Puccini's final opera contains his two favourite female character types, with the neurotic Chinese Princess Turandot, who sets impossibly cryptic riddles for all her would-be suitors and then has them executed when they fail to guess the answer, and the self-sacrificing slave-girl Liu, who dies for her impossible love.
New York Metropolitan Opera Chorus and Orchestra, conductor Marco Armiliato

Act 1

7.10 Twenty Minutes: New York Artists in Their Studios
Tim Marlow talks to Larry Poons, a lyrical abstract impressionist of the 1960s New York school.

7.30 Act 2

8.30 Interval: The Met Opera Quiz
Thor Eckert puts listeners' questions to Ken Benson, Stephen Brown and Henry Fogel. Send questions to: Met Opera Quiz, [address removed].

8.45 Opera Snaps
Rodney Milnes takes a sideways glance at this evening's opera.

8.50 Act 3