On 8 Feb 2005 at 19:38, Mark D Lew wrote: > On Feb 8, 2005, at 6:05 PM, David W. Fenton wrote: > > > No one is a bigger fan of Mozart than I am. But I have always felt > > that the Magic Flute is incoherent *as an opera* (or Singspiel, > > technically speaking, I guess). If it did not have some of the most > > glorious music ever written, it would be a failure. But so far as I > > can tell, it's really just a string of great tunes held together by > > a rather incomprehensible narrative. That's not great opera, though > > it may very well include some of the greatest music ever written. > > I'm actually not a big fan of Magic Flute, but I think its greatness > is undeniable in spite of my own taste. I was arguing the case that > that greatness is not dependent on understanding the Masonic > symbolism. And yes, I think it does work *as an opera*.
Well, if you don't require understandable character motivations, or any kind of explanation of why the characters go through the events they experience, then I guess you can get by without knowing the Masonic symbolism. But I don't consider that to be viable as opera *by itself*. Can one enjoy The Magic Flute without knowing about the Masonic background? Sure! One can enjoy any kind of nonsense for any personal reasons whatsoever -- it's called personal taste. But that's a very personal, individual response, based on what one brings to the work, not what happens to be in the work itself. Which is fine, but I don't think The Magic Flute stands alone as coherent without the outside information. I think it would be a stronger, more accessible piece if it were not dependent on that outside information for explaining why things happen the way they do. -- David W. Fenton http://www.bway.net/~dfenton David Fenton Associates http://www.bway.net/~dfassoc _______________________________________________ Finale mailing list [email protected] http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
