"Little Women"
“A moving treatise on change, growth, and love... Adamo's writing is so good, and the production so strong, that Little Women is likely to earn a chance at the title of 'greatest American opera.' ”
--Advocate.com
Mark Adamo’s Opera Little
Women
An Opera in Two Acts (1998) (120’)
Music and Libretto by Mark Adamo
With additional text by Louisa May Alcott, John Bunyon and Goethe. Commissioned
by the Houston Grand Opera for the Houston Opera Studio.World Premiere:
Houston Opera Studio, 13 March 1998.
Friday & Saturday, August 2 & 3, 2002, 8pm;
and Sunday, August 4, 2pm matinee
Santa Cruz Civic Auditorium
Music Director/Conductor: Marin
Alsop
Stage Director: Peter Kazaras
Scenic Designer: Curtis Wallin
Costume Designer: Anna Bjornsdotter
Lighting Designer: Troy Hornung
Cast:
Jo: Cherry Duke, mezzo-soprano
Laurie: Wesley Rogers, tenor
Brooke: John Packard, baritone
Meg: Quinn Patrick, mezzo-soprano
Beth: Natalie Taormina, soprano
Amy: Cara Johnston, soprano
Bhaer: Kurt Ollman, baritone
Cecilia: Alexandra Hughes, mezzo-soprano
Alma March: Linda Pavelka
Gideon March & Mr. Dashwood: Dean Elzinga, bass-baritone
The Cabrillo Festival’s 40th anniversary season opens August 2-4 at the Santa Cruz Civic Auditorium with Little Women, a sensational new opera based on the classic novel by Louisa May Alcott. Created by composer Mark Adamo and premiered by the Opera Studio of Houston Grand Opera in 1998, its success there was immediate. Within two years, it received multiple main stage opera productions, revivals, and national broadcasts on both National Public Radio and PBS’ "Great Performances." It has been called a "wonder of the American opera world." Its Northern California premiere at the Cabrillo Festival will be directed by New York based Peter Kazaras, with a cast of top flight soloists and the award-winning Festival Orchestra conducted by Marin Alsop.
Mark Adamo's first opera, Little Women, was composed to his own libretto after the novel by Louisa May Alcott. Upon its premiere in March 1998 by the Opera Studio of Houston Grand Opera, General Director David Gockley pronounced it "destined to be an American classic," and scheduled Little Women for a mainstage revival of 10 performances in March 2000 -- making it the first of HGO's twenty-some commissions to be so revived. G. Schirmer published the opera in May 1998; National Public Radio broadcast the recording of the premiere the following September; new productions have since been mounted by the Civic Opera Theater of Kansas City, Central City Opera (Colorado) and the Ash Lawn-Highland Summer Festival (Virginia) and new productions are planned by Glimmerglass Opera and Indiana University in 2002. In addition, Opera Pacific revived the HGO production in May of 2001 and Opera Omaha, Minnesota Opera, and Opera in the Ozarks (Arkansas) all plan production revivals in 2002. The national television premiere of Little Women took place on August 29, 2001 on PBS's Great Performances (a co-production between Houston Grand Opera and Thirteen/WNET New York), and the world premiere recording of the HGO production was released on Ondine on August 28, 2001. At Mr. Gockley's request, Adamo is currently developing two new operas for HGO over the next six seasons.
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