Opera

Mozart's The Magic Flute

Barbe & Doucet (direction and design), Ryan Wigglesworth (conductor) – With David Portillo, Esther Dierkes, Marta Fontanals-Simmons...

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Cast

Renaud Doucet — Stage director

André Barbe — Set designer, costume designer

Patrick Martel — Puppet Designer

Guy Simard — Lighting designer

Kathleen Stakenas — Assistant director

Donna Stirrup — Assistant director

Caroline Wettergreen — Queen of the Night

Brindley Sherratt — Sarastro

David Portillo — Tamino

Sofia Fomina — Pamina

Björn Bürger — Papageno

Alison Rose — Papagena

Esther Dierkes — First Lady

Marta Fontanals-Simmons — Second Lady

Katharina Magiera — Third Lady

Jörg Schneider — Monostatos

Michael Kraus — Speaker

Program notes

Think you’ve already seen The Magic Flute? You haven't really seen it until you've seen the version of the explosive duo Barbe & Doucet, who invite us to what they call a “huge musical comedy”. At the Glyndebourne Festival under the direction of Ryan Wigglesworth, experience one of Mozart's most popular works in an ambitious production with “eleven sets and two years of preparation”. 

Completed just months before its composer's untimely death at age 35, the Singspiel draws heavily on the codes of Freemasonry, of which Mozart was a member. As part of the search for his love Pamina, Prince Tamino undergoes different tests that lead him toward truth and away from the darkness of ignorance. In the words of Hegel, “The Kingdom of the Night, the Queen, the Kingdom of the Sun, the Mysteries, the Initiations, Wisdom, Love, the Tests, along with a kind of moral middle ground, which in its generality is excellent, all of that, combined with the depth, enchanting grace, and soul of this music, stretch and satisfy the imagination, and warm the heart”.

Photo: La Flute enchantée © Glyndebourne Productions Ltd. Photo Bill Cooper

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