Photos: Merola Brings Mozart's DIE ZAUBERFLÖTE to Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, August 4 & 6

Merola Opera Program continues its 2022 season with a fully staged production of Mozart's Die Zauberflöte (The Magic Flute), giving the public the opportunity to see Merola's exciting 2022 participants performing full operatic roles, conducted by Kelly Kuo, Associate Director of American Lyric Theatre and Music Director of the Reno Chamber Orchestra.

Taking the form of a singspiel, a comic opera with spoken dialogue, Die Zauberflöte evokes intimacy, mysticism, and wit-with a dollop of humor-set to musical brilliance. Director Gina Lapinski directs this production, bringing the work's colorful characters to life-from a handsome young prince to a silly bird-catching sidekick and the mysterious Queen of the Night. Lapinski has been a stage director for the Metropolitan Opera for more than two decades. The production will feature the groundbreaking costumes created by Dame Zandra Rhodes for San Diego Opera, in a vivid setting brought to life with projections by award-winning designer Ian Winters, enhancing the setting by designer Stephen D. Mazzeno. Die Zauberflöte will be presented at 7:30pm, Thursday, August 4 & 3:00pm, Saturday, August 6 at the Blue Shield of California Theatre at YBCA, 700 Howard St., San Francisco. For more information or to purchase tickets ($55/$80 plus $1 per ticket facility fee), the public may visit www.merola.org/calendar.

Mozart's final opera, Die Zauberflöte premiered at Vienna's Freihaus-Theater auf der Wieden in September 1791, just two months before the brilliant composer's death. Its popularity was such that it received its 100thperformance just a year later, in November 1792. Since then, Die Zauberflöte has been performed in nearly every country of Europe and throughout the world. Featuring a libretto by Mozart's close colleague Emanuel Schikaneder, this work remains a staple of today's opera repertory. Last performed by the Merola Opera Program in 1998, the company returns with a marvelous, family-friendly production of this beloved work.

The young artists featured in Die Zauberflöte include: soprano Chelsea Lehnea as Pamina, tenor Sahel Salam as Tamino, baritone Scott Lee as Papageno, bass Edwin Jhamaal Davis as Sarastro, soprano Maggie Kinabrew as the Queen of the Night, tenor Chance Jonas-O'Toole as Monostatos, soprano Adia Evans as the First Lady, mezzo-soprano Erin Wagner as the Second Lady, mezzo-soprano Veena Akama Makia as the Third Lady, bass-baritone Le Bu as the Speaker, soprano Ashley Marie Robillard as Papagena, soprano Olivia Prendergast as the First Spirit, countertenor Cody Bowers as the Second Spirit, mezzo-soprano Maggie Reneé as the Third Spirit, tenor Daniel Luis Espinal as the First Priest, baritone Andres Cascante as the Second Priest, tenor Moisés Salazar as the First Armored Man, and bass-baritoneSeungyun Kim as the Second Armored Man.

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