Mozart wrote THE MAGIC FLUTE for a popular theater in the suburbs, away from the hifalutin crowd of the regular opera theater in Vienna. In Amadeus, Peter Shaffer called it “a vaudeville” – something to entertain the audience. But Mozart’s work is also many other things: a love story; a daring adventure; a mystery about making one’s way in the world and what that all means. THE MAGIC FLUTE has some of opera’s iconic characters, who sing some of the most memorable music ever written for the stage, from Papageno’s earworm aria to the fiercely challenging solos of the Queen of the Night. THE MAGIC FLUTE is a Singspiel, which means it has passages of spoken dialogue between the musical numbers. We will sing the music in the original German, while speaking the dialogue in English translation.

Joseph Dennis (Rigoletto) sings Tamino, Rainelle Krause is the Queen of the Night, Hugh Russell is Papageno, and Hidenori Inoue is Sarastro. Keitaro Harada (Carmen, Pagliacci) returns to conduct, and Frances Rabalais makes her NCO debut as director.