Metropolitan Opera chief sees digital future
Mar 13, 2006

With a range of new initiatives, incoming Metropolitan Opera chief Peter Gelb, the former Sony Classical president, wants to make the Met's offerings more accessible and "reconnect the Met to the world."

A Reuters report said his ideas included offering live, high-definition broadcasts of Met productions via satellite to major movie theater chains, as well as making digital streams and downloads of Met performances available to fans.

He also wanted to "significantly modernize" the venue's beloved weekly radio broadcasts, adding behind-the-scenes elements and interviews that would make them "more like sports broadcasts," the report further said.

The report said that although Gelb acknowledged that plans such as satellite broadcasts and digital delivery were still being discussed with the unions whose current agreements would have to be renegotiated in order to make them a reality, he imagined that the Met would have to create products that "will work across the entire digital landscape - whether it's on our Web site, through broadband services, iTunes and all the digital delivery platforms. We'd even like to offer ringtones."