“Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra music director Miguel Harth-Bedoya is spending the end of his summer vacation working,” writes Gregory Sullivan Isaacs in Wednesday’s (8/5) Fort Worth Star-Telegram (Texas). At Santa Fe Opera from August 1-22, he is conducting Cold Mountain, a “world premiere by his longtime friend and collaborator Jennifer Higdon … based on Charles Frazier’s novel…. Higdon is one of the most sought-after composers of contemporary classical music. She won a Pulitzer Prize in 2010 for her Violin Concerto and a 2009 Grammy Award for her Percussion Concerto.… Higdon took two years to compose the opera, … co-commissioned by the Santa Fe Opera, Opera Philadelphia and Minnesota Opera, and in collaboration with North Carolina Opera. Renowned librettist Gene Scheer condensed the novel for the stage…. The vocal writing … is somewhere between purely melodic phrase and a modern take on recitativo accompagnato…. Higdon’s use of the orchestra is fascinating…. She uses it in every possible combination, alone and together…. When she pulls out the full orchestra stop, which she does frequently, the results are thrilling…. Harth-Bedoya said he felt elated to be on the podium. ‘Opening night was a historic event,’ he said. ‘We will read about it in future music history texts.’ ”
Posted August 7, 2015
