third maestro to occupy this position in company history.
The Met has given the U.S. premieres of some of the most important operas in the repertory. Among Wagner’s works, Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, Das Rheingold, Siegfried, Götterdämmerung, Tristan und Isolde, and Parsifal were first performed in this country by the Met. Other American premieres have included Boris Godunov, Der Rosenkavalier, Turandot, Simon Boccanegra, and Arabella. The Met’s 32 world premieres include Puccini’s La Fanciulla del West and Il Trittico, Humperdinck’s Königskinder, and five recent works—John Corigliano and William Hoffman’s The Ghosts of Versailles (1991), Philip Glass’s The Voyage (1992), John Harbison’s The Great Gatsby (1999), Tobias Picker’s An American Tragedy (2005), Tan Dun’s The First Emperor (2006), and the Baroque pastiche The Enchanted Island (2011), devised by Jeremy Sams, with music by Handel, Vivaldi, Rameau, and others. An additional 78 operas have had their Met premieres since the opera house at Lincoln Center opened in 1966.
Hänsel und Gretel was the first complete opera broadcast from the Met on Christmas Day 1931. Regular Saturday afternoon live broadcasts quickly made the Met a permanent presence in communities throughout the United States and Canada.
In 1977, the Met began a regular series of televised productions with a performance of La Bohème, viewed by more than four million people on public television. Over the following decades, more than 70 complete Met performances have been made available to a huge audience around the world. Many of these performances have been issued on video, laserdisc, and DVD.
In 1995, the Met introduced Met Titles, a unique system of real-time translation. Met Titles appear on individual screens mounted on the back of each row of seats, for those members of the audience who wish to utilize them, but with minimum distraction for those who do not. Titles are provided for all Met performances in English, Spanish, and German. Titles are also provided in Italian for Italian-language operas.
Each season, the Met stages more than 200 opera performances in New York. More than 800,000 people attend the performances in the opera house during the season, and millions more experience the Met through new media distribution initiatives and state-of-the-art technology.
The Met continues its hugely successful radio broadcast series—entering its 88th year this fall—the longest-running classical music series in American broadcast history. It is heard around the world on the Toll Brothers–Metropolitan Opera International Radio Network.
In December 2006, the company launched The Met: Live in HD, a series of performance transmissions shown live in high definition in movie theaters around the world. The series expanded from an initial six transmissions to 10 in the 2014–15 season and today reaches more than 2,000 venues in 73 countries across six continents. The Live in HD performances are later also shown on public television, and a number of them have been released on DVD. In partnership with the New York City Department of Education and the Metropolitan Opera Guild, the Met has developed a nationwide program for students to attend Live in HD transmissions for free in their schools.
In 2006, the Met launched a groundbreaking commissioning program in partnership with New York’s Lincoln Center Theater to provide renowned composers and playwrights the resources to create and develop new works at the Met and at Lincoln Center’s Vivian Beaumont Theater. The first of these to reach the stage was Nico Muhly’s Two Boys, with a libretto by Craig Lucas, which opened at the Met in the fall of 2013.
Other initiatives include annual holiday entertainment offerings; a Rush Ticket Program offering discounted orchestra seats for $25; expanded editorial offerings in Met publications, on the web, and through broadcasts; and new public programs that provide greater access to the Met.
When the new Metropolitan Opera House at Lincoln Center opened on September 16, 1966, it represented the culmination of an effort that began nearly 60 years earlier to plan, finance, and build a modern home for the Met—one that would provide the company with facilities and technology equal to its lofty artistic standards. The oral history that follows offers an inside look into the creation and opening of the new house, with commentary from key artists and administrators of the time, current Met staff, and archival documents that contain the voices of those no longer with us. The majority of the material is drawn from interviews conducted as part of the creation of The Opera House. Edited by Jay Goodwin
The Met had known only one previous home, the original Metropolitan Opera House at Broadway and 39th Street, which had served the company since its founding in 1883, but which had long presented significant challenges.
Rudolf Bing, Met General Manager 1950–72: A nasty rumor has it that the original Metropolitan was obsolete the day it opened its doors. If one were to describe the inadequacy of the old theater in one phrase, it would be: lack of space—lack of storage space, lack of rehearsal space, lack of office space, lack of space in the front of the theater. In a new big production like our recent Aida, the limited margins on the sides of the stage were a maze that was nothing less than a hazard to limbs, lungs, and lyricism.
The original Metropolitan Opera House at Broadway and 39th Street
Herman Krawitz, Met Assistant Manager in charge of Stage, Production, and Business Departments 1953–72, who was instrumental in the planning of the new house: The building was outmoded for many reasons. It was built at a time of gas and gaslights. At a time when, for example, to make it cooler, you put ice in the attic. And there was not enough rehearsal space. They used to rehearse literally in anterooms to the toilets.
Richard Holmes, Met Administrator of Supernumeraries, a member of the company since 1964: The old Met was brilliant and mysterious and claustrophobic. The backstage was tiny. When you rehearsed during the day, the sets for the opera that evening were just lying against the wall outside on Seventh Avenue. It rained, it snowed, and they were just out there. You’d know it’s Turandot that night because you’d see the big staircase all squashed up and lying there.
Planning for a new Metropolitan Opera House began as early as 1908, led by Otto Kahn, Met Board President from 1903 to 1931.
Peter Clark, Met Director of Archives: There were many different attempts to move the Met to different places, the most famous being what eventually became Rockefeller Center. Rockefeller Center was initiated by the Met in 1928, but the company eventually pulled out. Also, in 1925, Kahn had actually bought, with his own funds, a lot on 57th Street between Eighth and Ninth Avenues, and he hoped to build the new Met there. In the ’30s and ’40s, there were proposals to build at Columbus Circle and Washington Square. There were all sorts of plans that never were realized due to myriad problems.
A sketch for the proposed opera house at what is now Rockefeller Center
Finally, in 1955, everything began to come together when the domineering city planner Robert Moses suggested a new site for the Met as part of a larger redevelopment project at Lincoln Square. The Met joined forces with the New York Philharmonic, which was also looking for a new home, to consider building a music center. The two organizations formed an exploratory committee, chaired by John D. Rockefeller III, to oversee the proposals, and Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts was officially incorporated in June 1956.
Paul Goldberger, Architecture Critic: It was an incredibly ambitious project, Lincoln Center. We can only be in awe of the level of ambition that they felt and were moved to actually bring into being. It was motivated very much by the notion that culture is a national symbol, that if we’re really going to be the major world presence as America saw itself in the postwar era, we needed to be a leader in culture as well as manufacturing and finance.
On May 14, 1959, President Eisenhower turned over the first shovel of earth on the site of Lincoln Center as part of a groundbreaking ceremony that featured representatives of the Met, the New York Philharmonic (including Leonard Bernstein), the Juilliard School, and the New York city and state governments.
President Dwight D. Eisenhower breaking ground for Lincoln Center in 1959
Leonard Bernstein, at the groundbreaking: Ladies and gentlemen, we have duly ushered in the first stage of a remarkable project—the culmination of three years of planning, to give New York and the whole American nation, a great center of the performing arts, the like of which the world has never seen.
President Dwight D. Eisenhower: Here in the heart of our greatest metropolitan center, men of vision are executing a redevelopment of purpose, utility, and taste. The beneficial influence of this great cultural adventure will not be limited to our borders. Here will occur a true interchange of the fruits of national cultures. From this will develop a growth that will spread to the corners of the earth, bringing with it the kind of human message that only individuals, not governments, can transmit. Here will develop a mighty influence for peace and understanding throughout the world.
The work site for Lincoln Center when construction began in 1959
The centerpiece of Lincoln Center was to be the new Metropolitan Opera House, which would be the largest and most expensive of the campus’s buildings and would occupy the central position on the plaza. The architect chosen to design the house was Wallace K. Harrison, who had been involved in the Met’s planning process since the proposed Rockefeller Center project and who had recently worked on the design team for the United Nations headquarters.
Paul Goldberger: Harrison was a fascinating architect in that he was an unusual combination of the practical and the political, and also the very idealistic, the modern, and the romantic. And he really had an enormously fertile, potent, flamboyant architectural imagination. His initial ideas, while very beautiful, were also quite expensive. They were very sculptural. But engineering for that kind of sculptural form was tough in those years, and very expensive. And a building that had as many practical demands as the Metropolitan Opera is difficult to combine with a very unusual sculptural form.
The practical demands of the new house were overwhelming. To begin with, the building would need state-of-the-art theatrical technology, an enormous stage and backstage area, cavernous storage space, and a suitably grand and beautiful auditorium and lobby.
A sketch by Robert Schwartz of one of architect Wallace K. Harrison’s early designs for the new Met
Herman Krawitz: We were determined to do the interior of the stage and the auditorium first, with the exterior to follow. I think we did 44 different versions of the exterior with different arrangements of office space and so forth, but the auditorium and the stage were fixed features and remained, beginning to end, the way we wanted them from almost the first conversations.
John Sellars, Met Assistant General Manager, Production: The facility we moved into in 1966 was state-of-the-art. Not only did we gain space, but we gained technology and the ability to better pursue the idea of grand opera in repertory. The systems included the lifts built into the main stage as well as a modern fly system. We went from a manual system—downtown, the guys had to pull ropes by hand—to a system that flew all the scenery up and down with electric motors. And the stage has three wagons—platforms that are also driven by electric motors on which we can have a full stage set already prepared and drive that wagon out onto the main stage and back—one stage right, one stage left, and one upstage in the rear, which has a turntable built in. It is a tribute to the architects and the engineers of this facility that it’s all still working after 50 years.
The new Met under construction
Rosalind Elias, mezzo-soprano: Let me tell you about my first day coming to the new Met—my first year, really. I was always lost in this house. I could never find my way around, and I wasn’t the only one. It’s a complicated building, and it’s larger than you can imagine.
Richard Holmes: You couldn’t believe it—it was like going into wonderland after living in a postage stamp. You went out into the auditorium and into the lobby, and there were all these vast, serpentine corridors, and everything was circular and flowing and bright, and while you missed the wonderful, mysterious gloom of the old Met, suddenly there was this brave new world of sunlight.
In designing the auditorium, Harrison and his team needed to allow for more seats than the old house while achieving better sightlines and equally good acoustics.
Herman Krawitz: The Met board requested 4,500 seats—25% more than the old house. Harrison told me almost right from the start, “They’re crazy. There’s no way I can do it.” But there’s a way of counting the seats so that you can exceed 4,000 if you include standing room. So we spoke of it not as 4,000 seats but 4,000 admissions. We were very clever about that. And to provide the best views, we brought in surveyor’s equipment. If you look, you’ll see some seats have two arms, some have one, sometimes they are two inches apart, sometimes four. Each seat in the orchestra section was measured. It’s a very good hall to see things. But most importantly, the sound of the non-amplified voice was the game. That’s what the Met is—the beauty of the voice naturally released by an artist and filling the room. In that respect, the Met is the finest house in the world in my opinion, then and now.
Architect Wallace K. Harrison, Lincoln Center President William Schuman, and Met General Manager Rudolf Bing admire the new Met’s nearly complete auditorium.
Leontyne Price, soprano: It was something the first time I walked out on that stage at the new Met. I thought, you’ve got to be kidding. It was so huge. But the first note that I sang, I thought I was singing to Staten Island. It was that incredible. I just heard my beautiful voice go like it was into another country. The acoustics are so fantastic. It’s like a meteor when you sing there. You just want to kiss yourself you sound so great.
To open the new house, the Met commissioned a new opera from American composer Samuel Barber: Antony and Cleopatra, featuring a libretto adapted from Shakespeare and a spectacular production by Franco Zeffirelli that would showcase the grandeur and the full technical capabilities of the new theater. Leontyne Price and Justino Díaz were chosen to sing the lead roles, with Rosalind Elias as Cleopatra’s servant Charmian, and Thomas Schippers on the podium. Opening Night was to be a glittering affair, with 3,000 bottles of Champagne on hand to be served to a dazzling list of attendees that included Lady Bird Johnson, Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos, New York Governor and Mrs. Nelson Rockefeller, and Mr. and Mrs. Alfred Vanderbilt.
Director Franco Zeffirelli, conductor Thomas Schippers, and composer Samuel Barber
Justino Díaz, bass-baritone: When Mr. Bing told me that I had been chosen to open the new house, it was incredible for me. It was like a miracle, like a dream. The tone of rehearsals in this new opera house was intense. Everybody was very busy. Franco had carte blanche—everything that he wanted. And he wanted to use the whole stage, to showcase the marvels of the new theater.
Leontyne Price: We were surrounded with geniuses. Sam being one of them, who really represents American composers at their height. Zeffirelli—what can I tell you? I knew that the stage would be full—I had done a fabulous production with him at La Scala where everyone in Milan was on that stage. He would get these ideas, and all of a sudden there it was. But he’s so brilliant that everything works out.
A rehearsal for Franco Zeffirelli’s extravagant production of Antony and Cleopatra
Richard Holmes: The first scene of Antony was the biggest conglomeration of people that I have ever seen on the Met stage. I think there were 250. But we’re not satisfied just with getting 250 people—there’s also a gigantic golden pyramid in which Leontyne was waiting for her first entrance. And people were climbing it and pawing it, and Zeffirelli, I remember, said “You must climb passionately.” It’s hard to go to school to learn how to climb a pyramid passionately—but he gave lessons. And no Zeffirelli production would be complete without animals, so we had camels and goats for atmosphere.
Rosalind Elias: Some miracle happened that everything worked. It’s a brand new house, and right up to the dress rehearsal, there were technical things that were not working, but something—some spirit, or whatever you want to believe—helped it come together. It was an exciting time. And Leontyne, God bless her, she’d open her mouth and that voice would come out, and I’d always think, “Where is it coming from? It’s coming from heaven.”
Justino Díaz as Antony and Leontyne Price as Cleopatra
Leontyne Price: I call the new Met the temple of grand opera. Everything is so majestic—a work of geniuses. And she still just gleams, you know? Whenever I’m in the neighborhood, I’ll wave and say ‘Remember me? I opened you.’ To this day, I will never recover from it. The honor.
For 90 years, millions of listeners have tuned in to the Met’s Saturday Matinee Radio Broadcasts. To date, the Met has presented more than 1,800 broadcasts, with opera lovers in more than 30 nations listening over the Toll Brothers–Metropolitan Opera International Radio Network. Below is a small selection of noteworthy events in the annals of the longest-running continuous classical music program in American broadcast history. By Christopher Browner
JANUARY 12–13, 1910 Lee de Forest, the self-proclaimed “Father of Radio,” uses a makeshift antenna on the Met roof to transmit Puccini’s Tosca, Mascagni’s Cavalleria Rusticana, and Leoncavallo’s Pagliacci via telephone systems to listeners as far as Newark, New Jersey. This is the first time an audience outside the opera house hears a Met performance.
DECEMBER 25, 1931 The Met launches the first season of matinee radio broadcasts with Humperdinck’s Hänsel und Gretel (pictured above). Milton Cross, who would go on to host 851 performances, is the announcer.
FEBRUARY 25, 1933 The Met launches its first radio fund drive. Donations from this and subsequent on-air appeals help the company survive the Great Depression.
FEBRUARY 2, 1935 Kirsten Flagstad causes a sensation with her U.S. debut, singing Sieglinde in a live broadcast of Wagner’s Die Walküre. Other major Met artists to debut during a radio broadcast include Renato Bruson, Kiri Te Kanawa, Jan Peerce, Hermann Prey, Bidú Sayão, Georg Solti, and Astrid Varnay.
DECEMBER 7, 1940 Texaco begins its sponsorship of the broadcasts, with a performance of Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro. This is also the first appearance of the Opera Question Forum, now known as the Metropolitan Opera Quiz.
1942–1945 The broadcasts are used to help the war effort—with intermissions renamed as “Victory Rallies” that feature important figures from Allied countries. First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt appears as a guest during a performance of Wagner’s Tannhäuser.
First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, baritone Lawrence Tibbett, Met General Manager Edward Johnson, and Metropolitan Opera guild founder Eleanor Belmont
1950 The Metropolitan Opera, ABC Radio (which carried the broadcasts at the time), and Texaco receive the Peabody Award in Music for “public service in making the most brilliant opera company in the world a by-word in millions of homes.” The Met broadcasts will go on to win three more Peabody Awards over the next 40 years.
SEPTEMBER 16, 1966 The opening of the new Metropolitan Opera House at Lincoln Center is broadcast live. The performance is the world premiere of Barber’s Antony and Cleopatra, starring Leontyne Price and Justino Díaz.
1973–74 SEASON Stereo transmission is used for the first time to 12 east-coast stations.
A 1973 intermission roundtable discussion featuring baritone Robert Merrill, soprano Zinka Milanov, and tenor Richard Tucker
DECEMBER 28, 1974 Milton Cross hosts his final broadcast, dying six days later.
JANUARY 4, 1975 Peter Allen becomes the broadcasts’ second announcer, a position he holds until 2004.
1980–81 SEASON The broadcasts are transmitted via satellite for the first time, increasing stereo coverage and improving sound quality.
OCTOBER 22, 1983 In celebration of the Met’s centennial, the company’s day-long, two-part gala is telecast internationally and simulcast on radio.
JANUARY 23, 1988 During an intermission of Verdi’s Macbeth, an audience member leaps to his death in the auditorium. Host Peter Allen must improvise commentary for nearly an hour before the remainder of the performance is canceled.
DECEMBER 8, 1990 The Met begins broadcasting to Europe. Over the next decade, coverage continues to expand, eventually reaching listeners on six continents.
2003–2004 SEASON After Texaco decides to end its sponsorship, the Met launches the Broadcast Campaign Fund, spearheaded by soprano Beverly Sills, to keep the broadcasts on the air.
DECEMBER 11, 2004 Margaret Juntwait takes over as host. She holds the position until her death in 2015. Between Saturday-matinee and satellite-radio broadcasts, she holds the company record for hosting the most performances at 1,122.
Margaret Juntwait interviews soprano Beverly Sills
2005 Toll Brothers begins its support for the Saturday matinee broadcasts.
2006 Complementing the Saturday broadcasts, the Met launches its own station on Sirius Satellite Radio. Today, listeners can hear archival broadcasts and live performances 24 hours a day on Met Opera Radio on SiriusXM.
2015 After serving as Senior Radio Producer since 2006, Mary Jo Heath becomes the fourth host of the Met Saturday Matinee Broadcasts.
March 7, 2020 The afternoon’s performance of Mozart’s Così fan tutte is the final live matinee broadcast before the Met’s closure due to the Covid-19 pandemic. While the house is dark, the company continues to present opera on the air, including a full season of encore presentations during the period in which the 2020–21 radio season would have occurred.
2021 An accomplished concert pianist and radio presenter, Debra Lew Harder becomes the series’s fifth official host.
Театр, который начинал работу с произведений Вагнера. Театр, чье здание украшено фресками Марка Шагала. Театр, на сцене которого выступали Федор Шаляпин и Лучано Паваротти. Все это — Метрополитен-опера в Нью-Йорке. Об истории одного из самых знаменитых оперных театров мира расскажет сегодня Diletant.media.
С Бродвея на Манхэттен
История Метрополитен-оперы, или, как сокращенно называют театр местные, Мета, началась в 1880 году, когда была создана компания «Метрополитен Опера». Компания разместилась в здании оперного театра на Бродвее, и в 1883 состоялась премьера — на сцене была поставлена опера «Фауст» Шарля Гуно. Правда, дела недолго шли гладко: как водится, произошел пожар, и в 1892 он сильно повредил здание. Театр восстановили и использовали вплоть до 1966, пока Метрополитен-опера не переехала, наконец, в здание Линкольн-центра на Манхэттене.
Так выглядело здание Метрополитен-оперы на Бродвее
От Вагнера к Чайковскому
В начале работы в театре шли преимущественно постановки Вагнера. В первую очередь Мет обязан этим дирижеру Дамрошу, руководителю немецкой труппы театра с 1984 по 1991 год. Чуть позже, в 1908—1910 здесь работал Густав Малер. Именно он поставил на сцене Мета первую русскую оперу — ей стала «Пиковая дама» Чайковского. В 1908 году художественным руководителем театра был назначен знаменитый Артуро Тосканини. После Метрополитен-оперы он ушел в миланский театр Ла Скала, один из самых знаменитых оперных театров мира. Именно при Тосканини в нью-йоркской опере началась традиция постановки произведений на языке оригинала. Заветы итальянского дирижера исполняются в театре и по сей день.
Знаменитый дирижер Артуро Тосканини
Афроамериканцы на сцене Метрополитен-оперы
В XX веке Мет считалась одной из ведущих оперных сцен мира наряду с Ла-Скалой и Венской оперой. Особую страницу в истории театра открыл приход дирижера Бинга. Метрополитен-опера становилась все популярнее и популярнее, в том числе благодаря тому, что Бинг первым рискнул пригласить на сцену афроамериканских солистов.
Первооткрывательницей стала Марина Андерсон, знаменитая американская оперная певица, исполняющая музыку Баха, Шуберта, Верди, а также духовную музыку в стиле спиричуэлс. На сцене Метрополитен-оперы она появилась в 1995 в роли Ульрики в опере «Бал-маскарад» Верди.
К тому времени выступить в стенах Метрополитен-оперы успели уже многие знаменитые исполнители, среди которых Лотта Леман, знаменитая своим сопрано по всему миру, Нелли Мельба, уроженка Австралии, Лилиан Нордика, Олив Фремстад, Жак Урлус и многие другие. В 19о3 на сцене Мета дебютировал в опере «Риголетто» сам Энрико Карузо! Итальянский тенор работал в нью-йоркском театре вплоть до 1920. Он был так любит зрителями, что в 1929 году, после его захоронения в каменной гробнице, на средства, собранные его поклонниками, в честь Карузо была создана огромная восковая свеча. Она должна зажигаться раз в год перед ликом Мадонны. По примерным подсчетам, свечи должно хватить на 500 лет.
Звезды Метрополитен-оперы: Мария Каллас
Чуть позже на сцене Мета появлялись Зинка Миланова (хорватская оперная певица), Кирстен Флагстад (знаменитая норвежская исполнительница Вагнера), Астрид Варнай (шведская исполнительница Вагнера и Бетховена), Марта Медль (оперная певица из Германии), Тереса Берганса (певица из Испании), Лауриц Мельхиор, Леонард Уоррен, Адам Дидур и золотой голос Федор Шаляпин! А в 1948 в опере «Аида» в заглавной роли появилась сама Мария Каллас! Затем знаменитая певица еще не раз выступала на сцене Мета. Она успела побывать и Нормой из оперы Беллини, и Брунгильдой из «Валькирии» Вагнера, и Эльвирой из «Пуритан» Беллини.
Новый дом: Линкольн-центр
1966 стал переломным моментом для Метрополитен-оперы. Старое здание на Бродвее решили снести, а сам театр переехал в здание Линкольн-центра. Свой переезд театр отпраздновал мировой премьерой оперы «Антоний и Клеопатра» Сэмюэля Барбера. Новый дом Мета, Линкольн-центр — настоящий остров культуры и искусств. Кроме Мета здесь расположены также труппа Нью-Йоркского балета, Нью-Йоркский филармонический оркестр, Джазовый центр, Нью-Йоркская публичная библиотека исполнительских искусств и многое другое.
Спонсировал создание этого центра Рокфеллер, часть денег он выложил из своего кармана. И он не поскупился: например, вестибюль здания театра украшают фрески Марка Шагала! А роскошный занавес, весом в несколько сотен килограммов, украшен шитьем из чистого шелка и блестками.
Не такой, как все
На сцене Мета ставились знаменитейшие мировые оперы. Особое место среди них занимали произведения и русских классиков. Например, в 1913 Тосканини поставил «Бориса Годунова» Модеста Мусоргского, в свое время на сцене появилась и «Сорочинская ярмарка». В 1925 поставили оперу «Соловей» Стравинского.
Особой чертой Метрополитен-оперы стали трансляции спектаклей в прямом эфире по радио. Начиная с 1931 года каждую субботу жители США могли наслаждаться оперным пением, не выходя из дома. Премьерной постановкой стала опера «Гензель и Гретель» Гумпердинка.
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