Metropolitan Opera Archives

Translation by Ruth and Thomas Martin
Die Zauberflöte received eight performances this season.

FUNDING:
Production a gift of The Metropolitan Opera Guild

Review 1:

Review by Virgil Thomson in the New York Herald Tribune

The evening as a whole was one of the most delightful I have spent at the Thirty-Ninth Street emporium of music in many years. The first cause of this pleasure was Bruno Walter. He paced the work so rightly, speeded it so justly, and balanced its sonorities so clearly that one was unaware that there was any conductor at all. The whole thing sprang as music full born and rounded. Rarely have I heard an opera so unmaimed. The second reason was the scenery and costumes of Mr. Richard Rychtarik. Though not strikingly original or powerful in themselves, they were dignified, fanciful, tasty. The stage direction was pleasing too, and the scene shifting, so often a dragger-out of this work, was as expeditious as anyone might wish. Shipshapeness was the note of the evening. The English text of Ruth and Thomas P. Martin was highly satisfactory.

Rarely have I been so sorry to leave a performance. From its beginning until eleven-fifteen it was lively and sensible. It was not a display of fine vocalism, for the most part; but it was at all times musically interesting and never dull to watch. Moreover, care for production detail, as well as musical, had given it a general harmony and integrity that are not easy qualities to achieve in a repertory theater. I may add that I have noted with pleasure the presence of these qualities in the Metropolitan's productions quite regularly this season. Someone is taking care.

Search by season: 1941-42

Search by title: Die Zauberflöte,

Met careers