Anthony Davis’s new work at Long Beach Opera has potent music, but it struggles to turn its ripped-from-the-headlines story into satisfying drama.

Nathan Granner as Khorey Wise, Cedric Berry as Yusef Salaam, Orson Van Gay as Raymond Santana, Derrell Acon as Antron McCray and Bernard Holcomb as Kevin Richardson Photo: Keith Ian Polakoff By Heidi Waleson June 18, 2019 5:39 pm ET

San Pedro, Calif.

Stories ripped from the headlines are a relatively recent operatic genre, and Anthony Davis’s “The Central Park Five,” which was commissioned by the Long Beach Opera and had its world premiere at the Warner Grand Theatre on Saturday, demonstrates how difficult they are to pull off. Other media have advantages in this area, and the Ava DuVernay Netflix miniseries “When They See Us,” released on May 31, tells the same story with more nuance and emotional impact.

The tale is harrowing: One spring night in 1989, a young white female jogger was raped, beaten and left for dead in New York’s Central Park. Five black and Latino teenagers—Antron McCray, Yusef Salaam, Raymond Santana, Korey Wise and Kevin Richardson—aged 14 to 16, who had been in the park that night as part of a larger group, were charged in the crime. The case sparked a virulent outcry from the city’s tabloids, which seized on words like “rampaging,” “wolf pack” and “wilding” to fan the flames of racial fear and distrust; the then-real-estate developer Donald Trump loudly called for the return of the death penalty. Although no physical evidence or eyewitness testimony linked them to the crime, the teens were found guilty. The convictions were largely based on videotaped confessions, elicited after hours of interrogation, that the suspects later said were coerced; they maintained their innocence at trial and subsequently. Then, in 2002, Matias Reyes, a convicted serial rapist and murderer, confessed to the crime and said he acted alone. His DNA matched that from the scene of the crime, and the five were exonerated. Each had served between six and 13 years in prison.

In early scenes, Mr. Davis and librettist Richard Wesley sketch the era’s tension between black and white New Yorkers, a toxic environment that played an important role in the case. The music—its potent, jazz-based style intricately meshed with more classical idioms and the occasional hip-hop riff—creates a kind of tapestry into which the voices are woven. However, the technique, while musically effective, is more pictorial than narrative, and often makes the characters seem like symbols rather than people. The zealous District Attorney (Jessica Mamey), Donald Trump (Thomas Segen) and the Masque (Zeffin Quinn Hollis), who represents the world of white detectives, judges, journalists and men-on-the-street, egg each other on to pursue confessions and convictions, no matter what. These three grow increasingly cartoonish and strident over the course of the opera. The five teens (Derrell Acon, Cedric Berry, Orson Van Gay, Nathan Granner and Bernard Holcomb) are presented as a musical and theatrical unit. Two are bass-baritones and three are tenors, adults reliving their ordeal in flashback, but there’s no indication as to who is who, since none of them are named until fairly late in the opera.

Mr. Davis’s music ably captures mood and atmosphere, especially in Act I, when the heavy beat and accelerating pace depict the District Attorney and the Masque steamrolling through the interrogation process: They coerce confessions by lying to the frightened teens about evidence and promising that they are just witnesses who will be allowed to go home if they give the police what they want. It is shocking, but less emotionally immediate than the television version, which emphasized the vulnerability of the teens by casting young actors and painstakingly individualizing their stories.

Opera can provide psychological windows into inner lives through music, but “Central Park Five” offered only a few such moments, like the brief duet for tenors as Kevin (Mr. Holcomb) and Raymond (Mr. Van Gay) express their fear and confusion when they are first arrested, and the agonized aria “They stole from me!” sung by Korey (Mr. Granner) when he is finally released after the exoneration. (The real Mr. Wise was 16 at the time of the crime, was sentenced as an adult, and served a longer term than the others.)

The strong cast also included an ensemble of four, with each playing multiple roles, including the teens’ parents. One especially notable moment came from mezzo Lindsay Patterson, as Yusef ’s mother, exploding in anger in the courtroom. The 15-member orchestra, conducted by Leslie Dunner, set the rhythm of the evening, from the initial soundscape of woodwind squeals and electronic growls and scratches to the bending brass lines and drumbeats that relentlessly propelled this tale of miscarried justice to its conclusion.

The bare-bones production, directed and designed by Andreas Mitisek with lighting by Dan Weingarten, only outlined the opera’s dramatic contours. Movable screens acted both as doors and as surfaces for projections, and video footage, archival and original, suggested settings like Harlem, interrogation rooms and Trump Tower. Sometimes they didn’t: It was unclear, for example, that the ensemble’s chant of “Our young men / When will it end?” was actually a street demonstration. At times, the directing went overboard. Donald Trump was played for laughs, including having him sing one aria while sitting on a golden toilet, a choice that trivialized his pernicious role as the cheerleader for conviction. And for all the story’s contemporary resonance, the opera felt like a period piece. It ends with a blandly triumphant chorus, “The world is ours”; only a projection still of a TV news report about a current #BlackLivesMatter case brought its theme up to date. It wasn’t enough.

—Ms. Waleson writes on opera for the Journal and is the author of “Mad Scenes and Exit Arias: The Death of the New York City Opera and the Future of Opera in America” (Metropolitan).

Long Beach Opera.

Romantic jealousies and magical interventions lead to all kinds of complications in this stunning production of Agostino Steffani’s forgotten gem at the Boston Early Music Festival.

A scene from ‘Orlando’ PHOTO: KATHY WITTMANByHeidi Waleson

June 12, 2019 2:01 p.m. ET

Boston

The Boston Early Music Festival has unearthed a forgotten Baroque opera gem—Agostino Steffani’s “Orlando generoso” (1691)—and given it a splendid production, opening the festival on Sunday at the Emerson Cutler Majestic Theatre. (BEMF is titling the show simply “Orlando.”) The Italian-born Steffani (1654-1728) made his career in service to the aristocracies of Munich and Hanover, writing numerous successful operas for their theaters. For context, in 1710 the more famous George Frideric Handel succeeded Steffani as Kapellmeister at the court of Hanover; in 1733 Handel’s own “Orlando” had its premiere in London.

Both operas (and many others) are based on Ludovico Ariosto’s 1516 epic poem “Orlando furioso,” the tale of the knight Roland, whose unrequited love for Angelica, the Princess of Cathay, drives him mad. (Angelica is not interested because she is already married to Medoro, a soldier.) Ortensio Mauro’s libretto also features the knight Ruggiero and his beloved, Bradamante (both central to Handel’s “Alcina”), plus a sorcerer, a sorceress, and a comic thief. They all wind up in Cathay, where Galafro, Angelica’s father, does not recognize her (she has been gone a long time and is in disguise), and falls in love with her himself. Romantic jealousies and magical interventions lead to all kinds of complications. It is only when Orlando, imprisoned by Galafro, finally comes to his senses that the world can be righted.

Director Gilbert Blin devised a stunning period-style show. Flats and drops (by Mr. Blin with Kate A. Noll) made quick work of location transformations and magical events, and the de rigueur flying machines, including the sorcerer’s hippogriff, were delightful. Anna Watkins’s lavish costumes delicately referred to the Chinese setting with dress shapes and top-knots, contrasting with the clothing of the Western visitors to seem foreign but not too foreign; Kelly Martin’s atmospheric lighting suggested a pre-electricity era. Mr. Blin’s directing kept things light and entertaining, and big scenes, like the sorcerer’s enchanted palace, with its automata-like inhabitants, had dramatic éclat and wit.

Steffani’s appealing music was an intriguing combination of Italian and French styles, with full-fledged da capo arias co-existing with danced minuets and chaconnes (Marie-Nathalie Lacoursière contributed the low-key, effective period choreography). Tenor Aaron Sheehan deftly captured the disintegration of the suffering Orlando. In his elaborate opening aria, describing how Glory and Love battle within him, his lengthy runs on the word “combattono” had military precision and awe-inspiring breath control; his Act III revelation in prison properly brought the opera’s antics to a contemplative halt. Two superb sopranos offered contrasting personalities: Amanda Forsythe, exquisite as the wide-eyed Angelica, and Emőke Baráth, impassioned as the martial Bradamante. The trio of countertenors—Christopher Lowrey (Ruggiero), Kacper Szelążek (Medoro) and Flavio Ferri-Beneditti (Galafro)—ably complemented them. Baritone Jesse Blumberg gave the sorcerer Atlante a lyrical spin, tenor Zachary Wilder contributed some lively physical comedy as the thief Brunello, and soprano Teresa Wakim had a brief but potent moment as the sorceress Melissa.

With music directors Paul O’Dette (theorbo) and Stephen Stubbs (baroque guitar) leading from the continuo section, and concertmaster Robert Mealy heading the top-flight orchestra, the opera’s pacing rarely flagged over its considerable length of four hours, including two breaks. And the show’s high points were unforgettable. For example, early in Act II, singing a plaintively lovely double lament for their (temporarily) vanished lovers, Angelica was accompanied by bassoon and violin and Ruggiero by oboe and cello, as fireflies darted around the darkened stage. It was one of those time-stopping moments that make BEMF’s biennial opera essential.

—Ms. Waleson writes on opera for the Journal and is the author of “Mad Scenes and Exit Arias: The Death of the New York City Opera and the Future of Opera in America” (Metropolitan).

The New York Philharmonic presents a remake of Beethoven’s sole opera, ‘Fidelio,’ with entirely new music, and the result is a gloomy production leached of the original’s passion.

A scene from ‘prisoner of the state’ PHOTO: CHRIS LEEByHeidi WalesonJune 12, 2019 2:47 p.m. ET

New York

With “prisoner of the state,” given its world premiere last week by the New York Philharmonic, composer David Lang remakes Beethoven’s sole opera, “Fidelio,” with entirely new music. His version strips away not only the awkward comic elements and secondary love stories of the original, but also rejects both its central narrative premise—rescue—and its theme, the triumph of justice. What remains is a gloomy, 65-minute oratorio that extends the prison setting to the wider world. As Mr. Lang’s Prisoner sings: “Everywhere we are in chains. The difference here—between prison and outside—in here you see the chains.” The production, directed by Elkhanah Pulitzer with scenic design by Matt Saunders and costumes by Maline Casta, ringed the David Geffen Hall stage with chain-link fencing topped by barbed wire. The onstage orchestra wore black watch caps, and the chorus, in yellow prison garb, occupied a raised platform at the rear.

Mr. Lang devised his own English libretto, following Beethoven’s basic template but adding references and texts from Machiavelli, Rousseau, Hannah Arendt and Jeremy Bentham. The characters have titles rather than names (Assistant, Jailer, Governor, Prisoner) and there’s a chorus of Prisoners and four Guards. The opera begins with the Assistant’s simple, wistful song, “I was a woman once.” It is an early high point of the score, particularly as sung by Julie Mathevet in an ethereal, vibrato-free soprano. She’s the Prisoner’s wife, pretending to be a boy in order to save him, but her straight tone, as we will see, also suggests that she is powerless.

Indeed, in damping down the narrative thrust of the story, Mr. Lang leached much of the passion from it. There’s nothing corresponding to Leonore’s defiant “Abscheulicher!” The Prisoner’s aria, “uhhh, so dark,” is oddly pretty and tonal; with his mellifluous baritone, Jarrett Ott sounded more like Jesus in Bach’s St. Matthew Passion, already passed to the other side, rather than a living man in extremis, as in the Beethoven original. (He was seen in a video feed from his cell beneath the stage apron.) Even the music of the Governor (tenor Alan Oke), his villain’s part beefed up with utterances like the aria based on Machiavelli’s line “Better to be feared than loved,” is matter-of-fact rather than nasty. The Jailer’s aria about gold has more texture, and Eric Owens used the weight of his bass to express a cynical, downtrodden view of a world where nothing matters but money.

The opera’s most interesting musical moments were choral, like the chilling a cappella number in which the short, choppy phrases of the Prisoners (“We break. We are worked”) were woven with those of the Guards (“We punish so we can forgive”). (The men’s chorus came from the Concert Chorale of New York; Matthew Pearce, John Matthew Myers, Steven Eddy and Rafael Porto were the Guards.) Most of the dramatic tension was built in the orchestra, conducted by Jaap van Zweden, using repeated melodic cells and slashing percussion that created an undertone of darkness and dread. The darkness is warranted: There is no rescue. The Assistant fires a gun at the Governor to protect the Prisoner; the Governor smiles, and takes the weapon. The trumpet of rescue sounds, but the Governor sings, “In a better world, the inspectors would arrive at just the right moment” and “Until we hear [the people] crying out ‘Freedom’…No one man is ever safe or free.” The noisy finale throws the responsibility for liberation back on the audience, but its musical confusion suggests that this will not be an easy job.

—Ms. Waleson writes on opera for the Journal and is the author of “Mad Scenes and Exit Arias: The Death of the New York City Opera and the Future of Opera in America” (Metropolitan).

Boston Early Music Festival. Steffani.

New York Philharmonic. david lang.

The North American premiere of Heiner Goebbels’s deconstructed portrait of the past 120 years; a stripped-down Purcell work performed in a cemetery’s catacombs.

A scene from ‘Everything That Happened and Would Happen’ Photo: Stephanie Berger for Park Avenue Armory By Heidi Waleson June 6, 2019 4:22 p.m. ET

New York

I’m all for recycling, but Heiner Goebbels’s “Everything That Happened and Would Happen,” which had its North American premiere at the Park Avenue Armory on Monday, looked mostly like a way to repurpose scenic elements from the director’s 2012 Ruhrtriennale production of John Cage’s “Europeras 1 & 2.” The 11-member company scurried around the gigantic Wade Thompson Drill Hall, raising and lowering cutout Baroque-style drops depicting trees and buildings—often displaying them upside down or backward. Sometimes the drops became screens for video, most of it very recent footage from the Euronews “No Comment” program (we saw the immense cruise ship that smashed into a dock, colliding with a small tourist boat in the middle of Venice on June 2; a Tough Mudder race in Germany from the day before). The company also pushed pedestals and large wheeled bins around the space; the latter action, with the bins lighted from the inside, looked like a dance for dumpsters. Boulders rolled noisily down inclines. There was also fog.

Ostensibly, the show was a deconstructed portrait of the past 120 years, presenting fragments rather than a narrative intended to tell the audience what to think—except that it did. Readings (in multiple languages) from Patrik Ouředník’s 2001 book “Europeana” touched on such 20th-century events and concepts as racist ethnographic displays, the Holocaust, Barbie dolls, the death toll of World War I (“500,000 kilometers of soldiers fell”), jogging, and the Millennium bug. This juxtaposition of serious things and trivial ones, though seemingly chosen at random, nonetheless painted a picture of a global society that never learns anything. Resistance to a progressive theory of history is nothing new, but this formulation didn’t allow for any positive developments at all. No discovery of penicillin, for example.

In any case, the physical production bore little or no relation to the text. Nor did the music, a dreary tapestry of drones, squeals, crashes and wails improvised by the five musicians (percussion, clarinet/saxophone, ondes martenot, organ, guitar/electronics) positioned around the edge of the playing space. The lighting (by John Brown and Mr. Goebbels) provided some dramatic moments, and in one cool effect a giant bar code of white lines rolled slowly across the stage along with the performers, who seemed to be trying to outrun it. But when the lengthy finale, which had the company making a pile of those drops and the musicians building up a noisy crescendo, finally ended, it was a relief to realize that the running time of this pretentious display, announced as 2 1/2 hours, had been mercifully reduced by about 30 minutes.

iii

A scene from ‘Dido and Aeneas’ Photo: Kevin Condon

Brooklyn, N.Y.

Rather than filling a giant space with a lot of hot air, Death of Classical’s intimate production of Purcell’s “Dido and Aeneas” (1689) this week suffused the Catacombs of Brooklyn’s Green-Wood Cemetery with as much sound and emotion as this claustrophobic tunnel, flanked by family burial chambers, could hold. Alek Shrader’s focused, imaginative production, tucked into one end of the tunnel, relied on simple visuals—a small platform, a single chair, flickering candles, Dido’s dramatic red dress and chainmail jewelry (by Fay Eva), arresting makeup (by Ivey Ray), subtly hued lighting (by Tláloc López-Watermann)—and let the music do its job in this highly resonant acoustical environment.

Mr. Shrader interpolated a few brief spoken scenes from Christopher Marlowe’s 1594 play on the same subject. This device turned chorus members into named characters, such as the Berber king Iarbas (bass-baritone Paul Greene-Dennis), who is rejected by Dido in favor of Aeneas. It also added some detail to the central love story and gave Dido’s final lament an extra suicidal twist. Dancer/choreographer Liana Kleinman—representing Dido’s soul, perhaps?—supplied a poignant movement component compact enough for such a small space, while the singers kept their physical gestures to a minimum.

Daniela Mack was a mesmerizing Dido, both her voluptuous mezzo and her demeanor complex yet generous in love and in death. Baritone Paul La Rosa made Aeneas irresistible—who wouldn’t fall for this buff, handsome, clear-toned warrior? He even did the dialogue well. Molly Quinn was an enchantingly mellifluous Belinda; Vanessa Cariddi, a scary Sorceress (her chain face-mask added to the effect); Alyssa Martin and Erin Moll, comical yet deadly Witches. Marc Molomot led the sailors’ song with brio; Brooke Larimer was a bit over-vibratoed as the Second Woman, here renamed Anna, Dido’s sister. Anna is in love with Iarbas, a Marlowe plot complication the Purcell can easily do without.

Music director Elliot Figg led an ensemble of five period string players from the harpsichord. Their position behind the stage resulted in a few coordination problems, and some of the arias and choruses were too slow. This erotic languor was sometimes interesting, but I missed consistent rhythmic snap and variety. This is the second season of the Angels Share, a series of opera and other music productions in the Catacombs and elsewhere in the cemetery. It has proved inventive and exciting in its use of this unconventional space, but some production dead zones remain to be animated.

—Ms. Waleson writes on opera for the Journal and is the author of “Mad Scenes and Exit Arias: The Death of the New York City Opera and the Future of Opera in America” (Metropolitan).

Greenwood Cemetery. Forget my fate.

At The Armory — a new candidate for one of the worst five things I’ve seen. I should have seen it coming with the Gertrude Stein quotation at the front of the program. Heiner Goebbels needs to know a bit more about history and philosophy before holding forth. Both elitist and anti-intellectual at the same time.