Metropolitan Opera Announces Cast Change For RIGOLETTO

Canadian bass-baritone John Relyea, who just ended a highly acclaimed run as Boris Ismailov in the Met's production of Shostakovich's Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk, will also be singing the role of the Grand Inquisitor in all of the Met's upcoming performances of Verdi's Don Carlo, which opens on November 3.

The 2009 recipient of the Met's Beverly Sills Artist Award, he made his company debut in 2000 as Alidoro in Rossini's La Cenerentola, followed by performances as Masetto in Mozart's Don Giovanni, Colline in Puccini's La Bohème, the Nightwatchman in Wagner's Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, Vodník in Dvořák's Rusalka, Figaro in Mozart's Le Nozze di Figaro, Escamillo in Bizet's Carmen, and Gesler in Rossini's Guillaume Tell. Last season, he sang the Grand Inquisitor in the Met premiere of the five-act French version of Verdi's Don Carlos and the Ghost of King Hamlet / First Player / Gravedigger in the company premiere of Brett Dean's Hamlet. Later this season, he will sing Wotan in Wagner's Das Rheingold at English National Opera, King Marke in Act III of Wagner's Tristan und Isolde in concert with the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, and Hunding in Wagner's Die Walküre in Naples.

Rigoletto opens on November 10, with Rosa Feola and Lisette Oropesa sharing the role of Gilda, Aigul Akhmetshina as Maddalena, Benjamin Bernheim and Stephen Costello as the Duke of Mantua, and Quinn Kelsey, Michael Chioldi, and Luca Salsi as Rigoletto. Speranza Scappucci conducts Bartlett Sher's production.

Other performances are November 14, 17, 20mat, 26mat, 29, and December 3, 8, 11mat, 14, 17mat, 20, 23, and 29.

For more information, visit metopera.org.

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