The Met's abridged Magic Flute

The Met's abridged, translated-into-English version of Mozart's The Magic Flute is nice if one wants to see Julie Taymor's fanciful production of Zauberflote without sitting through the full three-hour opera. And there are choice highlights from the score too (notably, the two Queen of the Night arias in full) but other moments are sadly shortened (Pamina's lovely Act 2 aria, for instance) or missing all together (such as the overture, yikes). The Met is marketing this as a family affair, though I'm not sure how many kids would warm to the opera's rather convoluted plot and the fact that you have to read the Met Titles to understand half of what the singers are singing. Nevertheless, there were some good performances to be had today's afternoon matinee today. Nicole Cabbell made her Met debut this afternooon as Pamina (I saw her full Pamina with Opera Pacific last year, lovely performance), and Cyndia Sieden was a fine Queen of the Night. I had a good enough time hearing many of the Mozart tunes and watching Taymor's production live. (And I went seat shopping for future performances, too!)