Janos Gereben <[log in to unmask]> wrote: From the Met -

>New York, NY (February 13, 2006) - In the first significant
>creative collaboration of its kind between Lincoln Center sister
>organizations, The Metropolitan Opera and Lincoln Center Theater
>have joined forces on a groundbreaking opera commissioning program
>to foster the creation of new works to be produced at their
>respective theaters.

I predict, in spite of the high-profile talent, that not one significant
opera will be produced (leaving aside John Adams) that will break into
even the ghetto-rep that is modern opera.  It's a fairly safe prediction.

I just don't see any striking theatrical composing talent out there -
Adams and Sondheim excepted.  Jake Heggie has always struck me as a
lyric, rather than dramatic composer, better at songs than at opera -
even Dead Man Walking.  Same goes for Torke.  Wynton Marsalis wouldn't
know a workable libretto if it kicked his butt.  Rufus Wainwright is far
too Sensitive (and too uninteresting a composer).  The Met usually screws
up its Modern productions anyway.  The country as a whole has very little
idea what modern opera is these days, since so little of it is done.  I
see the whole project headed for a fizzle.

After it's all over, the Met will congratulate itself on its daring and
not do anything like that again for another 70 years, and I'll get to
hear yet again how modern composers don't know how to write a tune.

Steve Schwartz, cranky