Met Live season concludes Saturday

Live at the Met, the Metropolitan Opera's award-winning series of live, high definition (HD) opera transmissions to theaters around the world, concludes its 2022-23 season at the 1891 Fredonia Opera House Performing Arts Center on Saturday at 1 p.m., with Wolfgang Mozart's Die Zauberflote.

The production was broadcast live on Saturday, June 3, but the Opera House did not present it due to a conflict with its annual Bach Festival fund-raiser. Instead, it will be presented on June 17.

One of opera's most beloved works receives its first new Met staging in 19 years - a daring vision by renowned English director Simon McBurney that The Wall Street Journal declared "the best production I've ever witnessed of Mozart's opera."

Nathalie Stutzmann conducts the Met Orchestra, with the pit raised to make the musicians visible to the audience and allow interaction with the cast. In his Met-debut staging, McBurney lets loose a volley of theatrical flourishes, incorporating projections, sound effects, and acrobatics to match the spectacle and drama of Mozart's fable. The brilliant cast includes soprano Erin Morley as Pamina, tenor Lawrence Brownlee as Tamino, baritone Thomas Oliemans in his Met debut as Papageno, and soprano Kathryn Lewek as the Queen of the Night.

Sung in German with English subtitles, this production runs three hours, 30 minutes with one intermission.

Live at the Met is underwritten with support from Daniel S. Kaufman and Timothy W. Beaver.

Individual tickets to each of the operas in the Live at the Met season are $20, ($18 Opera House members, $10 students). A flexible subscription of eight tickets which can be used however you want - one at a time to eight different operas, all at once for eight people, or anything in between - is available for $142. Tickets may be purchased in person at the Opera House Box Office or by phone at 716-679-1891, Tuesday-Friday, 12-4:30 p.m. Tickets may be purchased online anytime at www.fredopera.org.

The Opera House is equipped with assistive listening headsets for the hearing-impaired. Simply request one from any usher or Opera House staff member.

The 1891 Fredonia Opera House Performing Arts Center is a member-supported not-for-profit performing arts center with a mission to "present the performing arts for the benefit of our community and region ... providing access to artistic diversity ... and high quality programming at an affordable price." It is located in Village Hall in downtown Fredonia. For a complete schedule of events, visit www.fredopera.org.