John Adams’ operas Nixon in China and Doctor Atomic stupefied my ears and expanded my mind. How is it possible it took the recent Nonesuch Records release of the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s reading of Girls of the Golden West to make me aware of the Adams work that premiered in 2017?
Giacomo Puccini set his 1910 opera La Fanciulla del West amid the American gold rush. (Unlike Girls of the Golden West, it’s an opera I’ve had the pleasure of watching.) Adams successfully refreshes the theme. Girls of the Golden West is so catchy I elected to listen a third time while mowing my lawn yesterday. The valuable time slot had been dedicated to Beyoncé since March 29.
The shared Western theme aside, the opera is obviously quite not as “country” as Cowboy Carter. Girls of the Golden West more closely resembles an avant-garde “Oklahoma” starring the impeccable Julia Bullock. Adams’ vigorous pieces about greed, sex and violence at a mining camp are well suited to a sweaty workout in the Kansas humidity.