Opera Scotland

Zauberflöte 1985Scottish Opera

Read more about the opera Magic Flute

The first revival of Jonathan Miller's interesting Flute concept was directed by Keith Warner in his first work for the company. Apart from Benjamin Luxon's Papageno, most of the principals were new. Robin Leggate and Rosa Mannion as Tamino and Pamina were particularly good. The Sarastro was a good Dutch bass, Pieter van den Berg, returning for the first time since the 1975 Ballo. The Queen, from America, Charlène Cella, was making her British debut.

At least in early performances, there was perhaps a slight hesitation in co-ordination between stage and pit - a Flute performance can suffer badly when there are gaps between dialogue and music.

 

Scottish Opera's Season -  1985/86

Scottish Opera's 1985/86 season consisted of ten operas. The company's new productions ranged through Mozart (The Marriage of Figaro), Weber (Oberon), Verdi (Il trovatore), Offenbach (La Vie parisienne) and Weill (The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny). The previous season's Orlando had further performances outside Glasgow, while the revivals were The Magic Flute, Werther, Tosca and The Turn of the Screw.  For Christmas there was a revival of Fiddler on the Roof.  In the spring there was a medium-scale tour of Tales of Hoffmann. The small-scall Opera-Go-Round tour in the autumn took the form of a new (and very different) staging of Tosca.