Blanchard's Fire Shut Up in My Bones: A Boy of Peculiar Grace
This week we’re decoding with the man who wrote the code - Terence Blanchard, composer of Fire Shut Up in My Bones. Not only is it the work that reope...
Aria Code
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About
Aria Code is a podcast that pulls back the curtain on some of the most famous arias in opera history, with insight from the biggest voices of our time, including Roberto Alagna, Diana Damrau, Sondra Radvanovsky, and many others. Hosted by Grammy Award-winner and MacArthur “Genius” Fellow Rhiannon Giddens, Aria Code is produced in partnership with The Metropolitan Opera. Each episode dives into one aria — a feature for a single singer — and explores how and why these brief musical moments have imprinted themselves in our collective consciousness and what it takes to stand on the Met stage and sing them. A wealth of guests—from artists like Rufus Wainwright and Ruben Santiago-Hudson to non-musicians like Dame Judi Dench and Dr. Brooke Magnanti, author of The Intimate Adventures of a London Call Girl—join Rhiannon and the Met Opera’s singers to understand why these arias touch us at such a human level, well over a century after they were written. Each episode ends with the aria, uninterrupted and in full, recorded from the Met Opera stage. Aria Code is produced in partnership with WQXR, The Metropolitan Opera and WNYC Studios.
Verdi's Nabucco: By the Rivers of Babylon
Psalm 137 depicts the ancient Hebrews, enslaved and weeping “by the rivers of Babylon,” as they remember their homeland, Jerusalem. Those words have i...
Once More Into the Breeches: Joyce DiDonato Sings Strauss
The young Composer in Strauss’s Ariadne auf Naxos is one of opera’s great trouser roles -- a female singer playing the part of a young man. He is set...
Breaking Mad: Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor
People who go to see Gaetano Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor spend the entire evening waiting for the famous Mad Scene, to hear the soprano’s incredib...
Crisis in the Kremlin: Mussorgsky's Boris Godunov
Perhaps no opera better reflects the questions and contradictions at the heart of Russian history than Modest Mussorgsky’s historical epic Boris Godun...
Only the Good Die Young: Verdi's La Traviata
One of opera’s great heroines is based on one of history’s extraordinary women. The 19th century French courtesan Marie Duplessis was elegant, success...
Guys and Dolls: Offenbach's The Tales of Hoffmann
What makes us human? As artificial intelligence becomes more advanced, technology is becoming even more integrated into the fabric of daily life, and ...
Strauss's Elektra: Waltzing With a Vengeance
Note: This episode includes descriptions of childhood sexual assault. The drive for revenge can be all-consuming, especially when you or someone you l...
Puccini's Tosca: Death is But a Dream
It’s not easy to talk about death. We associate dying with so much suffering and loss. But for many people, the end of life is full of peaceful rememb...
Handel's Agrippina: Nice Romans Finish Last
In order to be a Roman Emperor, you had to be entirely cold-blooded. It was a violent world of infighting, ruthless slander, and take-no-prisoners pol...