Met Stars Live in Concert presents

Joyce DiDonato in Bochum, Germany

WITH CARRIE-ANN MATHESON, PIANO, AND IL POMO D’ORO

Live: Saturday, September 12 at 1:30 PM ET

American mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato, one of opera’s most luminous stars, has given innumerable outstanding performances over the course of her Met career, most recently starring in the title role of Handel’s Agrippina last season. Her inimitable artistry will be on display in this program of alluring and acrobatic arias and songs, live from live from a unique venue—the converted Jahrhunderthalle on the northern Rhine, an imposing former industrial pavilion that has in recent years been used for theatrical events. DiDonato will be accompanied by Carrie-Ann Matheson on piano and the chamber ensemble Il Pomo d’Oro.

The Program

“Addio Roma”
From Monteverdi’s L’Incoronazione di Poppea

Didon’s Final Scene
From Berlioz’s Les Troyens

“Ich bin der Welt abhanden gekommen”
By Gustav Mahler

“Oh Shenandoah”
Traditional

“As with rosy steps the morn”
From Handel’s Theodora 

“Illustratevi, o cieli”
From Monteverdi’s Il Ritorno d’Ulisse in Patria

“Dopo notte atra e funesta”
From Handel’s Ariodante 

“I Dream a World” (World Premiere)
By Kenyatta Hughes, arranged by Craig Terry, with text by Langston Hughes

“Intorno all’idol mio”
From Cesti’s Orontea 

“Voi che sapete”
From Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro 

“La vie en rose”
By Louiguy

“Canción al árbol del olvido,” Op. 3, No. 2
By Alberto Evaristo Ginastera

“You’ll Never Walk Alone”
From Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Carousel

Kansas-born mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato is one of opera’s most popular artists, having sung to great acclaim the world over. She has been nominated for eight Grammy Awards, winning for her solo albums Divo, Diva in 2012, Joyce and Tony in 2016, and Songplay in 2020. She made her Met debut in 2005 as Cherubino in Le Nozze di Figaro and was the 2007 recipient of the company’s Beverly Sills Artist Award, established by Agnes Varis and Karl Leichtman. Since then, she has appeared in more than 100 Met performances of 13 roles, including Sesto in La Clemenza di Tito, Adalgisa in Norma, Elena in La Donna del Lago, Sycorax in The Enchanted Island, Isolier in Le Comte Ory, and the title roles of Agrippina, Cendrillon, La Cenerentola, and Maria Stuarda. To date, she has appeared in four Met premieres, seven new productions, and nine Live in HD transmissions. During the 2019–20 season, she was a Carnegie Hall Perspectives Artist. In recent seasons, she has appeared at the Vienna State Opera, Bavarian State Opera, Covent Garden, Deutsche Oper Berlin, La Scala, Paris Opera, Salzburg Festival, Teatro Real de Madrid, Baden-Baden Festival, and on tour with the Baroque Ensemble Il Pomo d’Oro, with whom she recorded her 2016 album In War & Peace.

Carrie-Ann Matheson enjoys a multi-faceted career as pianist, conductor, and educator. A native of Canada, she began her career at the Metropolitan Opera, where she was a tenured member of the full-time music staff as assistant conductor, prompter, and pianist. In 2014, she was invited by Fabio Luisi to join the staff at Opernhaus Zürich, which led to the expansion of her performing career in Europe. Especially in demand as a recital pianist, she has performed with many of the world’s most renowned artists, including Rolando Villazón, Jonas Kaufmann, Piotr Beczała, Benjamin Bernheim, Diana Damrau, Barbara Bonney, and Joyce DiDonato. In addition to her work with singers, she has performed in chamber music concerts with members of the New York Philharmonic, the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, and Philharmonia Zürich. Throughout her career, Ms. Matheson has held a passion for nurturing the development of the next generation of opera singers and pianists, and has devoted a portion of her time to working with artists of the Met’s Lindemann Young Artist Program, the International Opera Studio (Opernhaus Zürich), the Ryan Opera Center (Chicago Lyric Opera), and the Atkins Young Artist Program (Mariinsky Theatre).

Named after Antonio Cesti’s 1666 opera composed for the wedding celebrations of Emperor Leopold I and Margarita Teresa of Spain, period-instrument orchestra Il Pomo d’Oro was founded in 2012 and specializes in operas and instrumental works from the Baroque and Classical periods. The group appears regularly in prestigious concert halls and festivals throughout Europe and the United States, and have collaborated in recital with sopranos Francesca Aspromonte and Emöke Barath, mezzo-sopranos Ann Hallenberg and Joyce DiDonato, and countertenors Jakub Józef Orliński, Franco Fagioli, Max Emanuel Cencic, and Xavier Sabata. Among their extensive discography are celebrated recordings of operas by Handel, Vinci, and Stradella, as well as DiDonato’s Grammy Award–nominated album In War & Peace. The ensemble is an official ambassador of El Sistema Greece and plays charity concerts and offers workshops and music lessons in various refugee camps in Greece.

https://www.metopera.org

Met Stars Live in Concert
Opera’s greatest stars perform in a groundbreaking new series of pay-per-view recitals in striking locations around the globe, each live via satellite and shot with multiple cameras. While the Metropolitan Opera House remains dark because of the ongoing health crisis, Met Stars Live in Concert will allow audiences to experience extraordinary solo and duo performances by top singers—streamed live online—from such locations as a former abbey in Bavaria, a Norwegian castle, an outdoor terrace on a cliff overlooking the Mediterranean Sea, a church in Wales, and a historic mansion in Washington, D.C. The series marries the intimacy of the Met’s virtual At-Home Gala with the high production value of the company’s Live in HD series of cinema transmissions.

Tickets for each recital are $20, and the performances will remain available on demand for 12 days.