Editorial Review:

Product Description:
The Metropolitan Opera's acclaimed Live in High-Definition series, which projects live performances into theaters across the globe, has met with unprecedented critical and commercial success and has made opera convenient and affordable to millions of viewers worldwide. Now, EMI Classics is proud to collaborate with The Met to release 6 new DVDs made from these broadcast performances.

'The more vicious the society, the more vicious the individual.' (Benjamin Britten) Anthony Dean Griffey and Patricia Racette captivate in John Doyle's new production of
Britten's tortured masterpiece. Donald Runnicles leads the Met Orchestra in what the Boston Globe called 'an inspired performance . . . full of passion and commitment yet free of bombast.'









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Rating: - The Met's Peter Grimes is awesome!
I first saw this production of Peter Grimes when the Met broadcast it to movie theatres in March and vowed I would purchase the DVD when it became available. From the stark set of the poor fishing village to the wonderful performance by Anthony Dean Griffey in the lead role to the great sound of the orchestra under Donald Runnicles, bringing to life Britten's evocative score, the entire performace was mesmerizing. I highly recommend this DVD.

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Rating: - Runnicles leads an impressive reading of Grimes
The Met's HD production of "Peter Grimes" packs a lot of power and brings the brooding musicality of Benjamin Britten's 1945 operatic masterwork to life. The cast is uniformly fine vocally and dramatically, though people who remember Jon Vickers in his full-voiced portrayal of the titular anti-hero may find Anthony Dean Griffey's tenor light and reedy by comparison. Nonetheless, he is compelling in his portrayal of Grime's anguished internal pre-occupations, and the rest of the cast brings theatrical and vocal specificity to their roles as inhabitants of The Borough. Patricia Racette gives a heart-wrenching performance as Ellen Orford, the widowed school mistress who tries to befriend the embattled Peter. John Doyle's stage direction is strong in developing the characters, and in maximizing the dramatic impact of the choruses, but is often rendered static by the constraints of the uniwall black on black set. The real heroes, though, are conductor Donald Runnicles and the incomparable Met orchestra, who capture Britten's miraculous sonic evocation of the sea and its parallel storms in the minds of those who, like the fisherman Grimes, try to eke out a precarious livelihood from it.

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Rating: - incredible
This is the most brilliant operatic production I have ever seen, and it firmly established Benjamin Britten's well-deserved reputation in my mind. The set and costumes were perfect, the music direction was stunning, and the performers blew it out of the water, and I say these things with the addition that I am not an easy sell. Ever since the Met introduced me to Benjamin Britten, I have been enjoying his other works, notably his war requiem. If more composers focused on the virtue of relevance, opera would enjoy an upsurge of interest in the fine arts community.

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Rating: - Very good production
I saw this performance at the MET and it was my first "Grimes" but probably not my last. I had owned a copy of the Jon Vickers CD for many years before really taking the time to listen to it. The CD recording grabbed me with the first interlude (which is very haunting and makes a perfect ending to the opera). I liked the MET's "advent calender" wall set, a little claustrophobic at times but certainly a different way to go. Anthony Dean Griffey, Patricia Racette and the supporting cast are excellent.