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Hans Pfitzner is all but forgotten in the United States, but his operas are still performed in Europe, and you've already heard one of his works on the Sunday Opera during Christmases past - "Das Christ-Elflein." This week, we're looking at his most successful opera, "Palestrina" which is loosely based on the life and musical importance of the 16th century Italian composer who ensured the use of polyphonic music in the Catholic church.
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Most people know Meyerbeer's "Les Huguenots," but today's opera is another based on historical 'fact" in his 1849 work "Les Prophete" which centers on the Dutch Anabaptist revolt and the turmoil surrounding John of Leiden and his power grab in declaring himself "Emperor" of Munster with all of the tragedy that follows.
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This week's opera is Korngold's 1927 allegorical opera about Heliane, the wife of a tyrant who finds a love that magically overthrows her husband and teleports her to a new life.
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The Sunday Opera: Anton Urspruch's "Das Unmoglichste von Allem" ("The Most Impossible Thing of All")This week's program is a long-forgotten 1897 opera "Das Unmoglichste von Allem" ("The Most Impossible Thing of All") by a sadly forgotten late-Romantic era German composer, Anton Urspruch.
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We're heading back to the NCPA for a visiting production by the Bayreuth Opera and Wagner's "The Flying Dutchman." We'll continue our trip to the sea after the opera with a one-act opera by Ralph Vaughan Williams based on Synge's "Riders to the Sea" as well as a few other works including a brilliantly irreverent adaption of the "Dutchman" overture by Paul Hindemith entitled "Overture to the Flying Dutchman as Played at Sight by a Second-Rate Spa Orchestra at the Village Well at 7 o'Clock in the Morning."
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As a part of our Fall Membership Campaign, David Osenberg will be joining host Michael Kownacky this week for a live program sampling operas and performances in various languages.
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We're in Beijing for this week's Sunday Opera and Richard Wagner's fabled battle of sacred and profane love, "Tannhauser." After the opera, we'll have music by Siegfried Wagner to fill out the afternoon.
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Our first of two operas from the Vienna State Opera is Beethoven's 1814 first and only opera "Fidelio" about a courageous woman's plight to save her falsely imprisoned husband by pretending to be a young man.
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Today's opera features a lesser-known comedy by Richard Strauss: “Die schweigsame Frau” (The Silent Woman)