Peabody Awards
The Metropolitan Opera radio broadcasts have won over 60 awards, including multiple Peabody Awards, the highest honor in radio broadcasting.
In 1950, the Metropolitan Opera, ABC Radio, and the Texas Company (Texaco, the series' long-term sponsor) were awarded the Peabody Award in music for "public service in making the most brilliant opera company in the world a by-word in millions of homes." The announcement commended the "great artists," the "superlative orchestra," and the intermission features, as well as the series' spin-off programs such as the Auditions of the Air and the Opera Album.
In 1954, the Peabody committee gave a Personal Award for Radio Music to Boris Goldovsky, via the Metropolitan Opera radio broadcasts. The Peabody announcement noted Goldovsky's contagious enthusiasm for opera, evident in his decade of hosting intermission features and interviews on the Met broadcast series.
In 1960, the Texaco-Metropolitan Opera Network was awarded a Peabody Institutional Award for Radio Public Service. The Peabody committee cited 20 years of public service "of inestimable cultural value," and mentioned the carefully planned intermission programs and high-level music commentary. The committee also noted the "long-time excellence of this series, the good taste and restraint in the commercial identification," and the international use of the broadcasts.
In 1982, Texaco and the Metropolitan Opera were awarded a Peabody for excellence in both radio and television broadcasting. The Peabody committee cited the more than four decades of radio broadcasts, the continued technical refinements and improvements in sound, and the "informative intermission features, intelligent narration, and outstanding musical quality."
In 1989, its 50th year of broadcasting, the Texaco-Metropolitan Opera radio series received another Peabody Award. The committee noted that "the Met Opera has been continually innovative in its presentation. Sound quality is excellent, performances are first-rate, and the entertaining intermissions have become outstanding programs in their own right."
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