Aria Code

Introducing Classical Music Happy Hour with Emanuel Ax

Hello Aria Code fans, pianist Emanuel Ax is dropping into the feed to introduce Classical Music Happy Hour, a new podcast he hosts that you might enjoy.  The show is all

Introducing Our Common Nature with Yo-Yo Ma

Ana González is here to introduce you to her new podcast, Our Common Nature, a musical journey with cellist Yo-Yo Ma.  When the world stopped in 2020, Yo-Yo Ma started th

Love and Other Drugs: Gounod's Roméo et Juliette

Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet” is the most famous love story in the Western canon. It’s a tale so embedded in our culture — one that has seen so many iterations and ret

You Don't Own Me: The Myth and Magic of Bizet's Carmen

Carmen is maybe the most famous heroine in all of opera. She’s a woman of Romani descent living in 19th century Spain, sensual and self-confident, aware of the power she

Revisiting Mozart’s Queen of the Night: Outrage Out of This World

When the Voyager spacecraft set off to explore the galaxy in 1977, it carried a recording to represent the best of humanity. The “Golden Record” featured everyone from Ba

Love Takes Flight: Catán's Florencia en el Amazonas

It’s the early 1900s, and the steamship El Dorado makes its way along the Amazon River towards Manaus, a city in the heart of the Brazilian rainforest. Onboard is the wor

Davis’s X: The Life and Legacy of Malcolm X

Malcolm X led many lives within his 39 years: as a bereaved but precocious child; as an imprisoned convict; as a firebrand spokesperson for the Nation of Islam and Black

Revisiting Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice: Don’t Look Back in Ardor

If a loved one were to die, how far would you be willing to go to bring them back? Orpheus, the ancient Greek musician, goes to hell and back to have the love of his life

Good Things Come to Those Who Weep: Donizetti’s L’Elisir d’Amore

“L’Elisir d’Amore” — “The Elixir of Love” — is what’s known as an opera buffa, or comic opera. That means that we’re in for a happy ending. But Donizetti knows that the

Death, Faith, and Redemption: Heggie’s Dead Man Walking

What does redemption mean to a man sentenced to death? Is capital punishment justice or vengeance? Could anyone ever forgive a murderer? These are just some of the quest

Aria Code Returns for Season 4!

At last! After much anticipation, Aria Code returns! We’re guiding listeners through highlights from the Metropolitan Opera’s 2023-2024 season, pairing beloved classics w

P.S. I Love You: Renée Fleming Sings Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin

Saying “I love you” for the first time takes courage, especially when you don’t know the response you'll get. But being open with your emotions and putting yourself out t

To Be Or Not To Be: Dean's Hamlet

“To be or not to be, that is the question.” It’s hard to think of a more famous line from a more famous play. In this iconic speech from Shakespeare’s Hamlet, the trouble

Potion, Emotion, Devotion: Wagner's Tristan und Isolde

When we talk about “falling in love,” we talk about it like it is something that just happens. Suddenly the ground opens up and we are falling for somebody, as if there i

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 reopened the Met after it

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 inspired songwriters

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 to premiere his new

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 incredible acrobatics, and t

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 Godunov. Based on the pla

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, successful, famous, and gon