Met’s family-friendly Magic Flute vanquishes the forces of darkness

By Linda Holt, 16 December 2019

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“a unified and glorious production whose proportions and craft the Masons themselves would applaud”

Reviewed at Lincoln Center: Metropolitan Opera House, New York City on 15 December 2019

Mozart, Die Zauberflöte (The Magic Flute) (Sung in English)

Metropolitan Opera

Lothar Koenigs, Conductor

Julie Taymor, Director, Costume Designer, Puppet designs

George Tsypin, Set Designer

Joélle Harvey, Pamina

David Portillo, Tamino

Kathryn Lewek, Queen of the Night

Joshua Hopkins, Papageno

Morris Robinson, Sarastro

Patrick Carfizzi, The Speaker (Der Sprecher)

Rodell Rosel, Monostatos

Ashley Emerson, Papagena

Donald Holder, Lighting Designer

Mark Dendy, Choreography

The Metropolitan Opera Chorus

The Metropolitan Opera Orchestra

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Linda Holt

Linda Holt writes about classical music for broadstreetreview.com and newyorkclassicalreview.com, with a special interest in the life and works of Beethoven. She has a doctorate in arts-and-letters from Drew University (U.S.), studied music theory and history at Rider University, and teaches humanities courses. She is president of the Princeton Research Forum ( princetonresearchforum.org ) and member of the Philadelphia Classical Guitar Society and American Beethoven Society. As L.L. Holt, she is the author of two acclaimed novels based on Beethoven’s early years: Invictus (Harvard Square Editions, 2019) and The Black Spaniard (Unsolicited Press, 2016).