Amahl and the Night Visitors

I'll be honest, Menotti is not my favorite composer. I've seen a production of "The Old Maid and the Thief", which struck me as inane (though not as inane as "The Barber of Seville") and I own a copy of "The Medium" (the mezzo on the cover of the linked recording, Joyce Castle, was my wife's voice teacher while she was earning her doctrate) which does little to move me.

Yet I find myself really liking "Amahl and the Night Visitors" despite the bitchiness of Amahl's mother and the preposterous aria "This is my Box". The first Christmas television special to become a traditional favorite, it aired on Christmas eve from 1951 to 1956 on NBC. A far cry from "Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer" and "Nestor the Long Eared Christmas Donkey!"