MET Opera Saturday March 2nd at 1 PM Donizetti’s comic romp La Fille du Régiment – WJOP 96.3
February 22, 2019**METROPOLITAN OPERA RADIO BROADCAST ALERT**
The Met broadcasts Donizetti’s comic romp
La Fille du Régiment featuring an all-star cast
Radio Broadcast: Saturday, March 2 at 1:00 p.m. ET on WJOP-LP 96.3 FM Newburport
The 2018-19 Metropolitan Opera Radio Broadcast season continues with Donizetti’s comedy La Fille du Régiment. Soprano Pretty Yende stars in the title role as Marie, the young girl taken in and raised as a daughter by a regiment of French soldiers. Tenor Javier Camarena is Tonio, the boy who enlists just to marry her – and sings the show-stopping aria “Ah! mes amis,” famous for its remarkable nine high Cs. Mezzo-soprano Stephanie Blythe is the Marquise of Berkenfield, Marie’s long-lost relative, and bass-baritone Maurizio Muraro is the comical sergeant Sulpice. Tony–nominated actress Kathleen Turner makes a cameo appearance as the Duchess of Krakenthorp. Enrique Mazzola conducts the performance, which will be heard live over Toll Brothers-Metropolitan Opera International Radio Network at 1:00 p.m. ET on Saturday, March 2.
Pretty Yende adds a new role to her Met repertory as Marie, having previously sung it at the Teatro Della Maestranza in Seville. She made her company debut in 2013, stepping in on short notice to sing her first-ever performance of Countess Adèle in Rossini’s Le Comte Ory. Since then, she has returned to sing Pamina in Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte, Rosina in Rossini’s Il Barbiere di Siviglia, Elvira in Bellini’s I Puritani, Juliette in Gounod’s Roméo et Juliette, Adina in Donizetti’s L’Elisir d’Amore, and the title role in Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor. Earlier this season at the Met she performed Leïla in Bizet’s Les Pêcheurs des Perles opposite Javier Camarena as Nadir. Upcoming engagements include Amina in Bellini’s La Sonnambula at Zürich Opera and Adina in L’Elisir d’Amore at Bavarian State Opera. She also makes several more joint appearances with Camarena this season, starring as Norina opposite his Ernesto in Donizetti’s Don Pasquale at Paris Opera, and in the title role of Lucia di Lammermoor with Camarena as Edgardo at Bavarian State Opera.
Javier Camarena has previously sung Tonio at companies including the Vienna State Opera and Gran Teatre del Liceu in Barcelona. He made his Met debut in 2011 as Count Almaviva in Il Barbiere di Siviglia, and his company credits include Elvino in La Sonnambula, Arturo in I Puritani, and Idreno in Rossini’s Semiramide. He is one of only three artists in more than 75 years to give a mid-performance encore at the Met, first as Don Ramiro in Rossini’s La Cenerentola in 2014, then as Ernesto in Don Pasquale in 2016, and again this season as Tonio in La Fille du Régiment. Earlier this season, he sang Nadir in Les Pêcheurs des Perles alongside Pretty Yende. He reprises the role this spring in Bilbao, Spain, and reprises Tonio in upcoming performances at Royal Opera, Covent Garden.
Stephanie Blythe makes her Met role debut as the Marquise of Berkenfield, a role which she has previously sung at the Atlanta Opera. She has given more than 225 Met performances in a varied repertory that includes 27 different roles. Recently, these have included Madame de la Haltière in Massenet’s Cendrillon, Mistress Quickly in Verdi’s Falstaff, Fricka in Wagner’s Der Ring des Nibelungen, Ulrica in Verdi’s Un Ballo in Maschera, and Eduige in Handel’s Rodelinda. She is a graduate of the Met’s Lindemann Young Artist Development Program and a winner of the Met’s National Council Auditions. Earlier this season, she reprised her portrayals of the Principessa and Zita in Puccini’s Il Trittico with the company. Later this season she will appear as Mistress Quickly in Falstaff at Dallas Opera.
Maurizio Muraro reprises Sulpice, having sung the role at the Met during the 2009-10 and 2011-12 seasons. His more than 100 performances with the company include roles such as Dr. Bartolo in both Il Barbiere di Siviglia and Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro, Don Alfonso in Mozart’s Così fan tutte, and the Bailiff in Massenet’s Werther. Other performances this season at the Met include Talpa and Simone in Puccini’s Il Trittico, and the Prince of Bouillon in the new production of Cilea’s Adriana Lecouvreur, which was seen as part of the Met’s Live in HD series. Future appearances include Dr. Bartolo in Le Nozze di Figaro at Royal Opera, Covent Garden, and in Il Barbiere di Siviglia at Hamburg State Opera.
Kathleen Turner, a two-time Golden Globe–winning and Academy Award–nominated actress, joins a list of distinguished actresses who have performed the iconic, non-singing role of the Duchess of Krakenthorp at the Met. She has garnered critical acclaim for performances in movies including Body Heat, Romancing the Stone, Prizzi’s Honor, Peggy Sue Got Married, The War of the Roses, The Man with Two Brains, The Jewel of the Nile, The Accidental Tourist, Serial Mom, and many others. Stage appearances on Broadway have included Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (for which she received a Tony nomination for Best Actress), Indiscretions, The Graduate, and Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf (for which she received a second Tony nomination). Other stage credits include Mother Courage and Her Children, Red Hot Patriot: The Kick-Ass Wit of Molly Ivins, The Year of Magical Thinking, the West End production of Bakersfield Mist, and her own cabaret show, Finding My Voice.
Enrique Mazzola made his company debut conducting L’Elisir d’Amore in 2016. He has been the artistic and music director of Orchestre National d’Ile de France since 2012 and this season marks his first as principal guest conductor at Deutsche Oper Berlin. He has also conducted at the Bolshoi Theatre, La Scala, Opera du Rhin, Théâtre des Champs-Elysées in Paris, as well as the Glyndebourne Festival, Orange Festival, and Munich Opera Festival. This season’s engagements include Don Pasquale at Vienna State Opera, Offenbach’s Les Contes d’Hoffmann at Deutsche Oper Berlin and Orphée Aux Enfers at the Salzburg Festival, and Rossini’s Il Turco in Italia at Zürich Opera.
The single intermission will include artist interviews led by Live in HD host Nadine Sierra.
