Seattle Opera’s “Magic Flute” (It’s about the costumes, stupid!)

With all the hype and great critical press surrounding Seattle Opera’s “Magic Flute”, I attended a performance on Friday May 20th and realized how foolish I was. No, not because I had paid almost $200 to witness a performance that was, at best, the musical quality of a small provincial theater in Germany, but that I had actually expected to be transported by being present at a performance of one of the most uplifting and musically satisfying operas in the standard repertoire. Instead, I felt the same as a contributor to the “Seattle Gay Scene” who wrote, “I didn’t leave McCaw Hall last Sunday with much joy in my heart”. But I now know that if I had paid more attention to my own blog, I would have realized that the days of opera, as I have known it, are a thing of the past. Today it’s about the costumes, stupid.

And, indeed, the costumes for Seattle Opera’s Magic Flute were spectacular. So much so that intelligent and sophisticated people mistook a cross between Cirque de Soleil and San Francisco’s Beach Blanket Babylon for “Grand Opera”. Never mind that the singers, with a few exceptions, were not up to their roles. In fact, Sarastro and Papageno were actually wearing head mics (You’ve got to hand it to Seattle Opera for being on the cutting edge). Actually in the case of Sarastro it would have been better if he had not, because the mic made it clear that he did not have the low notes needed to sing the role.

But the costumes WERE spectacular. So spectacular that the animals that appeared, (more times than is usual and not necessarily in the plot) received more applause at the end of the opera than did the leads (perhaps I should give more credit to our Seattle audiences than I have). I might add that they were so amusing that the chuckles from the audience nearly drowned out the singing (I wonder if that was Mozart’s intent?). The previously quoted contributor to the “SGS” wrote at the end of his posting, “Their (Seattle Opera) “Flute” has it’s own charms and delights and is worth experiencing on it’s own merits. I just wish they’d maybe spent a bit less on hiring Zandra Rhodes (costume designer) and used some of that money on a better set and more interesting staging….” I agree, with most of what he states, but what really were the merits of this production?

I tried to figure out what else was meritorious, especially since this production was so widely hailed in the press. Clearly Mozart wrote a wonderful score for this opera (or singspiel if you prefer), but the way Maestro Wedow raced his orchestra along robbed us of all the real charm that should be present in any reading of “Magic Flute”. This was especially true in the case of the Three Spirits who sang the notes without any phrasing or feeling. It also would have helped if they had been on pitch. I know it is not nice to criticize school children, and in fact I don’t blame them, but rather those musically in charge, for not correcting the glaring pitch problems. I assume they are good diligent singers who could follow proper coaching. If they could not sing on pitch, then they should have been replaced and if no one could be found able to sing the roles, perhaps the choice of operas was a mistake (I guess the same could be said for a lot of Seattle Opera’s performances). Have I mentioned that I feel Seattle Opera needs a music director? I think those in charge were more concerned with the Three Spirits’ ability to ride scooters, blow bubbles or just wave and look cute, than to sing on pitch. Oh yes, they wore great, shiny silver “lederhosen”. Stupid me!

How stupid am I? Well for starters, I never realized that “Magic Flute” was a comic opera. I know there is a comic quality to Papageno and Papagena but many operas include a comic character or two without being classified as comic operas (Boheme, Hoffman, Cosi, and Entfuhrung come quickly to mind), but I never realized that it was actually a slap-stick Marx Brothers style comedy.

Although I have seen many “Magic Flute” productions and have participated in a few myself, I was stupid enough to think that “Magic Flute”, more than almost any other opera, had a great moral to teach; the triumph of good over evil (day and night) and the universality of brotherly love (Sarastro’s Order). I was even stupid, or naive enough, to think that Papagano was a foil for Tamino. Tamino a prince and Papageno a simple character, both share a common right to love and dignity. I was clearly mistaken on both counts.

This production makes it clear that Papageno is simply a buffoon and Leigh Melrose played this so successfully that towards the end of the opera, when Papageno threatens to hang himself if Papagena does not appear, which has a bit of humor included (I always felt that it added to the poignancy), the audience got into the act and shouted out eins, zwei, drei randomly. I have never experienced anything like it in any opera house before, and Seattle Opera and Leigh Melrose certainly deserve a great deal of credit for producing this theatrical happening. Maybe they should consider taking out the front few rows of seats and creating a “mosh pit”.

And secondly, my great moral theory doesn’t hold up either. Toward the end of the opera, Tamino and Pamina after going through fire and water (the requirements for entrance into Sarastro’s order) reject Sarastro’s offer of admittance. Incidentally, this is not how the opera usually ends, but rather another improvement to the plot that Seattle Opera has ingeniously come up with (what a shame Mozart is not alive to experience it). One does wonder, however, why Tamino bothers to go through all the trials in the first place (it appears not all princes are rocket scientists), but if he didn’t, it would have been a very short evening. Perhaps a better name for this opera would have been, “What I Did For Love”.

There are several other oddities that I am still in a quandary about. Since “Magic Flute” is a singspiel (meaning there is a lot of spoken dialogue), and the opera is translated via supertitles anyway, why didn’t the characters just simply speak the dialogue in English. I am bright enough to know that it is always better to sing an opera in the language in which it was composed, but spoken dialogue is another matter.

Also, Tamino and Papageno are each given musical objects (usually instruments; I will explain shortly). Tamino receives a magic flute; hence the name of the opera. This would lead one to believe that this is an important prop. Thanks to the wisdom of modern opera directors, we now have supertitles to tell us exactly what is being said/or sung in that strange language on stage. Why then would Tamino have a metal flute when Pamina tells us how her father carved that very same flute from a solid piece of wood. He must have been a “Magic Carver”. Papageno is given a music box (?): the type young girls have, with ballerinas that twirl around when you open them. This, I believe, is simply so the stage director could show a cameo of Papagena twirling around (ballerina in music box) right before she finally appears. However, in every performance I have ever seen, he is given a form of glockenspiel, which is composed of little bells on a pole that tinkle when shaken. The libretto reads “silber glockchen”, which means silver bells(not music box: “Komm, du schönes Glockenspiel, Laß die Glöckchen klingen…”). Why do we need to read the words of the libretto when they don’t match what is happening on stage. I guess they didn’t have music boxes in Mozart’s time(?).



Never mind the singers, plot, artistic style, conductor or composers intentions. THE COSTUMES WERE SPECTACULAR. What more does one really need?

I used to believe that opera was about great music sung beautifully by well trained singers who along with the orchestra and conductor transform a composer’s music and ideas into a magical, thrilling art form. I believed that names such as Bergonzi, Tebaldi, Pinza, Toscanini etc.….created a special musical excitement that enriched the soul and lifted the spirit, and I hoped that in some small way I could help continue that tradition. The critical acclaim and audience response given Seattle Opera’s “Magic Flute” has shown me the depth of my folly.

It’s about the costumes, stupid!