John Adams (born in February 15, 1947) is a leading composer in what is simply referred to as minimalist opera. This is a style that developed as a result of modernism of the early twentieth century. The Pulitzer prize winning American composer strongly believes in minimalism. Some of his works are; Short Ride in a Fast Machine(1986), Shaker Loops (1978), On The Transmigration of Souls (2002) and commemorating victims of September 11 attacks. His operas include Nixon in China (1987) and Doctor Atomic (2005)
As a child growing up in New Hampshire Adams developed early liking for American political life. He attended high school in the city of Concord which at that time was the centre of the presidential primary campaigns. He was highly influenced by politics of change i.e. voting for the maverick Eugene McCarthy, who through his 1968 campaign various changes were envisaged.
It was therefore almost natural when a stage director Peter Sellars proposed to him the topic of Richard Nixon, Mao Tse-tung, capitalism, and communism as a subject for an opera when they met in New Hampshire in 1983. By this time Nixon was the stuff of bad and predictable comedy routines. This was until when Alice Goodman a poet agreed to write a verse; libretto in couplets. The project went ahead to take on a complex guise, satire, issues of political posturing as well as serious examination of philosophical, historical and gender issues.
All this was focused on the six extraordinary personalities: Chairman Mao, the Nixon’s and Chou En-lai, Chiang Chingand Henry Kissinger. It was therefore big in the sense of both story and characterization necessitating only a grand opera.
It took two years to complete Nixon in China during which a lot of attention by the media and the music community at large was attracted. This therefore made it extraordinary opera that could not be sneaked out in the workshop. it attracted critics from several national newspapers and NBC Nightly News five months ahead of the actual premier During an untagged sing-through held in San Francisco
Nixon’s 1972 trip was a major event whose magnitude is unimaginable from our present perspective. This was the first opera to ever use a staged "media event" as a layout for its dramatic structure. The opera showed a great understanding for how those in power managed to always keep themselves in power.
Peter Sellers, brilliantly understood how dictatorships throughout the century was carefully used to managed public opinion in a form of public theater and the expression of "persona" in the political field. Both Nixon and Mao were serious manipulators of public opinion, and the opera shows through the famous meeting between Nixon and Mao the two complex figures in a dialogue oscillating between political one-upsmanship and philosophical sparring.
Since it is not a struggle between west and east, Nixon wanted to end the Vietnam war in which Taiwan was a historic millstone which therefore gives the idea of political gullibility as China did not have much to gain or lose either way. Either sides manipulates the media to fool each other as this is a game of tactics.
A particular meaning was brought out through the roles of Pat and Chiang Ch’ing, the two principal women. Both wives of politicians represented the two alternatives of living with a person immersed in political manipulation and power. Pat was ideal, and loved "family values", one who stood by the husband, embracing his causes and always smiled through a long career that certainly should have elements of humiliation and depression. On the other hand Chang Ch’ing started her career as an actress and later joined the Party, accompanying Mao through the long stretch and ultimately becoming the power behind his throne.
She was the force and mind behind the Cultural Revolution. On music, he goes beyond the public personae of these women and shows how fragile their relationship is to their spouses. Pat being the perfect diplomatic guest, loving every minute when treated to a whirlwind tour of the city and the shrill, corrosive Chang Ch’ing who interrupts the ballet so as to shout orders at the dancers then starts singing her credo of power, "I am the Wife of Mao Tse-tung". At the end, both text and music focuses on their vulnerability, desperation to roll back time to the times when life was simpler with lesser compromise of feelings. Indeed, the five principals are virtually affected by their deeper thoughts during this act.
In the solitude and loneliness of his or her bed, they all can’t avoid the feeling of regret, of lost time that con not be retrieved and missed opportunities. It is Chou En-lai, the only one left with an average degree of self-knowledge, who asks the final question seeking to find the magnitude of good in all that they did.
John Adams and Nixon in China as an American classic
Fifteen years elapsed between Nixon’s visit to China in 1972 and John Adams’s operatic retelling at the world premiere in Houston. Several other years have passed by since then: enough time to fade the puzzlement, long enough even to remove the feeling that the opera describes a “current event.” In 1987when most of the principal characters could have watched their onstage doubles sitting in the audience. Adams and the librettist, Alice Goodman, anticipated that time period, treating a state visit with such mythic encounter in the Elysian fields. Now what survives is a string of gnomic couplets that can never add up to a story that the novelty has flaked away.
Later arguments as to whether or not art should avoid entanglements as far as recent history is concerned has shown the importance of a transformative step that gave the full stretch of what Minimalism could accomplish. In initial stage work, Adams demonstrated that standard harmonies, unembellished scales, chugging rhythms and patient repetitions were able to yield an old-fashioned bone drama. Nixon in China gives a strong memory to everyone on the fantasy and melancholy that surrounds the issues addressed unlike Early Minimalism of the sixties and seventies
Adams has used other stage works, always having abundant syncopations, teeming orchestration and built-up layers to continue operating the involving operatic twentieth century but they never come close to the subtle eloquence of his first attempt.
Adams has powers to show a private crisis in public places which he uses to give a reaction to follow the changes in character emotions.
Nixon has been and will remain a momentous work, but a sense of its own importance nearly brings down the opera at times.
Nixon’s 1987 trip realigned the world and eventually led, to today’s economic partnership Chou En-lai makes a florid toast. Pat, confesses that she comes from a poor family that raises issues of uplift and social mobility. Between China and America, however Adams, Goodman, and Sellers have less interest in geopolitics. Adams depicts characters in confident strokes; however Goodman frames the character in set pieces and not as elements as he presents the play of relationships. The libretto transfigures actual people into effigies with which soliloquies are alternated and songs are sung with no interaction instead of humanizing politicians that are usually seen in TV appearances
Works cited
Braun, William R. "The Inquiring Mind". New York: OUP 2011
Gelb, Peter, "Nixon lands at the Met". The Metropolitan Opera New York: OUP 2011
May, Thomas "Program Note". The Metropolitan Opera Playbill New York: OUP 2011
Nixon in China: The Background". Opera News: 40. February 2011.
