About the Composer
Composer
Conrad Cummings
Libretto adapted by the composer from the novel in verse by Vikram Seth.
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Synopsis
Five twenty-somethings experience love, life, and loss in the magical and innocent San Francisco of the early 1980’s. JOHN (baritone), handsome and successful, will discover too late the price of his emotional detachment. He meets LIZ (soprano) through a personals ad placed by his former college girlfriend JAN (mezzo), a sculptor and punk rock drummer. Meanwhile, John’s best friend from college PHIL (bass), reeling from a divorce which has left him the single parent of six-year-old PAUL (spoken role), begins a passionate relationship with ED (tenor), Liz’s younger brother. Ed is bright, gorgeous, in search of a lover and mentor, and a profoundly conflicted devout Catholic. Couples come apart; new couples form, families are created, friendships are severed. A tragic death leads John, always the outsider, to the promise of a deeper connection and a warmer life.
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WHO: Center City Opera Theater
WHAT: The Golden Gate
Part of
ConNEXTions (The Philly Fringe) which includes three new operas
WHEN: Friday, September 12 at 4p
Saturday, September 13 at 8p
Sunday, September 14 at 3pm
WHERE: The Ethical Society, 1906 Rittenhouse Square, Philadelphia, PA 19103.
HOW MUCH: only $20
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Vikram Seth’s best-selling novel-in-verse about love and loss in San Francisco in the 1980’s, “The Golden Gate,” touches on all the nostalgia I feel for my home town and reminds me acutely of the adventures of my younger life. There’s nothing extraordinary about the characters, but Seth’s amazingly beautiful verbal music makes them transcendent. I hope my music does justice to his words, maintaining their unique mixture of pathos and gentle humor.
The Golden Gate has received invaluable development support from American Opera Projects and its Executive Director Charles Jarden. Conductor Steven Osgood has guided the work from the beginning and continues to be its sharpest and most valuable critic. Mark Adamo, Mark Stephen Campbell, Ned Canty, Caren France, Michael Korie, Gordon Ostrowski, and Tobias Picker have all given generously of their time and advice.
Character List
John Grey (baritone) is a handsome, athletic, and somewhat stiff twenty-six-year old whose career as a software engineer at a nuclear weapons lab is thriving but whose personal life seems empty even to him. His one close friend is his former girlfriend from college –
Janet Hayakawa (mezzo), a sculptor by day and a drummer in a punk rock band by night. Janet places a personals ad on John’s behalf, through which John meets and falls in love with –
Liz Dorati (soprano), a recent graduate of Stanford Law School and a prized associate at the staid law firm of Cobb & Kearny. Liz grew up on a working vineyard in the Sonoma Valley with her younger brother –
Ed Dorati (tenor), who is fresh out of college and works for an advertising agency. Though both Liz and Ed were raised Catholic, Liz finds Ed’s devotion to Church dogma perplexing. Ed finds himself intensely attracted to –
Philip Weiss (bass), John’s college roommate. Relations have been tense between John and Phil since Phil quit his engineering job to become an anti-nuclear activist. Phil is reeling from a recent divorce (from the absent Claire) that has left him the single parent of six-year-old –
Paul Weiss (speaking role).
Conrad Cummings has composed operas, music for orchestra, inaddition to music for amplified chamber ensemble. Performances of his operas include Eros and Psyche with libretto by the composer at Oberlin Opera Theater; Positions 1956 with libretto by Michael Korie, Photo-Op with libretto by James Siena, and La Mama all at Ridge Theater; and Tonkin with libretto by the composer and Thomas Bird at OperaDelaware. Cummings trained at Yale, Stony Brook, and Columbia, and did his post-doctoral work at IRCAM in Paris. Cummings taught at Oberlin Conservatory for ten years where he directed the music and media program. After Oberlin, he moved to New York to run a kids’ interactive media company and has since 2003 taught composition in the evening division at Juilliard. His new opera The Golden Gate, based on the novel in verse by Vikram Seth, is also in development with American Opera Projects.
Recordings are available on CRI’s Emergency Music label. His honors include MacDowell, Djerassi and Tanglewood fellowships and grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, Opera America and The Rockefeller Foundation.
For more info: www.conradcummings.com.