Video: Ailyn Pérez Sings 'Un bel dì' from Puccini’s MADAMA BUTTERFLY at the Met Opera

Watch Ailyn Pérez sings an excerpt from Cio-Cio-San’s Act II aria in an early stage rehearsal for Puccini’s Madama Butterfly.

The title character of Madama Butterfly—a young Japanese geisha betrayed by a visiting American naval officer—is one of the defining roles in opera, as convincing and tragic as any figure in drama. While the opera examines ideas about cultural and sexual imperialism, its true dramatic focus rests squarely on seemingly real people in desperate situations.

The opera takes place in the Japanese port city of Nagasaki at the turn of the last century, at a time of expanding American international presence. Japan was hesitantly defining its global role, and Nagasaki was one of the country’s few ports open to foreign ships. Temporary marriages for foreign sailors were not unusual.