Composers compete to celebrate Mozart birth with world premiere music pieces

NEW YORK -- World premieres of operas by John Adams, Tobias Picker, Elliott Goldenthal and Kaija Saariaho will compete for attention this season with celebrations of the 250th anniversary of Mozart's birth.\nAfter composing the popular operas "Nixon in China" and "The Death of Klinghoffer," Adams shifts his attention to the development of the nuclear bomb with "Doctor Atomic," which opens at the San Francisco Opera on Oct. 1.\n"This is an awesome subject that can't be dealt with in a rational way," Adams said. "It's about flesh-and-blood people screaming at each other and loving one another."\nThe Peter Sellars production, slated to travel to the Lyric Opera of Chicago and the De Nederlandse Opera in 2007, has an opening cast of Kristine Jepson (replacing Lorraine Hunt Lieberson, still recovering from a back injury) as Lilly Oppenheimer and Gerald Finley as Robert Oppenheimer. Music director Donald Runnicles conducts.\nIn the San Francisco Opera's final full season under general director Pamela Rosenberg, there will be just one Mozart production, a revival of "Le Nozze di Figaro" starting June 10 and featuring John Relyea, Ruth Ann Swenson, Camilla Tilling and Peter Mattei.\nNew York's Metropolitan Opera has the premiere of Picker's "An American Tragedy" Dec. 2. Based on the 1925 novel by Theodore Dreiser, it stars Patricia Racette, Nathan Gunn, Dolora Zajick, Jennifer Larmore and Susan Graham. James Conlon conducts and Francesca Zambello directs.\nThere also will be new productions of Gounod's "Romeo et Juliette" (Nov. 14 with Ramon Vargas and Natalie Dessay) and Donizetti's "Don Pasquale" (March 31 with Anna Netrebko and Juan Diego Florez) and the company premiere of Tchaikovsky's "Mazeppa" (March 6). On Jan. 27, the 250th anniversary of Mozart's birth, the Met presents a revival of last season's new Julie Taymor production of "Die Zauberfloete (The Magic Flute)."\nThe season ends May 20 with a gala honoring Joseph Volpe, who has been general manager since 1990. Volpe joined the Met in 1964 and is retiring Aug. 1.\nThe Lyric Opera of Chicago has a revival of its August Everding production of "Die Zauberfloete" opening Dec. 9 with Michael Schade, Erin Wall, Rebecca Evans and Jonathan Lemalu.\nDenyce Graves will sing in the world premiere of Goldenthal's "Grendel" at the Los Angeles Opera May 27. Based on the poem "Beowulf" and John Gardner's novel "Grendel," the opera features a libretto by Julie Taymor and J.D. McClatchy and will be directed by Taymor. It also is to be performed at the Lincoln Center Festival at the New York State Theater starting in July 2006.\nAt New York's Carnegie Hall, the Berlin Philharmonic will mark the Mozart anniversary Jan. 27 with music director Simon Rattle conducting the "Serenade in B-flat Major for 12 Winds," "Piano Concerto No. 27 with Alfred Brendel" and "Symphony No. 38" ("Prague"). Riccardo Muti will conduct the Vienna Philharmonic at Carnegie March 3-5 in programs that include Mozart's "Symphony No. 35" ("Haffner") and "Sinfonia concertante."\nDaniel Barenboim starts his final season as music director of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra Oct. 1 with a program that includes Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 1 with Itzhak Perlman. The highlight of the Boston Symphony Orchestra season will be three performances of Beethoven's "Missa Solemnis" Jan. 19-21 with music director James Levine conducting Deborah Voigt, Hunt Lieberson, Ben Heppner, Rene Pape and the Tanglewood Festival Chorus.\nA three-week "Magic of Mozart" tribute by the New York Philharmonic has music director Lorin Maazel conducting the "Prague" and "Haffner" (No. 35) symphonies Jan. 27 along with "Vesperae solennes de confessore" and the "Coronation" Mass.\nIn Europe, the Salzburg Festival plans performances of all 22 of Mozart's stage works next summer. The tribute begins with concerts Dec. 31 and Jan. 1 featuring Marc Minkowski and the Chamber Orchestra of Europe.\nThe Paris Opera, in its second season under Gerard Mortier, celebrates the anniversary Jan. 27 with the opening of a new production of "Don Giovanni" at the Palais Garnier with Mattei (Don Giovanni), Luca Pisaroni (Leporello), Christine Schaefer (Donna Anna) and Mireille Delunsch (Donna Elvira). Sylvain Cambreling will be on the podium in a Michael Haneke production.\nThe company's Mozart tribute begins Friday at the Garnier with a new Patrice Chereau production of "Cosi fan tutte," and therer will be a new "Figaro" production by Christoph Marthaler March 11 at the Garnier, with Cambreling conducting Lorenzo Regazzo (Figaro), Mattei (Count Almaviva), Heidi Grant Murphy (Susanna), Schaefer (Cherubino) and Christiane Oelze (Countess Almaviva).\nSaariaho's "Adriana Mater," performed in French, opens March 30 at the Bastille in a Sellars production and stars Patricia Bardon in the title role along with Solveig Kingelborn, Evgeny Nikitin and Gordon Gietz. Esa-Pekka Salonen will conduct.\nAt the Vienna State Opera, which celebrates the 50th anniversary of its postwar reopening with a gala televised concert Nov. 5, there will be new production of Mozart's "Idomeneo" opening Jan. 27 at the Theater an der Wien, with music director Seiji Ozawa conducting and Willy Decker directing. There also will be a new production of "Die Entfuehrung aus dem Serail" (The Abduction from the Seraglio) May 1 at the Burgtheater, with Philippe Jordan conducting and Karin Beier directing.\nLondon's Royal Opera has a new David McVicar production of "Figaro" opening Jan. 31 with Erwin Schrott (Figaro), Miah Persson (Susanna), Dorothea Roeschmann (Countess Almaviva), Finley (Count Almaviva) and Rinat Shaham (Cherubino). Music director Antonio Pappano conducts.\nThe company completes its new production of Wagner's Ring Cycle with "Siegfried" (Oct. 2) and "Goetterdaemmerung" (April 17) starring Lisa Gasteen, John Treleaven and John Tomlinson, and conducted by Pappano. Complete cycles are planned for October 2007. There is a star-filled new production of Puccini's "Tosca" starting June 13 that features Angela Gheorghiu, Bryn Terfel and Marcelo Alvarez.\nMilan's Teatro alla Scala opens its first season since 1985-86 without Muti as music director on Dec. 7 with "Idomeneo" conducted by Daniel Harding. Muti resigned under pressure last spring after the company's employees called for him to leave. Stephane Lissner of the Aix-en-Provence Festival was hired as artistic director, and many conductors will be used this season in place of a music director.\nAlso in Europe, there will be world premieres of Arnaldo de Felice's "Medusa" at the Bavarian State Opera Nov. 16 and Pascal Dusapin's "Faustus, the Last Night," Jan. 21 at the Staatsoper Unter der Linden in Berlin. The Bavarian State Opera will present a Mozart Festival from Jan. 27 to Feb. 14 that includes six operas and "Great" Mass in C Minor.