The Thieving Magpie is a serious piece, and quite long - the list of musical numbers indicates that it was more abbreviated than we would expect nowadays. But then neither would we expect the opera to be followed by a short concert of arias and duets by other composers, a comic song, and finally a farce Free and Easy, performed by the local theatre's resident company.
Miss Waters is described as a pupil of Signor de Begnis, and her character, Lucia, is here described as Fabrizio's daughter, rather than his wife. Perhaps she was too young and attractive to play the hero's mother.
The details of this performance by the De Begnis troupe in Glasgow are from a playbill in the Farmer Collection at the Glasgow University Special Theatre Collection.
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