A new production from the Met.

Georges Bizet may have attained immortality with a single work. He would not live to enjoy Carmen‘s success, however, as weighed down by the initially savage reviews of the work, and after two heart attacks, he passed away only a few months after the première at the age of only 36. At his death, he was seen as a symphonic composer who only dabbled somewhat in the opera genre. Among the numerous other works he wrote for the stage besides Carmen, Les Pêcheurs de Perles is an opera with its own unique tone. Although the critic of Le Figaro wrote mockingly after its première that "there were neither fishermen in the libretto, nor pearls in the music”, no lesser an authority than Berlioz had a different opinion, declaring that the work contained "a considerable number of beautiful expressive morsels, full of fire and richly coloured”.
Bizet's dazzling opera of desire and longing set in the Far East returns to the Metropolitan Opera stage for the first time in 100 years. The Met's world-renowned soprano Diana Damrau - who we will have the chance to welcome in person at a Müpa bel canto gala in May 2016 - takes the lead role of Leïla, the beautiful Hindu priestess. Playing the two fishermen and friends competing for her affections are Matthew Polenzani, who has already performed a number of lead roles at the New York opera house, and the wonderful Mariusz Kwiecień, a Polish baritone with a prodigious career on the international stage. This pair will perform one of the best-known numbers in opera, the duet Au fond du temple saint. Director Penny Woolcock tackles the timeless themes of love, betrayal and vengeance in a production that uses the undersea world as a vivid symbol on the stage of the Met. The performance, created jointly with the English National Opera, will be conducted by the Italian Gianandrea Noseda, who is responsible for bringing numerous forgotten works of the concert and opera repertoire "back to the surface”.

Presented by: Müpa Budapest