The Met Orchestra / Yannick Nézet-Séguin

The season begins with a flourish with the arrival of two concerts by the New York Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, accompanied by its musical director Yannick Nézet-Séguin. This first evening is entirely devoted to Richard Strauss.

Since making his debut leading the MET Orchestra in 2009, Yannick Nézet-Séguin has not gone a single season without returning to perform with his musicians, and he became the third musical director of the house in 2018.

The evening they devote to Strauss, with soprano Elza van den Heever, illustrates their closeness to the operatic universe: as a counterpoint to the symphonic poem A Hero's Life, they present the suite extracted by the composer from Der Rosenkavalier, as well as the final scene from Salomé.

When Salomé kisses the lips of the prophet Jokanaan whose decapitation she has just demanded, Herod orders her killed. Of remarkable intensity, this "death of love" is a sort of symphonic poem with voices where all of Strauss's lyrical genius is expressed.

Cast Metropolitan Opera Orchestra of New York Yannick Nézet-Séguin, conductor Elza van den Heever, soprano