NYTimes.com: Eric Owens in Verdi "Requiem": "And when Owens began the 'Mors stupebit' section with earthy deep tones, he sounded truly stunned."

 The Met’s music director, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, conducted the company’s orchestra and chorus and four vocal soloists: from left, the soprano Ailyn Pérez, the mezzo-soprano Michelle DeYoung, the tenor Matthew Polenzani and the bass-baritone Eric Owens. Credit...Richard Termine/Met Opera

The New York Times

September 12, 2021

By Anthony Tommasini

What it meant to be in the audience at the Metropolitan Opera on Saturday evening — for the first indoor performance there since March 2020 — was clear even before the music began.

The theater’s doors had been closed to listeners for 18 months, almost to the day. After standing on lines that extended out into the Lincoln Center plaza and showing proof of vaccination, it felt almost unreal to me to be back in the gilded auditorium for Verdi’s Requiem, the company’s commemoration of the 20th anniversary of 9/11.

***

It began slowly, with some claps here and there. Then built into vigorous applause and bravos. And then whoops, shouts and an exuberant standing ovation. Many choristers wiped away tears. Others touched their hearts or waved in gratitude.

Things calmed down only after the Met’s concertmaster, Benjamin Bowman, came out to lead the orchestra in tuning up. Then, when Yannick Nézet-Séguin, the company’s music director, appeared with the four vocal soloists — the soprano Ailyn Pérez, the mezzo-soprano Michelle DeYoung, the tenor Matthew Polenzani and the bass-baritone Eric Owens — another prolonged standing ovation began.

***

The soloists were excellent. Pérez sang beautifully, with radiant sound — sometimes seeming angelic, sometimes fiery. DeYoung balanced smoldering intensity with affecting refinement. Polenzani was ardent and earnest in a splendidly sung “Ingemisco.” And when Owens began the “Mors stupebit” section with earthy deep tones, he sounded truly stunned.