Wagner - Die Meistersinger von Nurnberg / Mackerras, Doese, McIntyre, Opera Australia
Die Meistersinger von Nürnbergis Wagner's only comedy, a Wagner  opera that will appeal to many who don't usually care for Wagner operas. It is handsomely staged by the Australian Opera in a witty, musically polished interpretation. The characters (medieval German  bourgeois craftsmen and artists) are recognizable types you might still see today: three-dimensional, warm, funny. Except for the villainous Beckmesser  (Wagner's caricature of the music critic Hanslick), the people inDie  Meistersingerare relatively free of the kind of  obsessions that haunt so many characters in other Wagner operas.This is, among other things, an opera about the nature of music, and it gives the composer opportunities, which he uses brilliantly, to show off his technical mastery. Conductor Charles Mackerras and a well-chosen cast, including Helen Doese, Donald  McIntyre, Paul Frey, and John Pringle, meet the music's challenges effectively, though there are some signs of vocal fatigue in the last act.--Joe McLellan