DER ROSENKAVALIER Premieres on Thirteen's Great Performances at the Met 4/25

Strauss's comic masterpiece of love and intrigue in 18th-century Vienna stars Renée Fleming as the aristocratic Marschallin and Susan Graham in the trouser role of her young lover Octavian. Edo De Waart conducts a cast that includes Christine Schäfer as Sophie, Eric Cutler as the Italian singer, Thomas Allen as Faninal, and Kristinn Sigmundsson as Baron Ochs. Directed for the screen by Barbara Willis-Sweete and hosted by Plácido Domingo, Der Rosenkavalier airs on THIRTEEN'S Great Performances at the Met on PBS on Sunday, April 25 at noon (check local listings).

Great Performances at the Met is a presentation of THIRTEEN in association with WNET.ORG - one of America's most prolific and respected public media providers.

Great Performances at the Met: Der Rosenkavalier is the sixth of 10 productions airing this season during the 2009-2010 series. The performance is sung in German with English surtitles. The production is by Nathaniel Merrill, sets and costumes are by Robert O'Hearn, and the lighting designer is Gil Wechsler.

Great Performances is funded by the Irene Diamond Fund, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, public television viewers and PBS. Corporate support for Great Performances at the Met is provided by Toll Brothers, America's luxury home-builder®. Major support for the telecast was also provided by Donald G. Sisler.

Visit Great Performances Online at www.pbs.org/gperf for additional information on this and other Great Performances programs. For the Met, Mia Bongiovanni and Elena Park are Supervising Producers, and Louisa Briccetti and Victoria Warivonchik are Producers. Peter Gelb is Executive Producer. For Great Performances, Bill O'Donnell is Series Producer; David Horn is Executive Producer.

About WNET.ORG

New York public media company WNET.ORG is a pioneering provider of television and web content. The parent of Thirteen, WLIW21 and Creative News Group, WNET.ORG brings such acclaimed broadcast series and websites as Great Performances, Worldfocus, Nature, American Masters, Charlie Rose, Wide Angle, Secrets of the Dead, Religion & Ethics Newsweekly, Visions, Consuelo Mack WealthTrack,Wild Chronicles, Miffy and Friends, and Cyberchase to national and international audiences. Through its wide range of channels and platforms, WNET.ORG serves the entire New York City metro area with unique local productions, broadcasts, and innovative educational and cultural projects. In all that it does, WNET.ORG pursues a single, overarching goal - to create media experiences of lasting significance for New York, America, and the world. For more information, visit www.wnet.org.

About the Met

Under the leadership of General Manager Peter Gelb and Music Director James Levine, the Met has a series of bold initiatives underway that are designed to broaden its audience and revitalize the company's repertory. The Met has made a commitment to presenting modern masterpieces alongside the classic repertory, with highly theatrical productions featuring the greatest opera stars in the world.

The Met's 2009-10 season features eight new productions, four of which are Met premieres: Janá?ek's From the House of the Dead, Verdi's Attila, Shostakovich's The Nose, and Rossini's Armida. The other new productions are Puccini's Tosca, Offenbach's Les Contes d'Hoffmann, Bizet's Carmen, and Thomas's Hamlet.

Building on its 78-year-old international radio broadcast history - heard over the Toll Brothers-Metropolitan Opera International Radio Network - the Met uses advanced media distribution platforms and state-of-the-art technology to reach audiences around the world.

The Emmy and Peabody Award-winning The Met: Live in HD series returns for its fourth season in 2009-10 with nine transmissions, beginning October 10 with Tosca starring Karita Mattila and ending with Armida starring Renée Fleming on May 1. The Met recently introduced Met Player, a new subscription service that makes much of its extensive video and audio catalog of full-length performances available to the public for the first time online, and in exceptional, state-of-the-art quality. Metropolitan Opera Radio on SIRIUS XM Radio broadcasts both live and rare historical performances; the Met on Rhapsody on-demand service offers audio recordings; and the Met presents free live audio streaming of performances on its website once every week during the opera season with support from RealNetworks®.

The Met has launched several audience development initiatives, including Open House dress rehearsals, a popular rush ticket program, reduced ticket prices, Gallery Met, and an annual Holiday Series presentation for families. For more information, please visit: www.metopera.org.

Remaining broadcast premieres on Great Performances at the Met are scheduled as follows (Please check local PBS listings):

Sunday, May 16, 12pm

CARMEN - El?na Garan?a sings the title role opposite Roberto Alagna in director Richard Eyre's new production of Bizet's masterpiece. Barbara Frittoli is Micaela and Teddy Tahu Rhodes plays the matador Escamillo. Yannick Nézet-Séguin conducts.

Sunday, June 20, 12pm

SIMON BOCCANEGRA - Plácido Domingo sings the baritone title role of Verdi's Simon Boccanegra for the first time in his Met career, in Giancarlo del Monaco's production. Adrianne Pieczonka, Marcello Giordani, and James Morris star. James Levine conducts.

Sunday, July 18, 12pm

HAMLET - Simon Keenlyside and Marlis Petersen headline the Ambroise Thomas opera based on Shakespeare's play, in a new production directed by Patrice Caurier and Moshe Leiser. With Jennifer Larmore, Toby Spence, and James Morris. Louis Langrée conducts.

Sunday, August 22, 12pm

ARMIDA - Renée Fleming plays Rossini's vengeful sorceress in this opera's Met premiere, directed by Mary Zimmerman. The cast of multiple tenors includes Lawrence Brownlee, John Osborn, José Manuel Zapata, Barry Banks, and Kobie van Rensburg. Riccardo Frizza conducts.