Tag Archives: Loren Elstein

Magic Flute, Welsh National Opera, March 2023

Posted on 20 March 2023

Mozart’s final opera, Die Zauberflöte (The Magic Flute) is a masterpiece. It sets the realm of night and obscurantism against that of daylight and rational thinking. These opposing worlds are ruled by the Queen of the Night, and Sarastro, named after the great Iranian prophet Zoroaster. Sadly the depth of this opera is lost in …

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Pia de’ Tolomei, English Touring Opera, ETO, Hackney Empire, March 2016

Posted on 11 March 2016

While working on the Siege of Calais, performed by the ETO this time last year, Donizetti and his librettist wanted to duplicate their great success with Lucia di Lammermoor. Casting around for another gentle and loving heroine, whose death would evoke huge pathos, they settled on Pia de’ Tolomei from Dante’s Purgatorio, and in James …

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