Die Zauberflöte (The Magic Flute): Overture

There are no waltzes or polkas in The Magic Flute. It is too early for that. It does, however, have a direct link with Viennese operetta since it was first performed in 1791 at the same theatre - the popular Theater auf der Wieden or, as it later became, the Theater and der Wien - where composers like Franz von Suppé, Johann Strauss and Franz Lehár were to enjoy some of their most spectacular successes. While the opera has its solemn side, based to some extent on masonic ritual (both Mozart and his librettist Emanuel Schikaneder were Freemasons) it is also a frankly popular theatrical entertainment. In the Overture the solemn side is represented by the slow introduction, beginning with three sonorous chords that are to be heard again half-way through. Much the larger part, however, is devoted to the bustling little theme which is introduced by violins as the tempo changes from Adagio to Allegro and which is to be involved in a breathtakingly brilliant series of adventures both before and after the intervention of those three solemn chords.