Listen
Robert Carsen’s production is the first new Met staging of Verdi’s comic opera in more than 50 years. Ambrogio Maestri, who has sung the title role of the gluttonous Sir John Falstaff at major opera houses around the world, will star in his first Met performances of the title role. A loose adaptation of Shakespeare’s Henry IV and The Merry Wives of Windsor, the opera features an ensemble cast: Angela Meade is Alice Ford; Stephanie Blythe is the wily Mistress Quickly; Jennifer Johnson Cano sings Meg Page; Italian tenor Paolo Fanale in his Met debut, is Fenton; Franco Vassallo is Ford; and, in a Met role debut, Cuban-American soprano Lisette Oropesa sings Nannetta.
In conversation with St.John Flynn from the Met Opera studio, Lisette talks about singing in this new production, the first new Met staging of Falstaff since 1964, the added pressures of the HD broadcast, and the thrill of working with Maestro James Levine.
Saturday, December 14 at 11:55 AM Central the matinee performance of Falstaff will be transmitted live to movie theaters around the world as part of the Met’s Live in HD series. At 12 noon the performance will be heard live on the radio as the regular Met weekly broadcast.
There’s more information, including where to see the Live in HD transmission in the Houston area, on the Met Opera website.