The MET Orchestra
The Metropolitan Opera Orchestra is regarded as one of the world's finest orchestras. From
the time of the company's inception in 1883, the ensemble has worked with leading
conductors in both opera and concert performances and has developed into an orchestra of
enormous technical polish and style.
The MET Orchestra (as the ensemble is referred to when appearing in concert outside the
opera house) maintains a demanding schedule of performances and rehearsals during its
33-week New York season, when the company performs seven times a week in repertory that
this season encompasses approximately 28 operas.
Arturo Toscanini conducted almost 500 performances at the Met, and Gustav Mahler, during
the few years he was in New York, conducted 54 Met performances. More recently, many of the
world's great conductors have led the orchestra: Walter, Beecham, Reiner, Mitropoulos,
Kempe, Szell, Böhm, Solti, Maazel, Bernstein, Mehta, Abbado, Karajan, Dohnányi, Haitink,
Tennstedt, Ozawa, Gergiev, Barenboim, and Muti. Carlos Kleiber's only US opera performances
were with the MET Orchestra.
In addition to its opera schedule, the orchestra has a distinguished history of concert
performances. Toscanini made his American debut as a symphonic conductor with the Met
Orchestra in 1913, and the impressive list of instrumental soloists who appeared with the
orchestra includes Leopold Godowsky, Sergei Rachmaninoff, Arthur Rubinstein, Pablo Casals,
Josef Hofmann, Ferruccio Busoni, Jascha Heifetz, Moritz Rosenthal, and Fritz Kreisler.
Since the orchestra resumed symphonic concerts in 1991, instrumental soloists have included
Itzhak Perlman, Maxim Vengerov, Alfred Brendel, and Evgeny Kissin, and the group has
performed five world premieres: Babbitt's Piano Concerto No. 2 (1998), Bolcom's Symphony
No. 7 (2002), Shen's Legend (2002), and Wuorinen's Theologoumenon
(2007) and Time Regained (2009).
The orchestra's high standing led to its first commercial recordings in nearly 20 years:
Wagner's complete Ring cycle, conducted by James Levine. Recorded by Deutsche
Grammophon over a period of three years, Das Rheingold, Die Walküre, and
Götterdämmerung were winners of an unprecedented three consecutive Grammy
Awards in 1989, 1990, and 1991 for Best Opera Recording. Other recordings under Maestro
Levine include L'elisir d'amore, Idomeneo, Le nozze di Figaro,
Der fliegende Holländer, Parsifal, Erwartung, Manon
Lescaut, and seven Verdi operas. Maestro Levine has also led the orchestra for
recordings of Wagner overtures, Verdi ballet music, an all-Berg disc with Renée Fleming,
and aria albums with Bryn Terfel, Kathleen Battle, and Ms. Fleming. The orchestra's first
symphonic recordings are pairings of Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition with
Stravinsky's Le Sacre du printemps; Beethoven's "Eroica" with Schubert's
"Unfinished" symphonies; and Richard Strauss's Don Quixote and Tod und
Verklärung.
Semyon Bychkov
A native of St. Petersburg, Russia, Semyon Bychkov has been music director of the
Orchestre de Paris; principal guest conductor of the St. Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra
; principal guest conductor of Maggio Musicale, Florence; chief conductor of WDR
Sinfonieorchester Köln; and chief conductor of Dresden's Semperoper. He made his debut with
the Metropolitan Opera in 2004, conducting Boris Godunov and returned in 2008
for Otello-a work he conducts again with the company this season. Today's
engagement marks his first concert appearance with the MET Orchestra.
In recent seasons, Maestro Bychkov has appeared with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra,
Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, Chamber Orchestra of Europe, Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra,
Berliner Philharmoniker, Munich Philharmonic, London Symphony Orchestra, and BBC Symphony
Orchestra. In the US, he is a frequent guest with the Cleveland and Philadelphia
orchestras, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and San Francisco Symphony, and the Los Angeles
and New York philharmonics. He has upcoming return engagements with each of these
orchestras, in addition to conducting the Orchestre National de France, Hamburg's NDR
Sinfonieorchester, Israel Philharmonic, Turin's Orchestra Sinfonica Nazionale della RAI
Turin, Rome's Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, and
Tokyo's NHK Symphony Orchestra.
At the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, he has conducted Elektra (for his
debut in 2003), Boris Godunov, The Queen of Spades, Lohengrin,
Don Carlo, Tannhäuser, and La bohème. He has also led
Elektra, Tristan und Isolde, Daphne, and
Lohengrin at the Vienna State Opera; Der Rosenkavalier at the
Salzburg Festival; Un ballo in maschera and Tristan und Isolde at
the Opéra de Paris; Elektra in Madrid; Tosca and
Elektra at La Scala; and Jenůfa, Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk
District, and Schubert's Fierrabras in Florence.
Among Maestro Bychkov's many recordings are Lohengrin (which was committed to
disc following staged performances at the Vienna State Opera and concert performances in
Cologne) and Strauss's Eine Alpensinfonie coupled with Till
Eulenspiegel (which followed a series of benchmark Strauss recordings that
included Ein Heldenleben and Metamorphosen, Daphne with
Renée Fleming, and Elektra with Deborah Polaski). With the WDR
Sinfonieorchester Köln, he has made recordings of works by Mahler, Shostakovich, and
Rachmaninoff, as well as the complete cycle of Brahms's symphonies and the Verdi
Requiem.