Singing even one high C can be an event for the tenor and his audience. Everyone in the room knows how easily it could go wrong. Multiply that pressure by nine? You get “Ah, mes amis.” Gaetano Donizetti wrote this high-stakes aria for his opera La Fille du Régiment. The young hero Tonio has just enlisted in the army and received permission to marry the girl of his dreams. “Ah, mes amis” is his celebration: Tonio’s bursting with so much joy that the guy sings nine – count ‘em, NINE – high C's. In this episode, host Rhiannon Giddens considers the sheer athleticism it takes to pull off “Ah, mes amis” with a singer, a vocal coach and a former NFL player. And once they've surveyed this Mount Everest of tenor arias, you'll hear tenor Javier Camarena scale its heights from his base camp on the Metropolitan Opera stage.
Puccini's Tosca: Death is But a Dream
Handel's Agrippina: Nice Romans Finish Last
Stravinsky’s The Rake’s Progress: I Walk the Line
Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro: Count On a Reckoning
Rossini's Barber of Seville: On a Wig and a Prayer
Verdi's Aida: There's No Place Like Home
Puccini's Turandot: Hope Never Sleeps
Aria Code Is Back and Bigger Than Ever!
Rossini's La Cenerentola: Opera's Cinderella Story
Offenbach's Tales of Hoffmann: Fool for Love
Puccini's Turandot: Bewitched, Bothered, And Beheaded
The Gershwins' Porgy and Bess: Rise Up Singing
Strauss's Der Rosenkavalier featuring Renée Fleming: Here's To You, Mrs. Marschallin
Gluck's Orfeo ed Euridice: Don't Look Back in Ardor
Mozart's The Marriage of Figaro: Sleepless in Sevilla
Philip Glass’s Akhnaten: I Am Your Sunshine, Your Only Sunshine
Puccini's Madama Butterfly: When My Ship Comes In
Verdi's Lady Macbeth: Sleepwalk with Me, featuring Anna Netrebko
Aria Code with Rhiannon Giddens is Back!
Floyd's Susannah: Hopeless in New Hope, featuring Renée Fleming
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