The Tender Plant of Love

The Magic Flute has always fascinated him: as a child, Julian Prégardien grew up in a musical family, got to know Tamino through his father, the great tenor Christoph Prégardien, and later sang one of the three boys. At the age of 18, he was offered his first Tamino role, which he turned down, and at the age of 25, he was ready for the role in Frankfurt. Since then, he has often interpreted the role internationally, just as his name is synonymous worldwide with subtle, musical and deeply moving evenings that show the life-changing power of music. Before his state opera debut in the new Magic Flute, Oliver Láng spoke to the tenor about Tamino's vulnerability, spontaneous love and why the Magic Flute conveys a vision of hope for a better world.

Do you appreciate the rehearsal process in the course of a new opera production? Trying things out? Coming together? Concretizing?

Julian Prégardien: In opera, absolutely! I find it very beautiful, this exploration of possibilities. Finding the physicality of characters. Discovering several levels of interpretation. And exchanging ideas about it. Because what goes on in my character has a big influence on everyone else involved. That's why rehearsals are important, exciting, exhausting and simply part of the journey. So that in the end we can bring something to the stage together that, if possible, is still not too concrete.

The not-too-concrete: does that refer to interpretative statements that are made? That you don't want to say that Tamino is a bank clerk for me and thinks this way and that way, but that you want to give yourself and the audience freedom in the theatrical experience?

To give you a concrete example: We worked on the speech scene for the first time this morning. There are sentences that can be interpreted in this or that direction - both emotionally and in terms of content. And that's exactly what the theater offers a space for. Even if we repeat the same dialog over and over again in numerous performances, we can give space to different facets on different evenings. This even applies to intermissions! Their length, whether it is an absolute pause or a process: that can vary. So there is an idea of a direction, but no one hundred percent plan. I refuse to be too specific.

When Tamino asks himself in the "Portrait Aria" what he would actually do when he finally comes face to face with Pamina and ends up in a general pause - is this pause a reflection on his part? So: "What would I do?" Or is he terrified at the thought of seeing her?

That is exactly the question! And I want to leave it open so that I can look at it anew every evening: What is my reaction to this question today? Is it really love now? Am I afraid of love? Am I curious about love? This new feeling - has anyone ever told me about it? Has it been kept away from me? And so on... Or when Tamino sings: "O eternal night" -
a great, intimate moment. My God, what meanings and fears can be attached to that! But you don't have to. You can also sing these four notes as beautifully as you can and then leave it up to the audience to decide what they mean. That's also part of the task, that we don't over-interpret and thus prescribe interpretations. Instead, there is someone sitting in the audience who interprets something for themselves and discovers something for themselves. Basically, that is the much greater task of theater.

Tamino falls in love with a painting. Is this simply a theater mechanic being used so that the plot can continue? Are you allowed to make fun of it? Or are you simply playing this moment with all your might to make it believable?

The portrait itself is just a placeholder. In truth, it is about an extraordinary, precious, sacred moment of recognition, of love. I would like to be so naïve and also so personal and say: I have experienced this moment several times, seeing someone just once and then falling in love. So much happens in Tamino at this moment. Perhaps he thinks to himself: I've never felt anything like this before! Or he asks himself: What fascinates me about this person? At this point, it is already about the great theme, the meta-level of The Magic Flute: love. What does Pamina say? "Love guides me!" Isn't that a wonderfully visionary statement about the quality of love? Or even a vision of an ideal world? A vision of a world led by women!

"We should have the courage to talk more often about what great potential there is in people. We've been talking about the difficulties all the time in the history of mankind anyway."

This is in contrast to misogynistic statements by Sarastro & Co.

It is often said that The Magic Flute is misogynistic. I maintain the opposite! Because it actually shows the weaknesses of men: The hero faints, Papageno makes crude remarks, the narrator, Sarastro and the harnessed men are an absurd satire of macho men. Not a pretty picture we see there!