Peter Gelb

Peter Gelb’s career has followed a singular arc that began with his teenage years as an usher at the Metropolitan Opera and led to his appointment, in August 2006, as the storied company’s 16th general manager. Now in his sixth year at the helm at the Met, Mr. Gelb began to launch initiatives aimed at revitalizing opera and connecting it to a wider audience since the start of his tenure. One of his fundamental goals is to recruit the world’s great theater directors to enhance the theatricality of the Met’s productions and complement the extraordinary musical standards established by Music Director James Levine. Mr. Gelb is also committed to securing more engagements each season from the world’s top singers. One of the most successful and groundbreaking of his new initiatives is The Met: Live in HD, a Peabody and Emmy Award-winning series of live performance transmissions shown in high definition in movie theaters. The series has sold nearly eight million tickets since its inception in December 2006 and in the 2011–12 season will be seen on more than 1,700 screens in more than 54 countries across six continents.