The Best Episodes of Great Performances Season 50

Episode Rankings

1. #1 Fan Favorite
   

   7.7/10(15 votes)

   #1 - Black Lucy and The Bard

   S50:E19/16/2022

   Explore Shakespeare’s love life through the perspective of the “Dark Lady” in this work from Nashville Ballet based on poetry by Caroline Randall Williams and featuring an original score by GRAMMY winner Rhiannon Giddens. TV-14

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2. 

   6.5/10(13 votes)

   #2 - Intimate Apparel

   S50:E29/23/2022

   Experience the story of seamstress Esther who begins writing to a mysterious suitor laboring on the Panama Canal. Featuring music by Ricky Ian Gordon, a libretto by Pulitzer Prize winner Lynn Nottage, this powerful opera is directed by Tony winner Bartlett Sher. TV-14

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3. 

   0.0/10(0 votes)

   #3 - Great Performances at the Met: Lucia Di Lammermoor

   S50:E310/2/2022

   Soprano Nadine Sierra returns to the stage in one of the most formidable and storied roles, the haunted heroine Lucia di Lammermoor, in a production with new staging by Australian theater and film director Simon Stone, conducted by Riccardo Frizza.

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4. 

   0.0/10(0 votes)

   #4 - Great Performances at the Met: Hamlet

   S50:E411/6/2022

   Experience this contemporary opera based on Shakespeare’s masterpiece directed by Neil Armfield and composed by Brett Dean. Starring Allan Clayton in the title role, mezzo-soprano Sarah Connolly as Gertrude, and baritone Rod Gilfry as Claudius.

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5. 

   0.0/10(0 votes)

   #5 - NY Phil Reopening of David Geffen Hall

   S50:E511/4/2022

   Celebrate the New York Philharmonic's return to its revitalized home. Under the baton of Music Director Jaap Van Zweden the concert features performances from soloists Joélle Harvey, Kelley O’Connor, Issachah Savage and Davóne Tines. TV-G

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6. 

   7.9/10(14 votes)

   #6 - Josh Groban's Great Big Radio City Show

   S50:E611/25/2022

   Get a sneak peek at the concert from Radio City, featuring clips from "The Impossible Dream" and "The Fullest." TV-G

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7. 

   0.0/10(0 votes)

   #7 - From Vienna: The New Year’s Celebration 2023

   S50:E71/1/2023

   Celebrate the new year with this annual classical music celebration featuring waltzes by Strauss from the opulent Musikverein hosted by PBS favorite Hugh Bonneville.

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8. 

   0.0/10(0 votes)

   #8 - Movies for Grownups® Awards 2023 with AARP The Magazine

   S50:E82/17/2023

   Iconic and beloved screen and stage performer Alan Cumming returns as host for this awards show in which two-time Golden Globe winner and Emmy nominee Jamie Lee Curtis receives the Career Achievement Award. TV-14

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9. 

   7.5/10(19 votes)

   #9 - The Magic of Spirituals

   S50:E92/24/2023

   Glimpse behind the curtain at opera legends Kathleen Battle and Jessye Norman’s famed concert at Carnegie Hall on March 18, 1990, featuring performance clips and new interviews with opera star Angel Blue, Met Opera General Manager Peter Gelb and more. TV-G

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10. 

    0.0/10(0 votes)

    #10 - Remember This

    S50:E103/13/2023

    Experience Academy Award nominee David Strathairn as reluctant World War II hero and Holocaust witness, Jan Karski, in this one-man true story of moral courage and individual responsibility. TV-14

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11. 

    0.0/10(0 votes)

    #11 - Great Performances at the Met: The Hours

    S50:E113/17/2023

    Renée Fleming makes her return to the Met with Kelli O'Hara and Joyce DiDonato in this new opera from a Pulitzer Prize–winning composer inspired by Virginia Woolf’s “Mrs. Dalloway.”

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12. 

    0.0/10(0 votes)

    #12 - Great Performances at the Met: La Traviata

    S50:E124/2/2023

    Nadine Sierra stars as the opera’s heroine, the self-sacrificing courtesan Violetta, with tenor Stephen Costello in the role of her self-centered lover, Alfredo, with baritone Luca Salsi as Alfredo’s disapproving father. Michael Mayer’s vibrant production is conducted by Daniele Callegari. Renée Fleming hosts.

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13. 

    7.7/10(9 votes)

    #13 - Now Hear This “Piazzolla’s History with Tango”

    S50:E134/7/2023

    Tango to Buenos Aires, Argentina, with host Scott Yoo and flutist Alice Dade to explore the evolution of composer Astor Piazzolla’s work and the music genre itself as it becomes fused with jazz across time and numerous instruments.

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14. 

    6.5/10(31 votes)

    #14 - Now Hear This “Schumann - Genius and Madness”

    S50:E144/14/2023

    Visit Scotland, Germany and France with host Scott Yoo as he investigates the connection between Robert Schumann’s bipolar disorder and creative genius via experts, musical performances and examining the work of other artists outside world of music.

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15. 

    5.7/10(8 votes)

    #15 - Now Hear This “Andy Akiho Found (his) Sound”

    S50:E154/21/2023

    Composer Andy Akiho explains to host Scott Yoo how living in New York City shaped his composing and performs his piece “Aka.”

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16. 

    8.5/10(8 votes)

    #16 - Now Hear This “Albéniz - Portraits of Spain”

    S50:E164/28/2023

    Discover the inspirations Spain provided composer Isaac Albéniz with host Scott Yoo and Scottish GRAMMY-winning guitarist David Russell along with musicians from Albéniz’s birthplace in the Pyrenees mountains as well as Sevilla, Mallorca and more.

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17. 

    0.0/10(0 votes)

    #17 - Great Performances at the Met: Fedora

    S50:E175/7/2023

    Back at the Met for the first time in 25 years, Umberto Giordano’s drama stars soprano Sonya Yoncheva in the title role, a 19th-century Russian princess who falls in love with her fiancé’s murderer, Count Loris, sung by star tenor Piotr Beczała. Soprano Rosa Feola is the Countess Olga, Fedora’s confidant, and baritone Artur Ruciński is the diplomat De Siriex.

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18. 

    7.8/10(45 votes)

    #18 - Celebrating 50 Years of Broadway's Best

    S50:E185/12/2023

    Enjoy a revue of milestone Broadway shows and songs from 1973 to 2023 hosted by two-time Tony Award winner Sutton Foster. Features performances by André De Shields, Chita Rivera, Vanessa Williams and more from Lincoln Center’s David H. Koch Theater.

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19. 

    0.0/10(0 votes)

    #19 - Richard III

    S50:E195/19/2023

    Starring Danai Gurira (“Black Panther: Wakanda Forever,” “The Walking Dead”) in the title role with Tony Award winner Ali Stroker (“Oklahoma!”) as Anne, Tony Award nominee Robert O’Hara (Broadway’s “Slave Play”) directs this Shakespearean tragedy spotlighting one of The Bard’s most indelible villains as part of Great Performances’ 50th anniversary season.

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20. 

    0.0/10(0 votes)

    #20 - Great Performances at the Met: Medea

    S50:E206/16/2023

    Great Performances at the Met raises the curtain on Medea with opera star Sondra Radvanovsky in the title role as the mythic sorceress who stops at nothing in her quest for vengeance. This production marks Radvanovsky’s fourth new production with director David McVicar, who also designed the sets for this staging. Based on Euripides’ famous play, Medea takes place in the ancient Greek city of Corinth, a locale once wealthy and sophisticated. Projections and a large mirror above the stage help illustrate how her choices reflect the collapse of her family, as the man she loves rejects her, and her children become her only outlet for revenge.

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21. 

    0.0/10(0 votes)

    #21 - Great Performances at the Met: Lohengrin

    S50:E217/9/2023

    Back at the Met after 17 years, this production of Wagner’s opera is directed by François Girard with Music Director Yannick Nézet-Séguin conducting. Tenor Piotr Beczała leads the cast in the title role of the mysterious swan knight, with soprano Tamara Wilson as the virtuous duchess Elsa, falsely accused of murder, and soprano Christine Goerke as the cunning sorceress Ortrud. Bass-baritone Evgeny Nikitin is Ortrud’s power-hungry husband, Telramund, and bass Günther Groissböck is King Heinrich. Christopher Maltman hosts.

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22. 

    0.0/10(0 votes)

    #22 - Great Performances at the Met: Falstaff

    S50:E228/6/2023

    Verdi’s Shakespearean comedy features an ensemble cast in Robert Carsen’s staging, with baritone Michael Volle performing in his first Verdi role at the Met as the knight Falstaff, tormented by a trio of clever women who deliver his comeuppance. Reuniting after their acclaimed turns in the production’s 2019 run are soprano Ailyn Pérez as Alice Ford, soprano Jennifer Johnson Cano as Meg Page, and mezzo-soprano Marie-Nicole Lemieux as Mistress Quickly. Soprano Hera Hyesang Park and tenor Bogdan Volkov are the young couple Nannetta and Fenton, and Maestro Daniele Rustioni conducts. Ryan Speedo Green hosts.

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23. 

    0.0/10(0 votes)

    #23 - Leonard Bernstein's Kaddish Symphony

    S50:E238/21/2023

    Performed from Highland Park’s Ravinia Festival, Great Performances presents legendary composer Leonard Bernstein’s Kaddish symphony featuring the talent of Uniting Voices (formerly Chicago Children’s Choir), Chicago Symphony Chorus and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. Led by famed conductor and Bernstein protégé Marin Alsop, the work includes music and spoken narrative segments voiced by narrator Jaye Ladymore (“Chicago Med”) and sung by soprano soloist Janai Brugger (Great Performances at the Met: Medea). Recorded July 2022, the symphony examines questions of humanity and faith, exploring the complicated nature of a higher power who governs mortality.

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24. 

    0.0/10(0 votes)

    #24 - Vienna Philharmonic Summer Night Concert 2023

    S50:E248/25/2023

    A beloved summer tradition, Great Performances presents the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra’s summer night concert from Vienna’s Schönbrunn Palace Gardens. Focusing on musical works from French Romanticism to Impressionism, the orchestra is led for the first time by Metropolitan Opera music director Yannick Nézet-Séguin, and features Elīna Garanča as a soloist performing three arias from “Carmen,” “Sapho” and “Samson et Dalila.” Also performed for the first time is a composition by Lili Boulanger, the first female winner of the prestigious Prix de Rome for her work in 1913.

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