OA1024: Dream City and the Magic Knight (DVD)

Victor Herbert’s Dream City and The Magic Knight
(The Ohio Light Opera, 2014 Summer Festival – DVD)

“A hit from start to finish,” “A new type of popular entertainment,” “A lift or two higher than anything of the kind.” These words, from the New York Times opening-night review of Victor Herbert’s Dream City and The Magic Knight, only begin to capture the ecstatic response of the press to one of the most remarkable shows to grace the early-20th-century Broadway stage. Herbert’s score is a revelatory amalgam of diverse musical styles: ragtime, vaudeville, country music, operetta, opera, and music hall. His 31-minute spoof of Wagner’s Lohengrin is masterful … and absolutely hilarious.