Hansel & Gretel -- MetHD

[SandyMcKean]

Does anyone know the facts here......

I plan to see Hansel & Gretel tomorrow (Saturday) in the cinema.  I am on the west coast.  Normally these performances start at 10am since they are live and the MET matinee in NYC starts at 1pm.  However, Hansel & Gretel is scheduled to start at 1pm both here on the west coast and in NYC.  I've checked several theaters in the Seattle area and they all say 1pm....but that does seem possible. (BTW, all other MET cinema performances for the rest of the season are scheduled for 10am as per normal; only Hansel & Gretel is at 1pm.)

[dirac]

Hi, Sandy,  good to hear from you. I hope someone can answer your question.

[Helene]

Hansel and Gretel is a holiday encore, and it is playing at 12:55pm in each time zone.

The matinee scheduled for tomorrow is The Magic Flute/English version (abridged), and it starts at 12:30pm EST, 9:30am PST, and can be heard on tomorrow's Saturday broadcast.  I know that plays on KING.FM in Seattle.

[SandyMcKean]

Thanks for the replies.

Well, I went to my local theater at 1pm and sure enough Hansel & Gretel did play at that time. As Helene implied, this performance seems to have been outside the normal MetHD process.....some sort of holiday presentation. It was abbreviated since almost all the between-acts interviews were cut, and indeed the entire intermission was cut. The 2017/2018 on-stage performances of Hansel & Gretel don't start until 12/18, and according to the synopsis, this cinema presentation I saw yesterday was a recording from 1/1/08 (Cootes & Schaefer)

I'd never seen Hansel & Gretel before, but always wanted to. Frankly, I was disappointed.  Probably just me (I was hang over from a wild party the night before ). In particular, I found the "food thing" over done. I was hoping to love the music given that Humperdinck's music is so closely related to Wagner (who is at the top in my pantheon), but I didn't.  Lots of great colors in the orchestra as one might expect given the Wagnerian influence, but somehow the music left me flat emotionally.

I think I was just having a bad day.........

[Birdsall]

The Met’s current production is sort of macabre if I remember. It is not a traditional version at all. And although I find the music nice it is never an opera I crave or long to see or hear again when in the mood to listen to opera.