Last week’s magnificent WASO opening concert in UWA’s historic Winthrop Hall evoked the Viennese concert halls of old and the festive atmosphere of a New Year’s Concert. It therefore turned out to be a fitting prelude to Friday night’s delightful semi-staged performance of Johann Strauss II’s New Year’s Eve staple Die Fledermaus (The Bat) in the same iconic venue.

When Offenbach aroused in The Waltz King’s heart a desire for new musical conquests in the form of operetta, little did he know he would be midwife to the birth of a masterpiece the enthusiasm for which continues unabated into our own time. Die Fledermaus took flight at its 1874 premiere at Vienna’s Theater an der Wien and since then has flown around the world.

So it comes as no surprise that even in a far-flung former colony not of the Austro-Hungarian but the British Empire one finds The Bat sojourning amid such irreverent yet respectful artistic licence and raucous appreciation. As Andrew Foote writes in his excellent program note:

“To an audience of 1874 Vienna, the characters and plot of Die Fledermaus would have been recognisable as de facto ‘stock’ characters employed in commedia dell’arte, albeit in Viennese form, that poked...