Renée Fleming Sings First Complete Met Performances of Capriccio

Renée Fleming will sing her first complete Met performances as the elegant Countess in Richard Strauss's Capriccio beginning March 28. Fleming sang the demanding final scene of the opera in a gala opening the Met's 2008-09 season, but this season's performances will be her first time singing the full opera with the company. Andrew Davis, who led the Met premiere of the opera in 1998, returns to conduct its first revival, which also stars Joseph Kaiser as the composer Flamand, Russell Braun as the poet Olivier, Sarah Connolly as Clairon, Morten Frank Larsen in his Met debut as the Count, Peter Rose as the flamboyant La Roche, and Barry Banks and Olga Makarina as a temperamental Italian tenor and soprano; all are making Met role debuts. The Saturday, April 23 matinee performance will be transmitted to 1500 movie theaters and performing arts centers in 46 countries as part of The Met: Live in HD series.

In Capriccio, Strauss uses the romantic indecision of the widowed Countess-who is pursued by both a composer and a poet-as the opportunity for a sophisticated, breezy examination of aesthetics. The Countess wonders which is more important to musical drama: the music or the written word? The opera's supporting characters, including the actress Clairon, the stage director La Roche, and the Countess's love-struck brother, amplify and complicate this central artistic question. While Fleming sings her first Capriccio at the Met this season, she has sung the Countess to wide acclaim in other venues, most recently in 2008 and 2010 productions at the Vienna State Opera. This is the third Strauss heroine in Fleming's wide-ranging Met repertory, which also includes the Marschallin in Der Rosenkavalier and the title character in Arabella; it is the twenty-first complete role she has sung with the company.

John Cox's production, which updates the setting to the twentieth century, was created for the opera's 1998 Met premiere. The staging features sets by Mauro Pagano, interior décor and costume design by Robert Perdziola, and lighting design by Duane Schuler.

Live Broadcasts
Capriccio will be experienced by millions of people around the world this season in movie theaters, on the radio and on the internet, through distribution platforms the Met has established with various media partners.
The April 23 matinee will be transmitted to more than 1,500 movie theaters in 46 countries around the world as part of The Met: Live in HD series.

The March 28 opening performance will be broadcast live on Metropolitan Opera Radio on SIRIUS channel 78 and XM channel 79, as will the April 19 and 23 performances.
The March 28 performance will also be available via internet streaming at the Met's web site www.metopera.org. The April 23 matinee will be broadcast live over the Toll Brothers-Metropolitan Opera International Radio Network.

To post a comment, you must register and login.