NEW OPERA VIEWS UNDERBELLY OF GOLD RUSH – John Adams’ Moving Premiere, Warts and All
In this his fourth opera, composer John Adams reminds me of a football game that is 0-0 at the half, but ends up in a furious 42-41 score. Given major revisions for act one, this could become the resounding opera of our times. Adams’ brutally candid historical opera premiere retells the California Gold Rush miners’ days, this time with accounts of hardship, poverty, mob violence, lynchings and racial prejudice. Whether or not he truly struck gold here, once again he…