A Pocket Magic Flute reimagines Mozart’s masterpiece in an animated, pan-African world. A diverse team of artists from around the country and around the world contributed their unique talents to create this never-before-seen experience. Featuring an all-Black cast of opera singers and actors, A Pocket Magic Flute transforms the mystical journey of Tamino, Pamina, Papageno, and Papagena into a spectacular animated adventure, making this an ideal introduction of opera to children, especially children of Color. The primary project team consists of Pocket Opera, the Gibbs Sisters, San Francisco State University, and the Lorraine Hansberry Theatre.

About the Producers

Pocket Opera is a chamber opera company in San Francisco that has been bringing the joy of opera in English to audiences for nearly 50 years. Pocket Opera does four mainstage shows per year and has the largest standing repertoire of any chamber opera company in the country — 90 discrete titles. In 2024, Pocket Opera’s La bohème won the San Francisco Classical Voice Award for Best Opera Production. During COVID, when live performance wasn’t possible, Pocket Opera used its PPP and ERC monies to dive into the digital world by creating a live-action/animated hybrid film, A Pocket Magic Flute. This groundbreaking work has already been shown to nearly 1,000 students from ages 8–12. The Gibbs Sisters were brought on to this production as lead animation producers. Originally from Oakland, California, Shawnee and Shawnelle Gibbs write, produce, and animate professionally. They work on major projects for Cartoon Network and Marvel, to name a few. Proponents of Black representation both onscreen and behind the scenes, they took on this independent project because they believed in the educational value of The Magic Flute, told through an African lens. To assist the professional animators, San Francisco State University (and professor Martha Gorzycki) created a class called Animating Opera. SFSU provides a top education at an affordable price, and the creative talent in their animation department contributed to the piece by animating smaller elements like animals and props. To create the live-action sequences, Pocket Opera teamed as coproducer with the Lorraine Hansberry Theatre, San Francisco’s premier African American theater company. Led by renowned actor/director Margo Hall (recipient of an Opera Grant for Women Stage Directors and Conductors from OPERA America), the Lorraine Hansberry Theatre sourced all of the live-action talent that is seen on the screen.

The Awards for Digital Excellence in Opera are supported by The Joseph and Robert Cornell Memorial Foundation.