Patrick Vaz posted last month about San Francisco's new Magic Flute, which I saw in October and neglected to post about. Really, it was a lovely production, very charming. Like everyone else, I adored the portmanteau creatures in the scene where Tamino plays his flute. The singing was fine, and I especially liked Christopher Maltman's Papageno, my favorite character of the lot. He's a human, where everyone else is something of an archetype. The Three Ladies were hilarious, and hat's off to the Three Spirits. Erika Miklosa has one of those small, ethereal voices and didn't make that much impact as the Star-Flaming Queen; she also smudged the triplets in her second aria, which I realize is the norm. I don't necessarily agree with a friend who thinks the role should be sung by a dramatic soprano, but...
Patrick's right that it's a good introductory opera, and in fact I had as my guest a friend who had never seen live opera. She had a good time, thought the music beautiful and love the production; definitely a successful outing.
Was it the complete --or complete-ish-- opera, with the dialogue and all the musical numbers or was it a reduction, which are in vogue these days?
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