Margaret Ann Juntwait (March 18, 1957 – June 3, 2015) was an American radio broadcaster, best known as the announcer of the Metropolitan Opera radio broadcasts. After thirteen years on the air at

WNYC WNYC is the trademark and a set of call letters shared by WNYC (AM) and WNYC-FM, a pair of nonprofit, noncommercial, public radio stations located in New York City. WNYC is owned by New York Public Radio (NYPR), a nonprofit organization that ...

-Radio, she debuted as the Met's announcer on December 11, 2004. She was also the Met's first announcer on Sirius XM Satellite Radio from 2006, and remained in both jobs until her death in 2015.

Early years

Raised in Ridgewood and

Upper Saddle River, New Jersey Upper Saddle River is a borough in Bergen County, New Jersey. As of the 2010 United States Census, the borough's population was 8,208,Northern Highlands Regional High School Northern Highlands Regional High School (NHRHS) is a regional public high school and school district in Allendale, in Bergen County, New Jersey, United States. The school serves students in ninth through twelfth grades from Allendale, Ho-Ho-K ...

, where she first developed an interest in choral music. Later, she studied to be an opera singer – she was a lyric soprano – and earned a degree in voice from the Manhattan School of Music in 1980. After marrying, she withdrew from an operatic career in favor of raising her three children.

Broadcasting career

Juntwait began her career as a classical music radio announcer in 1991 at

-FM radio in New York City. In 2000, while continuing at WNYC, she began her

Metropolitan Opera The Metropolitan Opera (commonly known as the Met) is an American opera company based in New York City, resident at the Metropolitan Opera House at Lincoln Center, currently situated on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. The company is oper ...

career as the back-up announcer for radio host Peter Allen, who retired from the Metropolitan Opera radio broadcasts in May 2004. With the 2004–2005 broadcast season, Juntwait took to the air on her own, introducing a performance of Verdi's '' I Vespri Sicilani''. She became only the third regular announcer for the broadcasts, following

Milton Cross Milton John Cross (April 16, 1897 – January 3, 1975) was an American radio announcer famous for his work on the NBC and ABC radio networks. He was best known as the voice of the Metropolitan Opera, hosting its Saturday afternoon radio broadca ...

and Allen. On September 20, 2006, the Met announced that Juntwait would become a full-time Met employee, having been appointed as announcer of all programs on

Sirius Satellite Radio Sirius Satellite Radio was a satellite radio (SDARS) and online radio service operating in North America, owned by Sirius XM Holdings. Headquartered in New York City, with smaller studios in Los Angeles and Memphis, Sirius was officially lau ...

's new Metropolitan Opera Radio channel. On Sirius, Juntwait hosted three or four live broadcasts a week during the opera season, and recorded introductions for hundreds of archive performances aired on the channel. Juntwait also performed in radio theater plays produced by

NPR National Public Radio (NPR, stylized in all lowercase) is an American privately and state funded nonprofit media organization headquartered in Washington, D.C., with its NPR West headquarters in Culver City, California. It differs from other ...

veteran

Joe Bevilacqua Joseph K. Bevilacqua (born January 2, 1959) is an American actor, producer, director, author, dramatist, humorist, cartoonist, and documentarian. Biography Early life Bevilacqua was born on January 2, 1959, in Newark, New Jersey, the son ...

, including ''The Whithering of Willoughby and the Professor''. In episode 16, Juntwait essays three roles in a parody of the British show ''

The Prisoner ''The Prisoner'' is a 1967 British television series about an unnamed British intelligence agent who is abducted and imprisoned in a mysterious coastal village, where his captors designate him as Number Six and try to find out why he abruptl ...

'' from the 1960s. In episode 17, Juntwait portrays Willoughby's mother, a mermaid and god. The plays aired on "The Comedy-O-Rama Hour", heard on

XM Satellite Radio XM Satellite Radio (XM) was one of the three satellite radio ( SDARS) and online radio services in the United States and Canada, operated by Sirius XM Holdings. It provided pay-for-service radio, analogous to subscription cable television. Its se ...

's Sonic Theater Channel. Juntwait died of ovarian cancer at a hospice facility in

Saddle River, New Jersey Saddle River is a borough in Bergen County, New Jersey, United States. It is a suburb of New York City, located just over northwest of Manhattan. The town is known for its natural fields, farmland, forests, and rivers, and has a bucolic atmos ...

on June 3, 2015, aged 58. According to a memorial published on the Metropolitan Opera website, Juntwait had been diagnosed with cancer over ten years prior to her death, but continued working with the Metropolitan Opera, missing only one Saturday matinee broadcast before January 2015. Her final live broadcast was on SiriusXM Radio on December 31, 2014. She recorded material for future broadcasts just a few weeks before she died.

Early years

Broadcasting career

References

Further reading