Carnegie Hall

The Metropolitan Opera Orchestra is regarded as one of the world’s finest orchestras. Since the Met’s inception in 1883, it has worked with leading conductors in both opera and concert performances, and has developed into an orchestra of enormous technical polish and style. The musicians maintain a demanding schedule of performances and rehearsals during the 33-week Lincoln Center season, with as many as seven performances per week in repertory that this season encompasses 22 operas. In addition to its opera schedule, the orchestra has a distinguished history of concert performances, including an annual series at Carnegie Hall.

The history of The MET Orchestra Chamber Ensemble goes back to 2005, when then–Music Director James Levine organized the group’s first performance at Carnegie Hall in an effort to showcase the artistry and virtuosity of the orchestra members, and to create an opportunity for the musicians to perform more intimate repertoire. The Chamber Ensemble gave performances until 2016, when the concerts were discontinued.

Now, the group returns in a new initiative of the Met, with an artistic committee of orchestra members planning its repertoire in collaboration with Met administration and music staff. All orchestra members will have the opportunity to participate in the series, and the programs will often feature guest singers from the Met’s roster. This season, the Chamber Ensemble presents six performances in Weill Recital Hall—more than in any previous year—as well as free performances in neighborhoods throughout New York as part of the Carnegie Hall Citywide series, to begin when COVID-19 restrictions have eased.

Visit metorchestramusicians.org to read bios for individual orchestra members.

Yamaha is the Official Piano of the Metropolitan Opera. The Met is grateful to Yamaha for providing the Bösendorfer piano for today’s performance.

Canadian-born conductor and pianist Yannick Nézet-Séguin became the Metropolitan Opera’s Jeanette Lerman-Neubauer Music Director with the beginning of the 2018–2019 season. He made his company debut in 2009 with a new production of Carmen and has since returned every season, conducting more than 100 performances of 14 operas. During the 2021–2022 season, he conducted the historic company premiere of Terence Blanchard’s Fire Shut Up in My Bones and also leads Met premieres of Matthew Aucoin’s Eurydice and the French version of Verdi’s Don Carlos, as well as revivals of Puccini’s Tosca and Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro.

Mr. Nézet-Séguin has been music director of The Philadelphia Orchestra since 2012 and held the same position with the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra between 2008 and 2018. Since 2000, he has served as artistic director and principal conductor of Montreal’s Orchestre Métropolitain. From 2008 to 2014, he was principal guest conductor of the London Philharmonic Orchestra, and during the 2019–2020 season, he was a Carnegie Hall Perspectives artist.

He enjoys close collaborations with the Berliner Philharmoniker, Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, and Chamber Orchestra of Europe, and has led performances at La Scala; Royal Opera House, Covent Garden; Dutch National Opera; Vienna State Opera; Lincoln Center’s Mostly Mozart Festival; and the festivals of Salzburg, Edinburgh, Lucerne, Grafenegg, Lanaudière, Vail, and Saratoga. Recent recordings include his first solo piano album, Introspection: Solo Piano Sessions, as well as albums with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, The Philadelphia Orchestra, and Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra. In 2011, he began a cycle of seven Mozart operas for the Festival Hall Baden-Baden, which Deutsche Grammophon recorded live.

This season at the Met, American soprano Liv Redpath covers the title role in the company premiere of Matthew Aucoin’s Eurydice and the title role in the new production of Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor. Elsewhere, she makes her role debut as Lucia at Deutsche Oper Berlin and appears in concert at the Verbier Festival in Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9; with the Los Angeles Philharmonic for a chamber music gala in honor of the orchestra’s concertmaster, Martin Chalifour; with American Bach Soloists for a New Year’s Eve concert that features selections by Handel, Rameau, and Purcell; and with the Long Beach Symphony for Mozart’s Requiem.

In recent seasons, Ms. Redpath has sung Naiad in Strauss’s Ariadne auf Naxos at the Edinburgh International Festival, Woglinde in Wagner’s Das Rheingold at the Bregenz Festival, “Das himmlische Leben” from Mahler’s Symphony No. 4 as part of the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s Icons on Inspiration presentation, Marguerite de Valois in Meyerbeer’s Les Huguenots at Deutsche Oper Berlin, and Crobyle in Massenet’s Thaïs in concert with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra. She has also appeared to great acclaim at the Santa Fe Opera, Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, Cincinnati Opera, Scottish Opera, Wolf Trap Opera, Aspen Music Festival, and New York Festival of Song, as well as with the Seattle and Pacific symphonies, Tesserae Baroque, Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, and Los Angeles Master Chorale.