For those of you who can’t make it to the Met’s opening night, I am happy to provide you the opportunity to experience another Otello with a cast that was unmatchable for 1981.   

Plácido Domingo had by then pretty much established himself as the role’s leading interpreter, succeeding Jon Vickers and James McCracken whose let Met Moors were in the late 1970s.  The luscious-voiced Teresa Zylis-Gara had been the Met’s reigning Desdemona for a decade.  A stranger to North America, Renato Bruson provides an introspective, mesmerizing Jago (his Met debut in a 1969 broadcast of Lucia di Lammermoor was unfortunately overshadowed by Anna Moffo’s now-legendary on-air breakdown).

Giuseppe Verdi: Otello

Teatro Colón
Michelangelo Veltri, conductor
27 June 1981

Otello – Plácido Domingo
Desdemona – Teresa Zylis-Gara
Jago – Renato Bruson
Amelia – Aida Calamera
Cassio – Ricardo Cassinelli
Roderigo – Eduardo Sarramida
Lodovico – Nino Meneghetti
Montano – Pino de Vescovi
Un araldo – Bruno Tomaselli