The Met’s New Aida Visits the Other Met

On a recent snowy afternoon, the soprano Angel Blue travelled from the Metropolitan Opera House to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, to visit its Egyptian collection. Blue, who is forty, is statuesque and warmly serene, and she looked elegant in an overcoat, a sparkly sweater, and boots. “I just got out of rehearsal,” she told a companion, in an elevator. “I tried to take off some makeup, but—” An elderly museumgoer wheeled around. “Are you in a show?” she asked. Yes, Blue said—“Aida,” at the Met Opera. Her companion added that Blue was starring in it. The museumgoer’s eyebrows shot up. “Wow!” she said. “Congratulations.” Blue demurred, balking at “star.” “Well, it’s the title character,” she said. Later, she said, “Because of how Aida is as a person, she can’t put herself at the center of anything. I like her for that—she and I share that.”

The Met’s new production of “Aida,” which runs through May, is directed by Michael Mayer and features projections that evoke ancient Egypt, dancing that suggests hieroglyphics, and a narrative frame involving archeologists. Blue, who has lived in London and performed all over the world, has sung many great roles at the Met Opera—Violetta, Mimì, Micaëla, Bess—but this season marks her début there as Aida, and that afternoon marked her début visit to the Met Museum. First, she checked out a new exhibit, “Flight Into Egypt: Black Artists and Ancient Egypt, 1876-Now,” which highlights works that take ancient Egypt as a source of contemporary inspiration. Passing an array of Nefertiti heads, Blue stopped in front of a wall of album covers adorned with pharaohiana, by musicians ranging from Fela Kuti to Earth, Wind & Fire to De La Soul. In the middle: Leontyne Price in “Aida.” “I had this recording,” Blue said.

Blue, who lives in New Jersey with her husband and stepson, grew up in California, listening to popular music, classical, gospel, “everything.” “I mean, good grief. My dad listened to Deep Purple, the Ink Spots, Miles Davis, Frank Sinatra,” she said. “He had a really good musical palate.” Her mother, too: Aretha Franklin, Diana Ross, Cher. “My dad was a pastor, so I learned about ancient Egypt from the Bible—Exodus and Deuteronomy, basically,” she said. “I’ve learned a lot being in ‘Aida.’ ” She cocked her head, alert to music in an adjacent room. “ ‘The Wiz!’ ” she said, singing a little. “Ba-ba-ba—the Emerald City scene.” She popped into a multiscreen alcove, admiring clips including Michael Jackson’s video “Remember the Time,” starring Eddie Murphy and Iman as a pharaoh and his bored wife. “Iman came to our opening of ‘Porgy and Bess’ in 2019,” Blue said. “She was really sweet.”

Blue headed downstairs to the Egyptian collection and talked about her youth. When she was four, she saw “Turandot” with her parents; afterward, she said, “I want to be like the lady in the light.” By fifth grade, “I wanted to be Leontyne Price.” At fifteen, she enrolled in a performing-arts high school in Los Angeles, commuting two hours each way and studying alongside classmates including Josh Groban and Taran Killam. “It’s funny—whenever I have a moment of ‘I’m not going to do this anymore,’ I see someone from high school on a billboard.” During a low moment circa “La Bohème,” she said, “I turned on ‘S.N.L.’ and I saw Taran Killam. I was, like, ‘Oh, my gosh, I gotta keep going.’ ”

By the Temple of Dendur, atrium windows showcased a deep-blue late-afternoon sky. “The temple was given to us in 1965—I didn’t know that until, like, two days ago,” Blue said. “That’s fascinating. Leontyne Price made her Met début in ’61, and a little later was her huge success with ‘Aida.’ ” In the Tomb of Perneb, she took in the rows of hieroglyphs, and talked about Aida and Radamès, who spend the end of Act IV, and then eternity, in a tomb. “It’s, like, ‘This is our home now,’ ” she said. In a gallery, she bent to admire the Mummy of Artemidora, lying peacefully in a glass case. Blue’s father died eighteen years ago. “I don’t mean to be morbid, but I remember looking at him in his casket,” she said. “He had a suit on. He looked very peaceful, and he had a little smile. Whatever the paradise was that he was experiencing, I felt like I got to experience just a little bit of it, to see him like that.”

Her vocal talent is “a magical thing,” Blue said. “And it’s great to have it. But I didn’t give it to myself, you know? I’m borrowing it while I’m here.” She laughed apologetically, then went on. “And when I get there it’s going to sound even better. My dream is to sing in a choir in Heaven. If I could sing in a choir next to angels—seraphim, cherubim, streets of gold, and all that—that’s where it’s at for me.” Being named Angel, in short, is just fine. “My dad named me, and I’m thankful,” she said. “My mom wanted to name me Tiffany.” ♦