Girl of the Golden Met Awards 2025: Winners!
Choose your favorite performers and opera from the Met Opera's 2024-25 season! Vote by commenting on this blog post, on Instagram, on Facebook, or by voting each day in my Instagram story. Voting closes on Tuesday, June 24th, at 11:59 PM EST.
Sondra Radvanovsky and Bryn Terfel in Tosca (Evan Zimmerman/Met Opera)
Best Opera
Die Frau ohne Schatten
WINNER: Tosca (Cast C)
“Passions raged and voices seared” in the “electrifying” (Classical Review) third cast of Tosca, starring a “peerless” (NYTimes) Sondra Radvanovsky in the title role; Sir Bryn Terfel, returning to the Met after 13 years as an “unpredictable [Scarpia] that was terrifying at every turn” (OperaWire); and Brian Jagde as a “forthright” Cavaradossi with “lustrous tones tinged with emotion” (Classical Review).
Sondra Radvanovsky in Tosca (Evan Zimmerman/Met Opera)
Best Soprano
WINNER: Sondra Radvanovsky, Tosca
Sondra’s “sovereign” (New Criterion) Tosca had the “fearlessness and the freedom of a truly inhabited performance” (NYTimes). She sang with “blazing High Cs, a resonant chest voice, and declamatory grit,” and her “Vissi d’arte” was “nothing short of a masterclass” (OperaWire).
Freddie De Tommaso in Tosca (Marty Sohl/Met Opera)
Best Tenor
WINNER: Freddie De Tommaso, Tosca
“Without a doubt,” said OperaWire, Freddie “is the real deal and… a star that the [Met] needs at this time.” In his Met debut as the doomed painter Cavaradossi in Tosca, he delivered “passionate Italianate style… in spades,” with “robust swagger and evident grasp of Puccini’s style” (Observer).
Aigul Akhmetshina in Il Barbiere di Siviglia (Jonathan Tichler/Met Opera)
Best Mezzo-Soprano
With her “dazzling” (Classical Review) Rosina in Il Barbiere di Siviglia, Aigul “took hold of the stage from her first appearance and didn’t let go” (BroadwayWorld). OperaWire called this “her true arrival at the Met,” and the Classical Review noted her “remarkable ability to laugh while singing the most florid of runs.”
Quinn Kelsey in Tosca (Marty Sohl/Met Opera)
Best Baritone
WINNER: Quinn Kelsey, Tosca
This is Quinn’s third Best Baritone win in a row. His Baron Scarpia in Tosca was “a suave would-be seducer who, for once, could have been a real romantic threat to Cavaradossi,” (Observer) and Quinn sang with a “supremely secure baritone” (id.) and an oily “charm so chilling in its masking of wicked evil.”
Christian Van Horn in Les Contes d’Hoffmann (Karen Almond/Met Opera)
Best Bass-Baritone/Bass
Rene Pape, Fidelio
Bryn Terfel, Tosca
Christian embodied the Four Villains in 𝘓𝘦𝘴 𝘊𝘰𝘯𝘵𝘦𝘴 𝘥'𝘏𝘰𝘧𝘧𝘮𝘢𝘯𝘯 with “lush abundance of tone and personality” (Woman Around Town). OperaWire said that “he towers over everyone like a God… his vocal presence makes you shudder,” as did “his pitch-perfect evil laugh,” I added in my review.
Joana Mallwitz and Yannick Nézet-Séguin
Best Conductor
Giacomo Sagripanti, Il Barbiere di Siviglia
This is the first tie in Awards history, but well deserved for both! Maestra Mallwitz, in her “radiant” (Bachtrack) Met debut, was in “calm, stylish command” (NYTimes) of Le Nozze di Figaro and drew “crisp, clean playing” from the Met Orchestra (The Times). Maestro Nézet-Séguin brought “clarity, majesty, and drive” (OperaWire) to his “intimate, flowing interpretation” (NYTimes) of Die Frau ohne Schatten, which “stuns…due to Nézet-Séguin’s leadership” (Gramophone).
Jack Swanson in Il Barbiere di Siviglia (Jonathan Tichler/Met Opera)
Best Debut
“A new tenor is in town,” declared the New York Classical Review of Jack’s Met debut as Count Almaviva in Il Barbiere di Siviglia. Per OperaWire, he sang “with an elegant legato and ardent phrasing,” with BroadwayWorld adding that “his soaring high notes and great coloratura were a delight to hear.”
