Hong Kong music lovers will have the chance next month to be enthralled by the sumptuous melodies of a great opera classic.
For five nights from November 5 to 9, the Hong Kong Cultural Centre will stage a lavish performance of The Magic Flute (Die Zauberflote) in collaboration with Opera Hong Kong, the National Centre for the Performing Arts and Norway's Den Norske Opera & Ballett.
Headlined by a renowned international cast, the Hong Kong production, performed in German with Chinese and English subtitles, will feature Chinese soprano sensation Huang Ying and American tenors Bruce Sledge and Eric Margiore among others.
Overseeing the production is Warren Mok, the internationally acclaimed Hong Kong tenor who founded Opera Hong Kong in 2003 with a view to promoting classical music in the city and encouraging local talent.
In charge of direction is Paul Curran, the artistic director of Den Norske Opera. The performance will be conducted by Jari Hamalainen, whose extensive operatic repertoire encompasses several dozen masterpieces from Beethoven's Fidelio and Verdi's Don Carlo to Puccini's Tosca and Hindemith's Cardillac.
A musical masterpiece that Mozart completed just before his death in 1791, the great Austrian composer's last and best-known opera has been a favourite with opera lovers ever since.
Based on a libretto by the singer-poet Emanuel Schikaneder, The Magic Flute is set in a fairy-tale land and recounts an archetypal hero's quest replete with ordeals that Prince Tamino needs to overcome in order to win the hand of his beloved Pamina.