Radio New Zealand - Te Reo Irirangi o Aotearoa

In the first of a two-part series, Paul Bushnell goes through the stage door at New York's Metropolitan Opera to find out how it works. His backstage interviews feature a wide range of the key people who get the productions onstage and make it run, including the General Manager Peter Gelb. The talk is interwoven with music from several Met productions, including the opening of the controversial new Ring Cycle directed by Robert Lepage. (58′30″)

Technology is the focus of the final of Paul Bushnell's two-part series exploring how New York's Metropolitan Opera works. His backstage interviews touch on radio - including an interview with Margaret Juntwait, the entertaining host of the Saturday matinee broadcasts - but focus on the new highly-successful Live in HD relay which transmits those performances to a global audience of hundreds of thousands of viewers. The singer Renée Fleming also talks about her role as a TV host in a programme which surveys the première of Die Walküre, the second instalment in the new Ring Cycle which premièred at the Met at Easter. (58′30″)