Die Zauberflöte

[juliet]

So, it turns out that opera is a lot more interesting if it's actually staged. I know, I was surprised too.

The opera in question was The Magic Flute (sung in German[0], but with English surtitles, & English dialogue), at the Opera House, & was v good. Though I got a bit restless during some of the serious-ish (Masonic & Enlightenment-philosophical) bits in the second half. (I also couldn't avoid the internal critical deconstruction of the racist/sexist aspects of it, but yes, 18th c lyrics, not surprising.)

It was very well staged - I particularly liked the dance/acrobat people they had being wild animals & Night Armies and so on. (There was a brief bit with fire-staff: competent enough but I've seen & would expect better at pretty much any festival; but then the very good fire-staff people at festivals aren't as bendy & acrobatic as these guys, so it balances out.) Sarastro had a lovely furry voice; the Queen of the Night *just* made her high F.

Papageno showed up with a portable barbie & a six-pack, & continued thus entertainingly Aussie-bloke throughout; Papagena had bleached blonde dreads, hotpants, & furry boots. All very fine. I was in the cheap seats in the side, from where you can't quite see all the stage, & have a weird angle on the surtitles, but I had about the best of the cheap seats, & was perfectly happy with being able to see 75% or so of the stage. Also I could see down into the pit!

Anyway: I actually enjoyed it enough that I might consider going again, which is a bit of a shock given that I've been bitching about disliking opera for about 20 years now. I still wouldn't be inclined to listen to it without the staging, though.

[0] I was pleased that my German is still competent enough to notice where they'd flattened the translation a bit. Though I would have been screwed without the surtitles, but then it *is* opera, this is normal.

Comments

[webcowgirl.livejournal.com]

That really is a super fun opera even though it goes completely freak city at the end.

[juliet]

I was reading the Wikipedia entry about the Masonic & Enlightenment stuff - all v interesting.

[wezpez.livejournal.com]

See? It's not all tedious warbling women and 15 hour epics, though I'm still rather partial to a bit of Wagner on occasion. Just don't make a Nielsen opera your next choice. I had to play for one whilst at Guildhall and that'd definitely put you off again for life. You should go and see some Puccini: La Boheme, Tosca and Turandot are all fab if a little depressing of ending. That or some nice, rousing Verdi :)

[juliet]

Actually, the other bit of opera I've seen live was Wagner - they did, hm, 40 min or so from whichever the Ride of the Valkyries one is at Glastonbury a couple of years ago. (Including the R of the V, obviously). It was ace!

Isn't La Boheme also Madam Butterfly & Miss Saigon, storywise? Or am I getting confused? (I know that the latter two are the same.)

The staging really did make a big difference. Plus I do rather like several bits of the Magic Flute musically, despite my well-publicised antipathy to Mozart. (IF HE HAD EVER WRITTEN AN INTERESTING VIOLA PART I MIGHT FEEL DIFFERENTLY.)

Wanna go visit the ENO if there's something good on sometime when I get back? Did you ever go to Glyndebourne with Auntie Helen?

[lovingboth]

Miss Saigon = Madam Butterfly, and yes, it's they're both only a slightly more complicated version of La Boheme's 'opera plot A' (they had a child before he vanished).

I do ENO rather than the Royal Opera House because it's much cheaper and in English.

[wezpez.livejournal.com]

I did do a Glyndebourne trip with Auntie Helen once - it was Mozart's Idomeneo, which I must confess didn't thrill me particularly, but it was well done, with some extremely odd and interesting staging (as ever with Glyndebourne). And yes - we should definitely pay a visit to something good at ENO when you're back on the right continent :)

Also...Miss Saigon is basically an adaptation of Madame Butterfly, whereas La Boheme merely bears some similarities in story,in the way that rather a lot of operas are similar with a terribly depressing death at the end. Puccini dedicated a whole other opera to Madame Butterfly, though I'm not a huge fan.

[lovingboth]

Magic Flute was the one that got me into opera, many years ago, so it could be a slippery slope :)

Don Giovanni is my favourite, and difficult to mess up (although it has been done) as it also combines a story with some wonderful music.

Lots of operas skip the plot ('girl meets boy, they split up, they get together again just before - or sometimes just after - she dies, curtain' seems to cover about a quarter of them).

20th Century ones tend to be written by composers afraid that if they put tunes in, they will be accused of writing - horror! - a musical rather than Opera.

[juliet]

They gave us a little piece of paper with a summary of the plot (& the casting information - because the programme was 15 SODDING DOLLARS, jesus) beforehand. It made *no sense*. It made a little more sense when actually acted, but only barely. But hey, whatevs :)

See, I *like* musicals, which is why I've always been vaguely surprised that I have never been keen on opera. (And I was a classically-trained orchestral musician in my teens, so I know & like plenty of orchestral stuff.) It's the voices, mostly, especially sopranos.

I am Pro-Tune. Although for some reason there's a Steve Reich piece called 16 Musicians or 8 Musicians or something like that on my iPod, which has no tune *at all* & which I really like. Minimal techno!

[lovingboth]

It's very, very rare that I buy programmes and usually just check up the plot before leaving for the event. Some opera plots simply don't make sense (including this one) but it can vary between productions.

So ENO did Verdi's Nabucco a few years ago. Beautifully sung, looked gorgeous, but I wasn't the only one losing the plot and just enjoying the first two. A touring company did it last year, OK singing, you could tell it was done on a budget, but - coo - I could could follow it happily.

Philip Glass has done at least one (Akhnaten) and two thirds (first two acts of Satyagraha) of good opera.

[juliet]

Yeah, I don't bother with programmes any more, either (I used to like them when I was small); but I was still horrified at it costing $15!

Interesting to hear about the plot-following differences with those two productions!

I didn't know that Glass had done opera. Hmmmmmmmm. [ makes considering noises ]