Opera on WRTI
Saturdays, 1:30 to 5 pm
Each week WRTI brings you great performances from some of the finest opera companies in the world. From the San Francisco Opera to the Metropolitan Opera, you're sure to find them featured every Saturday afternoon.
May 17, 2008 1:30 to 5:30 pm
John Adams: Doctor Atomic
Lyric Opera of Chicago, Robert Spano, conductor
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John Adams: Doctor Atomic |
It was fitting that this landmark opera by post-minimalist composer John Adams and avant-garde director Peter Sellars about the first atomic bomb created a critical explosion following its premiere in 2005. Now numerous cast members from those memorable San Francisco performances, including Gerald Finley and Eric Owens, reprise their roles in a new production by Peter Sellars for Lyric Opera of Chicago, all under the baton of eminent American conductor Robert Spano.
Doctor Atomic focuses on the personal experiences of those who took part in the first tests of the Bomb at Los Alamos in 1945, mainly physicist Robert Oppenheimer, “the father of the atomic bomb,” and his wife Kitty. The story follows their growing stress and anxiety, set against tensions among key players in the Manhattan Project, especially General Leslie Groves. Sellars adapted the libretto from primary historical sources, but also quotes from the Bhagavad Gita, songs of the Tewa, the Holy Sonnets of John Donne, and the poetry of Muriel Rukeyser.
Doctor Atomic is similar in style to previous Adams operas Nixon in China and The Death of Klinghoffer, both of which explored the characters and personalities that were involved in historical incidents, rather than a re-enactment of the events themselves.
More about Doctor Atomic:
Cast
- Conductor: Robert Spano
- J. Robert Oppenheimer: Gerald Finley (baritone)
- Kitty Oppenheimer: Jessica Rivera (mezzo-soprano)
- Edward Teller: Richard Paul Fink (dramatic baritone)
- General Leslie Groves: Eric Owens (bass)
- Robert Wilson: Thomas Glenn (tenor)
- Pasqualita: Meredith Arwady (mezzo-soprano)
- Jack Hubbard: James Maddalena (baritone)
- Capt. James Nolan: Roger Honeywell (tenor)
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