The Metropolitan Opera Radio Broadcasts Quiz

Answer: Hansel und Gretel (Humperdinck)

"Hansel and Gretel" was paired with "I pagliacci" that Christmas afternoon, but "I pagliacci" was not broadcast.

In the cast of "Hansel und Gretel" were Editha Fleischer as Hansel, Queena Mario as Gretel, Henriette Wakefield as Gertrud, Gustav Schutzendorf as Peter, Dorothee Manski as the Witch, Dorothea Flexer as the Sandman, and Pearl Besuner as the Dew Fairy. Karl Riedel conducted.

(Composer Deems Taylor served as narrator for this broadcast performance, providing commentary from a specially-constructed glass booth in one of the Grand Tier boxes. Problem was, his narration continued throughout the opera, while the singers were singing and the orchestra was playing. NBC received a good many telegraphed complaints about Taylor's commentary during the music, so Taylor scaled back his comments for the rest of the broadcasts that season - and the "narration" during the music was done away with entirely the following season.)

Answer: Sadko (Rimsky-Korsakov)

Only Act II of "Sadko" was broadcast on 12 March 1932. (The opera was performed in French rather than the original Russian.) Cast principals included Georges Thill, Editha Fleischer, Pavel Ludikar, Ina Bourskaya, Faina Petrova, Max Altglass, and Alfio Tedesco. Tullio Serafin conducted.

"Das Rheingold" was broadcast, complete and uncut, on 26 February 1932 (and was broadcast in part on 27 January 1933). Cast principals included Michael Bohnen, Gertrude Kappel, Gustav Schutzendorf, Rudolf Laubenthal, Marek Windheim, James Wolfe, Siegfried Tappolet, Gota Ljungberg, and Ernestine Schumann-Heink. Artur Bodanzky conducted.

"Elektra" was broadcast complete on 3 December 1932; that broadcast performance was also the Metropolitan Opera premiere of "Elektra." The cast principals were Gertrude Kappel, Gota Ljungberg, Karin Branzell, Friedrich Schorr, and Rudolf Laubenthal. Artur Bodanzky conducted.

The world-premiere performance of "The Emperor Jones" (music by Louis Gruenberg, libretto adapted from Eugene O'Neill's play by Kathleen DeJaffa and the composer) was broadcast complete from the stage of the Met on the radio on 7 January 1933. Lawrence Tibbett sang Brutus Jones; Marek Windheim sang Henry Smithers; Pearl Besuner sang a native woman; and Hemsley Winfield played the Congo witch doctor. Tullio Serafin conducted. ("I pagliacci" was also performed that afternoon, but was not broadcast.)

Beginning with the 1933-34 season, all of the operas broadcast from the Metropolitan Opera were broadcast on Saturday afternoons (with a few exceptions made for "Hansel und Gretel" and the occasional student-matinee broadcast), and complete.

Answer: Milton Cross

In the 43 years that Milton Cross served as announcer/commentator of the Met broadcasts, he missed only 2 broadcasts, those being in February of 1973 following the death of his wife, Lillian. Ironically, he died of a heart attack at his home while preparing for the next afternoon's Met broadcast of Rossini's "L'Italiana in Algeri."

Peter Allen (who had worked as a staff announcer at WQXR-AM in New York City, and who had substituted for Mr. Cross at those two February 1973 Met broadcasts which Mr. Cross missed) succeeded Mr. Cross as announcer/commentator of the Met broadcasts on 4 January 1975, serving in that capacity until May of 2004, when he retired. (He died on 8 October 2016, at the age of 96.)

Allen was succeeded as announcer/commentator by Margaret Juntwait, who served as announcer/commentator until 31 December 2014, when she stepped down because of illness. (She died of ovarian cancer on 3 June 2015, at the age of only 58.)

Edward Downes (son of long-time New York Times music critic Olin Downes) served as quizmaster for the Texaco Opera Quiz for many years; the Opera Quiz was a regular intermission feature between Act II and Act III of Met broadcasts.

Answer: Sieglinde in Wagner's "Die Walkure"

Met General Manager Giulio Gatti-Casazza didn't "hype" Flagstad's debut at all, preferring to surprise the Met public. Well, both those in the opera house and those who listened to "Die Walkure" that afternoon were highly pleased with Flagstad's performance as Sieglinde.

Also in the cast that afternoon were Gertrude Kappel as Brunnhilde, Friedrich Schorr as Wotan, Paul Althouse as Siegmund, Emanuel List as Hunding, and Maria Olszewska as Fricka. Artur Bodanzky conducted.

(Flagstad did, indeed, broadcast Isolde, Kundry, and Leonore at the Met during the course of her career there.)

Answer: Bidu Sayao

Bidu Sayao did make her Met debut at a Saturday-matinee radio broadcast, but not in 1941-42. Her Met debut was on 13 February 1937, singing the title role in Massenet's "Manon," with Sidney Rayner, Richard Bonelli, Chase Baromeo, Angelo Bada, and George Cehanovsky, among others. Maurice de Abravanel conducted.

Jan Peerce's Met debut came at the Saturday-matinee radio broadcast of 29 November 1941, as Alfredo Germont in Verdi's "La traviata," with Jarmila Novotna and Lawrence Tibbett. Ettore Panizza conducted (substituting for Gennaro Papi, who died of a heart attack that morning).

The following Saturday afternoon, 6 December 1941 (yes, the day before the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor), Astrid Varnay made her Met debut a little earlier than planned, singing Sieglinde in Wagner's "Die Walkure" in place of an indisposed Lotte Lehmann. Also in the principal cast were Helen Traubel, Friedrich Schorr, Lauritz Melchior, Alexander Kipnis, and Kerstin Thorborg. Erich Leinsdorf conducted.

Lily Djanel made her Met debut on Saturday afternoon, 24 January 1942, singing the title role in Bizet's "Carmen." Her co-stars were Charles Kullmann, Leonard Warren, and Licia Albanese. Sir Thomas Beecham conducted.

Answer: Toll Brothers

Toll Brothers' business is the construction of custom luxury houses.

Funding for Met broadcasts also now comes from the Annenberg Foundation, from the Vincent A. Stabile Endowment for Broadcast Media, and from contributions from listeners nationwide.

Answer: Leonard Warren

Leonard Warren sang his first Met broadcast on 21 January 1939, as Paolo Albiani in Verdi's "Simon Boccanegra," in the company of principals Lawrence Tibbett, Ezio Pinza, Giovanni Martinelli, and Elisabeth Rethberg, with Ettore Panizza conducting.

What turned out to be his final Met Saturday-matinee broadcast was on 2 January 1960; he sang the title role in Verdi's "Macbeth," with Leonie Rysanek, Jerome Hines, and Daniele Barioni. Erich Leinsdorf conducted. Had he not died way too soon (heart attack during the 4 March Met performance of Verdi's "La forza del destino"; age 48), he would have sung three more Met broadcasts that season ("La forza del destino," "Tosca," and "Simon Boccanegra") and at least three more the following season ("Nabucco," "Il trovatore," and "Simon Boccanegra" - and maybe "Rigoletto" as well).

The most Saturday-matinee broadcasts that Warren sang in any Met season was EIGHT, in 1943-44: Rangoni in "Boris Godunov" (in Italian), the title role in "Rigoletto," Lord Enrico Ashton in "Lucia di Lammermoor," Renato in "Un ballo in maschera" (twice: once regular-season, and once on tour), Sir John Falstaff in "Falstaff" (in English), Il conte di Luna in "Il trovatore," and Tonio in "I pagliacci."

Answer: 1962

To be precise, the broadcast aired on 1 December 1962. Cast principals were Carlo Bergonzi (Ernani), Leontyne Price (Elvira), Cornell MacNeil (Don Carlo), and Giorgio Tozzi (Don Ruy Gomez da Silva). Thomas Schippers conducted.

Answer: The broadcast was on opening night of the season, not a Saturday matinee.

Texaco did, indeed, sponsor the opening-night radio broadcast of Samuel Barber's "Antony and Cleopatra" on Friday, 16 September 1966. This was not only the world-premiere performance of the opera, but it was also the first performance of the Metropolitan Opera's first full season in their new house in Lincoln Center. (In the spring of 1966, the Met had performed one student matinee performance of Puccini's "La fanciulla del West" in the new house.)

Cast principals for the broadcast were Justino Diaz, Leontyne Price, Jess Thomas, Ezio Flagello, Rosalind Elias, Belen Amparan, and Andrea Velis - NONE of whom suffered a heart attack during the performance. Thomas Schippers conducted.

(The stage machinery did break down, but that was BEFORE opening night, during rehearsals for "Antony and Cleopatra." That necessitated some creative solutions to some problems, such as moving a full-size model of the Sphinx onto the stage.)

Answer: Don Carlos (Verdi)

"Don Carlos" was performed in an Italian translation, rather than in the original French.

The broadcast on 11 November 1950 featured Jussi Bjoerling, Robert Merrill, Cesare Siepi, Delia Rigal, Fedora Barbieri, Jerome Hines, and a young soprano named Lucine Amara (as the off-stage Celestial Voice). Fritz Stiedry conducted.

The broadcast on 22 April 1972 featured Franco Corelli, Sherrill Milnes, Cesare Siepi, Montserrat Caballe, Grace Bumbry, John Macurdy, and a not-quite-as-young soprano named Lucine Amara (who graciously agreed to broadcast the Celestial Voice again, though she had been singing principal roles at the Met for 18 years). Francesco Molinari-Pradelli conducted.