Memorable Arias and Duets from Today's Operatic Superstars Topline Encores! Great Performances at the Met Airing in December on PBS

From Natalie Dessay and Anna Netrebko to Juan Diego Flórez and Jonas Kaufmann, show-stopping excerpts from "Carmen," "Rigoletto," "La Bohème," and more, hosted by Deborah Voigt

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Nov 14, 2014, 02:15 ET

NEW YORK, Nov. 14, 2014 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ --Encores! Great Performances at the Met – featuring 19 unforgettable arias and duets selected from the past eight seasons of broadcasts, performed by today's greatest opera stars and talents – will air on Great Performances in December. (In New York, THIRTEEN will air the program on Thursday, December 11 at 8:30 p.m.)

Great Performances" logo, courtesy: WNET New York Public Media

Hosted by soprano Deborah Voigt, from the Grand Staircase of the Met, the special covers a wide range of operatic ground, from heartbreak to hilarity, delivered by such artists as Natalie Dessay, Plácido Domingo, Renée Fleming, Juan Diego Flórez, Jonas Kaufmann, and Anna Netrebko, along with Voigt herself. These extraordinary moments, selected from more than 75 productions, were initially seen as part of the Met's global Live in HD movie-theater transmissions, and later shared with PBS audiences as presentations of Great Performances at the Met.

These broadcast performances are the "high pressure performances that separate the divas from the girls," says Voigt with a twinkle in her eye.

The musical excerpts are interspersed with commentary by Voigt and some backstage interviews with the singers.

Excerpts Listing:

"Chacun le sait, chacun le dit"
La Fille du Régiment (Donizetti)
Natalie Dessay

"Ah, mes amis"
La Fille du Régiment (Donizetti)
Juan Diego Flórez

"Figlia impura di Bolena"
Maria Stuarda (Donizetti)
Joyce DiDonato, Elza van den Heever

"Pourquoi me réveiller"
Werther (Massenet)
Jonas Kaufmann

Final Scene, Carmen (Bizet)
Elīna Garanča, Roberto Alagna

"So anch'io la virtù magica"
Don Pasquale (Donizetti)
Anna Netrebko

"How soft and sweet your magic tone"
The Magic Flute (Mozart)
Matthew Polenzani

"En proie à la tristesse"
Le Comte Ory (Rossini)
Diana Damrau

"Plebe! Patrizi!"
Simon Boccanegra (Verdi)
Plácido Domingo
with Adrianne Pieczonka, Marcello Giordani, James Morris

Final Scene, Eugene Onegin (Tchaikovsky)
Renée Fleming, Dmitri Hvorostovsky

"Largo al factotum"
Il Barbiere di Siviglia (Rossini)
Peter Mattei

"Fin ch'han dal vino"
Don Giovanni (Mozart)
Mariusz Kwiecien

"D'amor sull'ali rosee"
Il Trovatore (Verdi)
Sondra Radvanovsky

"Mild und leise wie er lächelt"
Tristan und Isolde (Wagner)
Deborah Voigt

"Questa o quella"
Rigoletto (Verdi)
Piotr Beczala

"Un bel dì vedremo"
Madama Butterfly (Puccini)
Patricia Racette

Death Scene, Boris Godunov (Mussorgsky)
René Pape

"O soave fanciulla"
La Bohème (Puccini)
Kristine Opolais, Vittorio Grigolo

"Loge, hör!"
Die Walküre (Wagner)
Bryn Terfel

Encores! Great Performances at the Met is produced by THIRTEEN Productions LLC for WNET. For Great Performances, Bill O'Donnell is series producer and David Horn is executive producer.

Corporate support for Great Performances at the Met is provided by Toll Brothers, America's luxury home builder®, with additional funding by the National Endowment for the Arts.

Great Performances is funded by the Irene Diamond Fund, the Anna-Maria and Stephen Kellen Arts Fund, The LuEsther T. Mertz Charitable Trust, Rosalind P. Walter, The Agnes Varis Trust, The Starr Foundation, the Philip and Janice Levin Foundation, and PBS.

Visit Great Performances Online at www.pbs.org/gperf for additional information about this and other programs.

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