[ Singing in Italian ] [ Singing in Italian ] [ Singing in Italian ] [ Singing in Italian ] ♪♪ Major funding for "Great Performances" is provided by... ...and by contributions to your PBS station from viewers like you.

Thank you.

[ Indistinct conversations ] -Hello.

I'm Rhiannon Giddens.

Welcome to the new season of "The Met: Live in HD."

Today you're in for a treat.

That's because we're performing Bellini's "La Sonnambula," one of the greatest showcases for thrilling bel canto vocalism.

As opera aficionados already know, "bel canto" means "beautiful singing," a style of operatic composition employed by Bellini and other composers of his time in the early- to mid-19th century.

And our two stars today, American soprano Nadine Sierra and Spanish tenor Xabier Anduaga, are among the greatest bel canto singers of this or any other generation.

Vincenzo Bellini was one of the bel canto masters, who channeled all the emotion and drama of his operas through the long, beautiful vocal lines of his characters.

With "La Sonnambula," he puts his melodic powers in the service of a psychologically rich story of an innocent village girl who sleepwalks her way into scandal, ostracism, and, in this new production directed by Rolando Villazón, ultimate liberation.

Villazón has placed the action in a closed, repressive community.

In this world, Amina, sung by Nadine Sierra, is about to marry her beloved Elvino, played by Xabier Anduaga.

But their love is put to the test by her mysterious sleepwalking.

-Maestro Riccardo Frizza is ready into go to the pit.

Here is "La Sonnambula."

[ Applause ] [ Applause ] ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ [ Singing in Italian ] -♪ La la la la la, la la la la la ♪ ♪ La la, la la, la la la la la ♪ ♪ La la la la la, la la la la la la ♪ ♪ La la, la la, la la la la la ♪ ♪ Viva Amina ♪ ♪ Viva Amina ♪ ♪ Viva Amina ♪ ♪ Viva Amina, Amina, Amina ♪ ♪ La la la la la, la la la la la ♪ ♪ La la la la la, la la la la la ♪ ♪ La la la la la, la la la la la ♪ ♪ La la la la la, la la ♪ ♪ La la la la la ♪ [ Singing in Italian ] ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ -[ Sings in Italian ] ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ -[ Vocalizing ] [ Singing in Italian ] ♪♪ [ Singing in Italian ] ♪♪ [ Vocalizing ] [ Vocalizing ] [ Singing in Italian ] ♪♪ ♪♪ -[ Sings in Italian ] [ Sings in Italian ] [ Sings in Italian ] [ Sings in Italian ] [ Cheers and applause ] [ Cheers and applause ] ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ [ Sings in Italian ] [ Singing in Italian ] [ Vocalizing ] [ Singing in Italian ] [ Singing in Italian ] [ Cheers and applause ] [ Cheers and applause ] ♪♪ [ Singing in Italian ] ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ [ Singing in Italian ] [ Both singing in Italian ] [ Cheers and applause ] ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ -[ Sings in Italian ] [ Sings in Italian ] [ Sings in Italian ] [ Sings in Italian ] [ Singing in Italian ] [ Singing in Italian ] ♪♪ [ Cheers and applause ] [ Cheers and applause ] ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ [ Singing in Italian ] -[ Sings in Italian ] [ Sings in Italian ] [ Cheers and applause ] ♪♪ ♪♪ [ Sings in Italian ] [ Singing in Italian ] [ Singing in Italian ] ♪♪ ♪♪ [ Applause ] ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ -[ Sings in Italian ] [ Singing in Italian ] ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ -[ Sings in Italian ] [ Vocalizing ] Oh!

[ Laughter ] -[ Vocalizing ] -[ Laughs ] Oh!

[ Singing in Italian ] [ Singing in Italian ] [ Singing in Italian ] [ Singing in Italian ] -[ Sings in Italian ] [ Singing in Italian ] [ Singing in Italian ] [ Singing in Italian ] [ Singing in Italian ] [ Singing in Italian ] ♪♪ ♪♪ [ Cheers and applause ] [ Cheers and applause ] ♪♪ Whee!

[ Laughing ] ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ [ Singing in Italian ] [ Singing in Italian ] ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ [ Singing in Italian ] [ Singing in Italian ] -[ Sings in Italian ] ♪♪ [ Singing in Italian ] [ Singing in Italian ] ♪♪ Oh!

[ Singing in Italian ] [ Singing in Italian ] [ Singing in Italian ] ♪♪ [ Cheers and applause ] [ Instruments tuning ] -At the end of the previous act, Elvino has called off his wedding to Amina, believing he has been betrayed.

When the next act begins, he laments the loss of the woman he loves.

But there is more sleepwalking to come.

Here is the concluding act of "La Sonnambula."

[ Applause ] [ Cheers and applause ] ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ [ Singing in Italian ] ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ -[ Sings in Italian ] [ Sings in Italian ] [ Sings in Italian ] [ Sings in Italian ] [ Sings in Italian ] [ Cheers and applause ] [ Cheers and applause ] ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ [ Sings in Italian ] [ Sings in Italian ] [ Singing in Italian ] [ Sings in Italian ] ♪♪ ♪♪ [ Cheers and applause ] ♪♪ ♪♪ -♪ Lisa ♪ -[ Gasps ] ♪♪ ♪♪ [ Sings in Italian ] [ Singing in Italian ] ♪♪ ♪♪ [ Cheers and applause ] ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ [ Singing in Italian ] ♪♪ [ Singing in Italian ] [ Singing in Italian ] -[ Vocalizing ] [ Singing in Italian ] [ Singing in Italian ] [ Singing in Italian ] ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ -[ Sings in Italian ] [ Sings in Italian ] ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ [ Sings in Italian ] ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ [ Sings in Italian ] [ Sings in Italian ] [ Sings in Italian ] [ Sings in Italian ] [ Sings in Italian ] [ Cheers and applause ] [ Cheers and applause ] [ Singing in Italian ] ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ [ Singing in Italian ] ♪♪ [ Sings in Italian ] [ Laughter ] [ Vocalizing ] [ Vocalizing ] ♪ D'amor ♪ [ Singing in Italian ] ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ [ Vocalizing ] ♪♪ ♪♪ [ Cheers and applause ] [ Cheers and applause ] [ Cheers and applause ] [ Cheers and applause ] [ Cheers and applause ] [ Cheers and applause ] [ Cheers and applause ] [ Cheers and applause ] [ Cheers and applause ] [ Cheers and applause ] [ Cheers and applause ] [ Cheers and applause ] [ Cheers and applause ] [ Cheers and applause ] [ Applause ] -Bravi, bravi, bravi!

-Oh, yeah.

-Oh, yeah, very good.

-[ Laughs ] Oh, my God.

-Oh, my God, too much.

Hi!

Hola, México.

[ Speaks a global language ] Hi!

[ Indistinct conversations ] -Nadine, Bravissima!

-Hi!

-Thank you so much.

What a whirlwind.

-I know.

I can't believe you have to talk after all that, but your vocal virtuosity is incredible.

-How do you do it?

-I don't know.

-I know.

What a stupid question.

But we all want to know.

-[ Chuckles ] Well, I've been training voice since I was 6 years old.

-Wow.

-And I got into opera when I was 10 years old.

And probably my teachers are watching, Kamal Khan and Cesar Ulloa.

Hi, you guys.

I've been working with them since I was 13 years old.

-Wow.

-So we've had a 23-year-long experience together.

-Incredible.

-And so I think that's it.

It's just preparation, training, staying humble, and being patient.

-I'm sure they're ecstatic about the performance.

-I hope so.

-Is this the most demanding of your bel canto roles, do you think?

-Yes, it's quite demanding.

Yeah, and I feel like every -- you know, every year that I'm getting older, the voice is maturing, the voice is changing.

And so I'm just going with the flow and seeing where my voice goes as I, yeah, grow older.

But yes, it's very, very difficult.

-Well, I learned that, when you were a kid, you had some sleepwalking experience.

-I did.

-Now, have you actually been able to pull that into this role?

-Yeah.

Well, just the information that was given to me by my mother.

She had this idea from -- I think I was sleepwalking from 4 to 7 years old.

-Wow.

-Yeah, that I was carrying a lot of stress as a child inside.

And I think that was my coping mechanism, I suppose.

And I think it's Amina's coping mechanism.

-Incredible.

-Yeah, she's dealing through her stresses of the village, this sort of sect life that she leads.

And then, of course, having Elvino, whom she loves desperately, but there are, you know, complications with their love story a little bit.

-Well, I bet you never thought you'd be able to pull that into anything.

-Yeah, never.

No, never, never.

-Well, since you're so active on Instagram, we asked your followers to send in some questions.

-Ooh!

-And we were inundated.

So, Maximillian07 wants to know -- do you have a specific ritual or mind-set before stepping on stage?

-Yeah, I just -- I just try to be grateful, you know, grateful for the moment that I have, being here, being at the Met.

Um, and, you know, I think about my loved ones.

I think about God even.

I'm a woman of faith, and so I think about that, as well.

And I think of all my teachers, too, who have always been rooting for me, teaching me all that they know, and supporting me all this -- all this time.

So, I think it's just staying humble, staying grateful, and hoping for the best.

-That makes -- All of that makes sense.

-Yeah.

-Nellyseifonlazar -- I'm not quite sure I got that right... -That's okay.

-...asked, "What is one piece of advice that you would give your former 25-year-old self?"

-Oh, goodness.

-Right?

That's a good one.

-Yeah, it is a good one.

I-I would -- I guess the advice I would give is to just keep going and to love yourself.

You know, I think artists have this tendency, oftentimes, to really judge and critique ourselves sometimes a little bit too harshly because we want to be the best and we don't want to disappoint anyone or ourselves.

And so I think I would tell her, "Don't worry, just love yourself, keep being patient, and take care of yourself, you know?

A lot of self-love and self-help."

-Well, I think we could all take that on board.

Thank you so much for speaking with me.

-Aww, thank you.

-Alright, John, let's come back to preset for the bed.

-And now I get to speak with our remarkable tenor lead, Xabier Anduaga.

Hello, Xabier.

It's so nice to meet you.

You've won a lot of acclaim in operas by Bellini and Donizetti.

What do you enjoy most about singing bel canto?

-I mean, bel canto is always difficult for tenors and also for the soprano.

I try to do my best always, but Bellini give us always these powerful moments, like we have shown.

So, yeah, I try to -- just to enjoy every moment, even if it's so, so hard to sing it.

-Yeah.

Well, tell us -- Can you tell us one of your secrets to making it -- to making it flow so beautifully?

-You have to be always fresh, even if it's impossible, but you have to try to, to be fresh, to be always keeping supportive and trying not to push every note and to just sing naturally and not push it.

-Yeah.

Well, you make it look so easy.

-Oh, it's not, but I try to.

-By this point in the story, we feel pretty sorry for Amina.

Well, how about Elvino?

How would you describe what he's going through?

-Elvino is in love with Amina, but he doesn't know how to tell her because he's a bit young man like a -- He's trying to show the love, but even when the count is arriving, he's crazy.

So, I don't know how to describe Elvino.

I don't really like it because he is not in the real love.

Because if you really love her, you just keep her doing what she wants.

-It's not what you would do?

-No.

So I don't agree with Elvino, but I try to do my best to do Elvino.

-Yeah.

Well, what can you tell us about his big aria coming up in Act II?

-I mean, it's big.

It's difficult, as all the opera.

But I like it because we will see like the -- Amina's dream, so what she is trying to -- she would like to happen, or it happens in the dreams.

So, this is a real moment for Elvino when I will really show my love to Amina.

So this is the best part for me, showing this love, because it's the real one.

-Yeah.

So, your director, Rolando Villazón, has had such success over the years singing some of the same rep that you do.

What has it been like having a fellow tenor directing you?

-Oh, my God, I have been always a huge fan of Rolando, and now even more because I was, like, hearing his Nemorino, his Alfredo in "Traviata," "Werther," everything.

And I was a crazy fan.

But now I am even more because he's an amazing person.

Even more than a singer or a stage director, he's an amazing person.

-Xabier, congratulations on this wonderful performance today.

-Thank you so much.

-With today's new production, director Rolando Villazón has imagined the Swiss alpine setting of "La Sonnambula" as a rigid place where the community rejects individualism.

We spoke to Rolando recently about this approach.

-Amina, this orphan that nobody knows where she comes from, is a character that wants to belong to the society, but there is something in herself that tells her, "You are not like that."

And so the concept I came up with is to transform this community into a very strict community, a very patriarchal, parochial community, very religious.

-[ Sings in Italian ] -The chorus and the people of the town are very formal.

I have asked them to keep their elbows next to the body so that everything is like this.

We don't shake hands.

♪♪ The set is -- We've created this square surrounded by doors, by the houses, by the private world where things happen inside that we don't know what happens.

But once we are in the square, we behave the way we have to behave.

And we have behind the mountains, long, big landscapes.

Everything is white.

Everything has the feeling of the snow, of isolation.

-[ Sings in Italian ] Amina -- she's in contact with nature.

She wants to rejoice, but she's supposed not to express all of that.

So, I create, before anything happens, already a conflict between herself and the society.

-[ Sings in Italian ] -She lives in a constant tension, trying to fit in the society and trying to be who she really is.

And, uh, to make it symbolic, poetic, if you want, I have a character who comes from outside, from the mountains, and keeps calling Amina to join her.

This is the call of the wild, the call of search inside of you.

-[ Sings in Italian ] ♪♪ -And then we go into the sleepwalking mind of Amina.

We enter the way she sees things while she's sleepwalking.

-[ Sings in Italian ] -Sleepwalking was at fashion at the moment of the Bellini story.

The border between science and magic was still not very clear, so sleepwalking was kind of a mysterious condition that attracted lots of attention.

And so sleepwalking in our story is the moment of complete freedom of Amina, the moment the tension and the internal fight is gone.

-[ Sings in Italian ] -It's in this state that she liberates herself from the voice that is telling her, "You shouldn't do that, you shouldn't feel like this, you shouldn't enjoy life like this."

-[ Sings in Italian ] -She becomes who she is, and she forgets about the rules that are limiting her.

-[ Sings in Italian ] -She will have to make a decision -- whether she stays in the society, marries Elvino, and becomes one of them, whether that is her happiness, or whether being who she is, and joining the call of the wild is her true happiness.

I let the audience discover that.

[ Laughs ] -[ Sings in Italian ] -We recently sat down with our conductor, Riccardo Frizza, to learn more about the art of bel canto.

♪♪ ♪♪ -[ Sings in Italian ] ♪♪ ♪♪ [ Sings in Italian ] -[ Sings in Italian ] ♪♪ ♪♪ [ Sings in Italian ] [ Piano plays melody ] -[ Sings in Italian ] [ Sings in Italian ] ♪♪ [ Sings in Italian ]