Agility (Puzzle No. 3,356)

I think I’m going to add a puzzle characteristic called “agility” for the weekly The Nation puzzle. This week’s puzzle is a good example. It has several clues that are better tackled with creative thinking than by grinding out the indicator and the fodder. Hot and Trazom enjoy the “play” aspect of wordplay, and construct puzzles so that you can too.

Link to puzzle: http://www.thenation.com/article/199041/puzzle-no-3356

Degree of difficulty (by standards of this weekly puzzle): moderate (though it will be hard if you are trying to solve by brute force)

Agility quotient: high

Hozom’s comment: “Notes from the Opera,” in which Trazom (who is a music critic when he’s not constructing puzzles) shares how Wagner’s Die Meistersinger is an inspiration.

What about it, solvers: do you have some musical muse?  Music to solve by?