Not written for a while...

But I have not forgotten about this blog.  We have been working on the wonderful and exciting story of the Magic Flute, and now we are beginning to create our own opera stories.  My opera story is included in this blog from early September, and they can use that one as an example of a more realistic opera story.  They can also use the fantasy of The Magic Flute to help them with this endeavor.  I have learned a little more about the story since my students had to create questions about The Magic Flute.  I found out the the queen of the night represents the idea of chaos and also a form of "obscurantism"(Definition of Obscurantism )and Sarastro represents the enlightened sovereign who rules based upon reason, wisdom, and nature.

At the beginning of the opera there is a serpent who is killed by the Queen's attendants.  The serpent represents chaos, which progresses into religious superstition (the three attendants to the queen), and then to rationalistic enlightenment (Sarastro and the priests)  through trial (Tamino) and error (Papageno), in order for the world to be "a heavenly Kingdom and mortals like the gods".  There is more philosophy in this opera than I ever knew or expected, and as happens every time I teach something, I learn something new about it all.  music of Mozart, his biography and the plot!

I am continuing to work with the gradual release of responsibility with my students.  I tell them to look at the examples we have seen of interesting opera stories.  I ask them who the main characters are and how would we describe them.  Then they can figure out how to make up characters of their own.  We talk about the basic plot of the opera, and what the setting is, the conflict, the rising action, the climax and the resolution, and then they can create sections of an opera with those elements on their own.  A few students have used Lucidchart to organize their thoughts, and I have used it very successfully on my own opera.  An old fashioned outline works just as well, of course, but you must flesh out the story once you have completed your outline.  Happy composing and libretto writing!  Have a great day!