A new Metropolitan Opera production, broadcast from New York, of one of the greatest classics in the operatic canon. Aida was premiered in Cairo in 1869, when Verdi was commissioned by the Egyptian sovereign to create a work to accompany the celebrations for the opening of the Suez Canal. The dramatic love between an (enslaved) Ethiopian princess called Aida and the Egyptian general Radamés will have soprano Angel Blue and tenor Piotr Beczala as the new leads, under the direction of conductor Yannick Nézet-Séguin.