On Feb. 12 Puccini's "Manon Lescaut" will return to the Met with Jonas Kaufmann and Kristine Opolais.

The Music

"Manon Lescaut" was Puccini's first international hit and the opera that put him at the forefront of Verismo opera. The opera is filled with luscious melodies audiences have come to expect from the verismo style and contains some of opera's most famous melodies. The title character's music also grows from Act II's elegant and self-pitying aria "In quelle trine morbide" into a fully blown dramatic one in Act IV's "Sola, perduta, abbandonata." The orchestra also plays a vital role in the score as it propels the action particularly the Act II love duet. Act IV is particularly innovative as the music is continuous in the vain of Wagnerian scores. One of the most famous pieces in the work is the Act III intermezzo filled with rich melodies and a heart wrenching cello solo.

Met History

"Manon Lescaut" first premiered at the Met in 1907 with Lina Cavalieri in the title role and Enrico Caruso in the role of Des Grieux.

The opera was performed regularly after the premiere by such divas including Lucrezia Bori in her Met debut and Frances Alda. Tenors Giovanni Martinelli and Beniamino Gigli also performed the work regularly. However, after the 1930 performances the opera was absent for 19 years and returned in 1949 in a new production by Herbert Graf.

On that occasion Dorothy Kristen and Jussi Bjorling performed the roles of Manon Lescaut and Des Grieux.

That production was later performed by Licia Albanese, Renata Tebaldi, Gilda Cruz-Romo, Raina Kabaivanska, Leontyne Price, Carlo Bergonzi, Richard Tucker, and John Alexander. The production was given until 1975.

In 1980 Gian Carlo Menotti's production premiered with Renata Scotto and Placido Domingo. The performances for that production were recorded on the Live from the Met series and was later released on video and DVD.

Numerous sopranos including Leona Mitchell and Mirella Freni performed the work until 1990 when it fell out of the repertoire.

The opera reappeared 18 years later with Karita Matilla and Marcello Giordani in the title roles. On this occasion in 2008 the work was featured on the Live in HD series in movie theaters and was later released on DVD. Since then the work has been absent at the Met.


The Production

This season the Met will premiere a new production directed by Richard Eyre, who has directed "Werther," "Carmen" and "Le Nozze di Figaro" with the company. The production first premiered at the Baden Baden festival in 2014 with Eva-Maria Westbroek and Massimo Giordano.

Eyre's production is set in the 1940's in France under the German occupation and takes place in a railway station, a large house from the time period, a harbor and a post nuclear landscape. For Eyre, the story is very much like a film noir and that is one of the moods that Eyre seeks to capture in his production.

Performers

Opolais will take on the title role after having performed the role Manon to acclaim at the Royal Opera House in London and at the Bayerische Oper in Munich. The soprano has become well known for her interpretations of Puccini's work and has performed "Madama Butterfly," "La Boheme" and "La Rondine" at the Met.

Kaufmann first performed the role of De Grieux alongside Opolais at the Royal Opera and later returned to the work with Opolais in Munich. The tenor is one of the most in-demand in the world and performs regularly in Munich, London, and Milan and in New York. Among the works the tenor has performed at the Met are "Carmen," "Tosca," "Parsifal," "La Traviata," "Werther" and "Die Walkure."

Massimo Cavalletti will perform the role of Lescaut while Brindley Sherratt will sing Geronte.

Fabio Luisi, the Met's Principal Conductor, will lead the orchestra in nine performances.