{"id":12,"date":"2020-09-20T21:40:00","date_gmt":"2020-09-20T21:40:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2020\/?p=12"},"modified":"2020-10-26T18:19:39","modified_gmt":"2020-10-26T18:19:39","slug":"opera","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2020\/opera\/","title":{"rendered":"Opera Premieres in Town Where Story Began"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

A plague of locusts, a bison stampede, a fatal shooting, an escape in the night. The 1873 founding of Cozad, Nebraska, by gambler John Cozad had plenty of melodrama for an opera. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nebraska\u2019s Glenn Korff School of Music debuted \u201cThe Gambler\u2019s Son,\u201d an opera about Cozad\u2019s ill-fated attempt to establish a preeminent metropolis on the Plains. It premiered in November 2019 at Cozad, a west central Nebraska town of 4,000, to a full house before concluding at Nebraska\u2019s Kimball Recital Hall. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite the story\u2019s Wild West excitement, Nebraska\u2019s Tyler White and Laura White were determined not to make a \u201ccowboy opera.\u201d Instead, they focused on Cozad\u2019s complicated relationship with his famous son, the painter Robert Henri. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe core of the opera is examining their relationship and how they came to understand each other,\u201d said composer Tyler White, director of orchestras and professor of composition and conducting. \u201cIt\u2019s a family drama that happens to be set in the Old West.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The opera is adapted from Mari Sandoz\u2019s novel \u201cSon of the Gamblin\u2019 Man: The Youth of an Artist.\u201d Laura White, John E. Weaver Professor of English, had the di\u001d cult task of pulling key moments from Sandoz\u2019s action-packed novel to write a libretto that didn\u2019t overwhelm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cozad \u201cwas almost this tragic hero because he had huge dreams for Cozad, the town,\u201d she said. \u201cThen it was just one horrible thing after another.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tyler White set the libretto within an eclectic music style that animates the characters and appeals to a modern audience. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The collaborative duo\u2019s e\u001f orts gave William Shomos, director of opera and Richard H. Larson Distinguished Professor of Music, the rare opportunity to produce an original opera set in Nebraska. For Shomos\u2019 team, the highlight was performing it where the story took place. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe mission of UNL opera is to promote new American works and to take opera to rural Nebraska, to share what we\u2019re doing and let people experience it. Thus far, the response has been great,\u201d Shomos said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

An audience member called the first live opera performed in Cozad a gift to the town.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe Gambler\u2019s Son\u201d was supported by the James C. and Rhonda Seacrest Tour Nebraska Opera Fund, Jane Rohman, Willard Bellamy family, Ivan and Shirley Paulsen family, Lincoln Community Foundation, UNL Friends of Opera and the Wilson Foundation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A plague of locusts, a bison stampede, a fatal shooting, an escape in the night. The 1873 founding of Cozad, Nebraska, by gambler John Cozad had plenty of melodrama for an opera. Nebraska\u2019s Glenn Korff School of Music debuted \u201cThe Gambler\u2019s Son,\u201d an opera about Cozad\u2019s ill-fated attempt to establish a preeminent metropolis on the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":184,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[142,6,137,141,139,140,143],"class_list":["post-12","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-cozad","tag-education-and-outreach","tag-glenn-korff-school-of-music","tag-laura-white","tag-opera","tag-tyler-white","tag-william-shomos"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":300,"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12\/revisions\/300"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/184"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}