The Met: In Focus
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The Met: In Focus
In Focus, a new podcast series from the Metropolitan Opera, introduces audience members to the operatic masterpieces presented in the company’s award-winning Live in HD cinema transmissions. Hosted by Met radio commentator and staff writer William Berger, In Focus provides historical context about t...
Recent Episodes
17 episodes
Wagner’s Der Fliegende Holländer
A spectral sea captain, cursed to wander the open ocean for eternity—unless the true love of a woman can save him. Learn more about Wagner’s Der Flieg...
Handel's Agrippina
Powerful men and—especially—women deceive and seduce one another to achieve their selfish ends, in a political satire as relevant now as ever. Learn m...
Berg's Wozzeck
An ordinary soldier is driven to madness and murder by an intolerable cocktail of humiliation, jealousy, and the indignities of daily life—his sufferi...
Glass's Akhnaten
A young pharaoh transforms ancient Egypt with his revolutionary religious ideas—a tale made modern through Philip Glass’s mesmerizing and distinctive...
Puccini's Madama Butterfly
A clash of cultures and the heartless abandonment of a naïve young Japanese geisha lead to one of opera’s most devastating and emotionally direct trag...
Massenet's Manon
A beautiful ingénue with a taste for the finer things makes her way to Paris, where she becomes irresistible to the men around her—including the passi...
Puccini's Turandot
In ancient China, a princess tests the worthiness of her suitors by posing a series of riddles—killing those who answer incorrectly—until a brave warr...
Poulenc's Dialogues des Carmélites
From a convent in northeastern France, amid the chaos of the Revolution, an order of nuns commit the ultimate act of martyrdom, giving opera one of it...
Wagner's Die Walküre
A gallant warrior-goddess bravely defies her father to save a mortal from certain death. Her sisters chime in with one of music’s most famous battle c...
Donizetti's La Fille du Régiment
She’s a spunky orphan brought up by an army regiment in the Alps. He’s the local country boy who falls in love with her. Together, they deliver unforg...
Bizet's Carmen
She’s one of opera’s iconic heroines, the irresistible gypsy seductress who leads her jealous lover to tragedy. Learn more about Bizet’s Carmen with o...
Cilea's Adriana Lecouvreur
A passionate, larger-than-life stage actress vies with a conniving princess for the love of the same dashing count. Learn more about Cilea’s Adriana L...
Verdi's La Traviata
Love. Heartbreak. Death. A classic tragedy and a classic opera. Learn more about Verdi’s La Traviata with our In Focus podcast, hosted by Met radio co...
Muhly's Marnie
Theft, denial, deceit, and a captivating, enigmatic heroine. Learn more about composer Nico Muhly and librettist Nicholas Wright’s new opera Marnie wi...
Puccini's La Fanciulla del West
A gun-slinging heroine. A romantic tale of the Wild West. The first great opera with an American setting. Learn more about Puccini’s La Fanciulla del...
Saint-Saëns’s Samson et Dalila
An immortal biblical tale. An underrated operatic masterpiece, with some of the repertory’s most luscious and seductive music. Learn more about Samson...
Verdi's Aida
An epic Egyptian backdrop. An intimate love story. Some of Verdi's most stirring melodies and ensembles. Learn more about Aida with our In Focus podca...