For years, the Metropolitan Opera’s opening night would arrive at the end of September, and half of the audience—there for the party after—would promptly doze off. The snoozy gala evenings tended to include morsels, or even whole acts, from warhorses like Otello and Carmen, and they always seemed to star Placido Domingo, Renee Fleming or both.

Well, we give Peter Gelb a lot of (well-deserved) flack, but, to give him his (considerable) due, opening night—Sept. 23 this year, mark your calendar and dry-clean your de la Renta—has regained considerable luster on his watch. Instead of the multi-opera mash-ups, the season, since the beginning of Mr. Gelb’s tenure in 2006, usually begins with a new production and at least one A-list star. And that star’s name usually begins with an A, too: the soprano Anna Netrebko, who has her third opening night in a row this year as she makes her New York role debut in Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin, with the extra dazzle of Valery Gergiev, unmatchable in Russian music, leading the Met’s orchestra. Read More

Before the season started, chatter among opera gossips would inevitably turn to the prediction of the biggest upcoming fiasco at the Metropolitan Opera.

Would it be Bartlett Sher’s opening-night production of Donizetti’s Elisir d’Amore? No, that would likely be dully inoffensive. Ditto David McVicar’s New Year’s Eve take on another Donizetti, Maria Stuarda. Read More

There are artists we wish were riveting, risky, charismatic performers—but they just aren’t. For years, Renée Fleming has paired a lusciously rich voice with the excitement of a bowl of Cream of Wheat.

Elīna Garanča’s mezzo-soprano is one of the most spectacularly smooth, even sounds in the world, but on stage she exudes a chilly dullness. Angela Meade, a rising soprano who can make dazzling musical challenges sound easy, always seems to think she’s singing the phone book. Read More

“They’re straying into different dramatic areas,” the English mezzo-soprano Felicity Palmer told me recently of today’s Metropolitan Opera. “But I wonder if they’re ready for David.” I was speaking with Ms. Palmer for a profile of director David Alden, and her concern made perfect sense in the lead-up to his Met debut last week, directing a new production of Verdi’s Un Ballo in Maschera. For a long time, he was the kind of director who simply didn’t work at the Met. Read More