The Metropolitan Opera has released its schedule for the 2014-'15 season, and there's something for everyone (we would argue more so than with recent seasons). The two headliners for the next season, which opens September 22 with Mozart's Le Nozze di Figaro, have to be conductor James Levine and composer Giuseppe Verdi, both of whom will make six "appearances."
Levine, as the Met's music director, is not a surprise per se, but his six appearances are still newsworthy after the recent health problems he's dealt with, including sciatica and injuries from a series of falls. He'll conduct six productions next season however, including the opener from Mozart, and revivals such as Stravinsky's The Rake's Progress and Wagner's Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg. Levine will also conduct three concerts for the MET Orchestra at Carnegie Hall series.
Verdi will be the star composer for the season, as six of the Italian Romantic's productions will be staged during the season: Aida, Un Ballo in Maschera, Don Carlo, Ernani, Macbeth, and La Traviata. Levine will conduct for Ernani.
Aida and Bizet's Carmen are classics, but if any production is going to make headlines this year, it will probably be John Adams' The Death of Klinghoffer. The show has generated controversy for the alleged sympathy it shows for Palestinian terrorists. The opera is based on the 1985 hijacking of a cruise liner by the Palestinian Liberation Front, and the subsequent death of Jewish passenger Leon Klinghoffer. The show was staged at the Brooklyn Academy of Music in 1991, but the reaction was so fierce from Jewish advocates that performances in Los Angeles and England were cancelled. Expect many protesting voices when the show comes to the Met in October.
Did we skip over your favorite composer? You can check out the full schedule here.
