Overview
, 2016 , 2014 Opera in the United States dates to the 18th century. It evolved from an imported European luxury into a vibrant, distinctly American art form. In the 19th and 20th centuries, tours, first by European artists and later by the Met, brought opera also to remote regions. Since 1931, regular radio broadcasts, and since 1949, televised operas, have contributed to the genre's popularity. Today, opera in the United States balances grand traditional productions with groundbreaking contemporary works. Four opera companies – the Metropolitan Opera in New York City, the San Francisco Opera, the Lyric Opera of Chicago, and the Houston Grand Opera — have achieved international recognition, also the opera composers Joplin, Gershwin, Barber, Menotti, Bernstein, Glass, Adams, Heggie and Mazzoli.
Many new operas tackle contemporary social themes, historical events, or American literature – like Treemonisha, Porgy and Bess, Susannah, Einstein on the Beach, and Dead Man Walking. Musically, they frequently blend classical traditions with American idioms like jazz, blues, musical theatre, and minimalism. The most famous US American singer was Maria Callas. Unlike European opera, which traditionally relied on state funding, US opera relies heavily on private philanthropy and ticket sales.
Colonial era
The first opera known to have been performed in the American colonies was the ballad opera Flora, which was performed in Charleston, South Carolina on February 8, 1735. Later in the century, The Beggar's Opera was performed in New York City in 1750. This continued the trend of the popularity of ballad operas.
The Disappointment
In 1767, a first example of an American ballad opera was announced in Philadelphia – The Disappointment or The Force of Credulity, written under the pseudonym Andrew Barton. It was heavily advertised and fully scheduled to premiere at Philadelphia's Southwark Theatre on April 20, 1767. However, just four days before opening night, the performance was abruptly cancelled. A notice in The Pennsylvania Gazette on April 22, 1767, explained that the play contained too many "personal reflections" that made it "unfit for the stage." In plain terms, it was a biting satire of local Philadelphia figures who were digging for buried pirate treasure, and those influential locals likely used their power to shut it down before the curtain could rise.
The opera was reconstructed by Samuel Adler, it premiered in 1976 at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York during the United States Bicentennial.
New Orleans
Opera in New Orleans began prior to the Louisiana Purchase, with the first recorded opera being a performance of André Grétry's Sylvain in May 1796. In January 1808, the Théâtre St. Philippe was opened with the U.S. Premiere of Une folie by French composer Étienne Méhul. The U.S. premiere of Cherubini's Les deux journées took place there in March 1811. The most famous opera venue in town between 1819 and 1859 was the Théâtre d'Orléans. It was succeeded by the French Opera House, located on Bourbon Street in the French Quarter. This theatre burned down in 1919, causing severe disruption to opera in the city. Five persons, asleep over the Café de l'Opéra, barely escaped the fire, all scenery, costumes, and music were destroyed.
Lorenzo Da Ponte
, 1830 Portrait by Samuel Morse The 18th century laid the foundation for the operatic tradition that would thrive in the United States in the subsequent centuries. Despite initial challenges and a limited scope, the interest in opera endured, paving the way for the expansion and diversification of the art form in the 19th century. Having had financial troubles in Europe, librettist Lorenzo Da Ponte came to the US in 1805. He settled in New York City first, then Sunbury, Pennsylvania, where he briefly ran a grocery store and gave private Italian lessons. He returned to New York to open a bookstore. He became friends with Clement Clarke Moore, and was named the first professor of Italian literature at Columbia College, an unpaid appointment. He viewed himself as an ambassador of European culture in a barbarous country.
He persuaded the Spanish tenor Manuel García to bring his opera troupe to New York, where they performed at the Park Theatre at Park Row in lower Manhattan. They presented a range of Italian operas, among them The Barber of Seville by Rossini. On May 23, 1826, the Manuel Garcia troupe also performed Don Giovanni. It was the first performance of this opera in America. Manuel Garcia's daughter, Maria Malibran, sung the role of Zerlina. Da Ponte was present. In 1833, at the age of eighty-four, Da Ponte founded the first purpose-built opera theater in the United States, the Italian Opera House. It was located on the northwest corner of Leonard and Church Streets in Manhattan and it was far superior to any theater the city had yet seen. It was a lavish, European-style building with frescoed ceilings and private boxes. But it lasted only for two seasons before the company went bankrupt.
Shortly after the death of Da Ponte, his opera house burned down to the ground. It was, however, the predecessor of the New York Academy of Music and of the New York Metropolitan Opera.
European tours and emergence of American companies
During the 1800s, European opera companies embarked on tours across prominent cities in the United States, introducing timeless masterpieces to American spectators. Memorable shows played a significant role in the increasing appeal of opera. The emergence of American opera companies, such as the Academy of Music in New York City (1854) and the Boston Academy of Music (1853), marked a transition towards establishing a domestically nurtured operatic heritage. Opera in the 19th century became a cultural cornerstone, influencing literature, art, and societal norms.
It played a role in shaping the cultural identity of growing cities, with the Metropolitan Opera, founded in 1883, emerging as a major institution. * 1857 Academy of Music, Philadelphia * 1878 Central City Opera House, Colorado * 1883 Old Metropolitan Opera House in New York City * 1928 Boston Opera House * 1929 Civic Opera Chicago * 1932 War Memorial Opera House in San Francisco
Wagner's immediate recognition
Although German composer Richard Wagner was an outspoken anti-Semite, which was also well known by then, his work quickly gained popularity in the US at the end of the 1880s, especially in cities with substantial immigration from Germany (Boston, Philadelphia, Cincinnati, Chicago, San Francisco, Milwaukee). Orchestral excerpts were performed in American concerts by the late 1850s, helping seed interest before full operas appeared. American conductors and impresarios – most notably Theodore Thomas – championed Wagner in concert, normalizing long symphonic excerpts and preludes. The Metropolitan Opera (opened in 1883) quickly became a Wagner stronghold.
Its early seasons featured Lohengrin and Tannhäuser, and by the 1890s the Met was presenting Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, Tristan und Isolde, and the four Ring operas (beginning piecemeal, then in cycles), mainly in German with prominent European guest singers.
Marginalizing black and female composers
While operas by Verdi, Wagner, and Puccini secured great successes, local composers had only little chances of getting staged. Especially African-American and female composers had a hard time to obtain recognition. Edmond Dédé (1827–1901) was a native of New Orleans. He fled to France and wrote the opera Morgaine in 1887; it was not performed until 2025, and then only in concert version. Neither Scott Joplin (1868–1917) nor his widow succeeded in staging Treemonisha (1911) during their lifetimes. In another case, a composer has disappeared entirely from public view: Harry Lawrence Freeman (1869–1957) supported himself and his own opera company during his lifetime, playing to predominantly black audiences in Harlem. He was acquainted with many African-American artists associated with the Harlem Renaissance.
Twenty-one of his operas, as well as many of his other works, survive in Freeman's own manuscripts, and are kept in a collection of his papers at Columbia University. Nevertheless, there are practically no revivals of his operas. Shirley Graham Du Bois (1876–1977) wrote Tom-Tom, an Epic of Music and the Negro. The work was performed successfully in a Cleveland stadium in 1932. Thereafter the work was forgotten for more than 80 years. In 2001, a working score was found at Harvard. A revival is pending. The Blues Opera, written in the 1950s, called ″magnificent″ by The New York Times, was never mounted in its full form. The authors were Harold Arlen (1905–1986) and Johnny Mercer (1909–1976), the subject were wealthy Black jockeys in the 1880s.
"The lyrics are smart, the music gorgeous." Throughout the entire 20th century, the Met staged only one opera by a woman, Der Wald by Ethel Smyth, an English composer. The opera Cabildo by Amy Beach (from 1932) wasn't performed until after her death which occurred in 1944. The operas by Margaret Bonds, like the Christmas opera The Ballad of the Brown King, were often relegated to community or church spaces.
Mainstream and radio transmissions
Although many American opera companies try hard to incorporate contemporary operas in their repertoire, still most of the most performed operas stem from the big three operatic composers – Mozart, Verdi, Puccini – plus some Italian bel canto composers such as Donizetti and Rossini. The Top 10 of the USA are very similar to European preferences, they contain three operas each by Puccini and Mozart, two by Verdi as well as Carmen by Bizet and The Barber of Seville. The only American operas among the Top 50 in the USA are Porgy and Bess and the Christmas opera Amahl and the Night Visitors by Menotti. Currently there are 125 professional opera companies in the USA − led by the Big Four, the Met, the San Francisco Opera, the Lyric Opera of Chicago and the Houston Grand Opera. sings into a transmitter, Chicago 1921 The USA were the pioneer of transmitting opera in radio, TV and cinema.
The very first attempt started on January 13, 1910: The radio pioneer Lee de Forest undertook the world's first experiment of a live radio broadcast from an opera stage. He installed microphones in the spotlight of the Met and transmitted parts of Cavalleria rusticana and Pagliacci starring Enrico Caruso and Emmy Destinn. Caruso was one of the most popular Met singers ever. He gave 626 performances over 17 consecutive years. The day before, there was a test with act II and III of Tosca, starring Olive Fremstad in the lead. However, the signal was extremely weak and could only be received by very few people using detector receivers. It took another more than a decade of technological advancements for opera to become a staple of home radio. In 1921, the Berlin State Opera broadcast a live performance of Madama Butterfly.
In 1923, the BBC aired its first live operatic transmission from Covent Garden, featuring the first act of The Magic Flute. On Christmas Day of 1931, the Metropolitan Opera launched its official, permanent Saturday Matinee Broadcast series with Humperdinck's Hänsel und Gretel. This weekly tradition survived to this day, evolving into the longest-running continuous classical music program in radio history. In the 1990s, the broadcast series expanded its transmissions to Europe, Australia, New Zealand, Mexico and Brazil.
"Truly American operas"
The 20th century saw the rise of the "truly American" opera, characterized by drawing upon distinctly American themes, settings, and musical styles, such as jazz and gospel music. In this sense, the first American operas emerged in 1937, with the premieres of Virgil Thomson's Four Saints in Three Acts, based on a libretto by Gertrude Stein, and George Gershwin's Porgy and Bess. The first opera was an immediate success, but subsequently disappeared from the repertoire. The latter, however, became a long-running success and the emblematic "Black Opera", despite being written and composed by three white people. Ten years later, in 1947, immigrant Kurt Weill (1900–1950) composed the score for Street Scene, a 1929 play about a domestic tragedy in a tenement during an oppressive heat wave. The play was by Elmer Rice, the lyrics by Langston Hughes.
The opera was described by John McWhorter as "dark and hopless, with angular melodies and busy ensembles – yet all of it immediately relatableon first hearing." The American Indian opera also emerged in the early 20th century, as both Native American composers and librettists, such as Zitkala-Ša (Yankton Dakota) and non-Native composers and librettists drew on Native American characters, stories, and music to create new operas.
Television transmissions
When it comes to opera on television, the British and Germans were slightly ahead. BBC launched the world's first regular high-definition public television service – including opera – in late 1936, the Germans broadcast Bastien und Bastienne by Mozart in 1939. On March 10, 1940, NBC hosted a landmark broadcast featuring the Metropolitan Opera, performing live scenes from Carmen, Pagliacci and The Barber of Seville. The 1950s brought us operas commissioned specifically for the television format, i.e. Amahl and the Night Visitors by Gian Carlo Menotti on Christmas Eve 1951. It attracted five million viewers, then an astronomical number. The NBC Opera Theatre was in existence from 1949 to 1964, it aired about five full productions per season, usually on Sunday afternoons. In October 1953, they broadcast Bizet's Carmen, marking the first time an opera was televised in color.
After commercial networks abandoned opera, public broadcasting stepped in, this time capturing actual live stage performances, predominantly from the Met. In March 1977, the Metropolitan Opera officially entered regular TV programming with Live from the Met – first with a landmark performance of Puccini's La bohème, starring Luciano Pavarotti and Renata Scotto.
Marian Anderson
Contralto Marian Anderson, born 1897, became a symbol of the Civil rights movement; in 1955, she was the first Black artist to perform in a leading role at the Met und hereby she opened the field to such stars as Leontyne Price, Grace Bumbry, and Jessye Norman, redefining who could occupy the center of the operatic stage, changing the industry itself. After being denied the right to sing at Constitution Hall in Washington, D.C., in 1939 by the Daughters of the American Revolution due to her race, she performed for 75,000 people on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. In 1955, she was already nearing the end of her career, but her presence was a moral earthquake for the institution. General Manager Rudolf Bing cast her as Ulrica in Un ballo in maschera. The audience erupted in thunderous applause before she could even sing her first note.
Post-war period
After World War II, the Ford Foundation began financially supporting the New York City Opera, in an attempt to promote more new American operas. In 1958, at the World's fair in Brussels, American culture was represented by Susannah, an opera by Carlisle Floyd, first performed at the Florida State University in 1955. Susannah Polk, an innocent girl of 18 years, is targeted as a sinner in the small mountain town of New Hope Valley in Tennessee. In 1957, Susannah had won the New York Music Critics' Circle Award. It became one of the most performed American operas.
Maria Callas
The name Maria Callas is associated with perfectionism, glamour, and scandals. She was born in New York City on December 2, 1923, which made her, the daughter of Greek immigrants, an American citizen. Nevertheless, she had little career luck in her home country. As a little girl, she performed in two school productions of Gilbert and Sullivan operettas at New York P.S. 164. In 1945, the Met offered her a beginner's contract with Madama Butterly and Fidelio on tour in Philadelphia; she declined. In 1946, she was engaged to re-open the opera house of Chicago as Turandot, but the company folded before opening. Her career then started in Europe, in Verona (in La Gioconda, 1946), Venice (with Wagner and Bellini), Florence and Catania (as Norma), Turin, Rome and Naples (as Turandot), and finally at La Scala in Milan (as Aida, 1950).
While she rushed from success to success in Europe and Latin America, in Buenos Aires in 1949, and with the season opening at the Scala in 1951, the USA hesitated with invitations. It wasn't until 1954 that an invitation arrived for the Lyric Opera of Chicago. There she debuted in five roles in 1954 and 1955 − singing the title roles of Norma, La traviata, Lucia di Lammermoor and Madama Butterfly as well as Elvira in I puritani and Leonora in Il trovatore. Her Met debut came in 1956 – opening the season with Norma. This was followed by the title roles in Tosca and Lucia di Lammermoor. She was hated by a small group of opera lovers, but most visitors were devotedly enthusiastic. People queued for days to get tickets and slept on the streets. , 1954 In 1957, she was scheduled to open the season in San Francisco. Disagreements arose, leading to her cancellation.
The general manager of the San Francisco Opera, Kurt Adler, barred her from performing in any other operas in the United States for a certain period. Between 1958 and 1959, she performed three roles at the Dallas Opera — Médée, Violetta and Lucia. In February and March 1958 she returned to the Met — as Violetta, Lucia and Tosca. Thereafter, a protracted scandal unfolded. Met's General Manager Rudolf Bing, considered authoritarian and reactionary regarding the Met's repertoire, wanted her to alternate between singing Lady Macbeth and Violetta Valery in La traviata during the tour. She refused on artistic grounds, arguing that it was impossible to switch between a highly dramatic role and a coloratura part in such short intervals. Bing then expelled her.
In January 1959, she returned triumphantly to New York and took on the leading female role in a concert performance of Il pirata at Carnegie Hall. The audience roared with enthusiasm. Six years later, a kind of reconciliation took place. Rudolf Bing invited Callas to appear twice as Tosca at the Met. The house was sold out. Again, there were rapturous applause. In 1966, she renounced her American citizenship, hoping for a marriage that would never take place.
Overlaps with Broadway
It is difficult to draw a line between opera on the one hand, and operetta and musical on the other. Two masterpieces of American composers were first presented on Broadway: Porgy and Bess (1935) and West Side Story (1957). The former is now firmly established in the operatic repertoire, i.e. at the Met, while Bernstein's musical still runs as entertainment in the US, whereas in Europe it is part of the canon of many opera houses. A similar fate befalls My Fair Lady, Candide and many works by Richard Rodgers, Stephen Sondheim or Andrew Lloyd Webber, which belong to both worlds or stand in between of them. Also Regina, an opera by Marc Blitzstein based on the Lilian Hellman play The Little Foxes, premiered on Broadway in 1949. Regina has been said to represent American verismo and to straddle the line between entertainment and so-called serious music.
The work gained better success in 1953 at the City Centre Opera in a new version with greatly expanded orchestration, giving the work a more "operatic" sound. The opera represents an ardent criticism of capitalism.
Festivals
Following the example of the first European festivals – Bayreuth (1876), Verona (1913), Salzburg (1920) and Glyndebourne (1934) – also in the United States several opera festivals were established in the second half of the 20th century. The Santa Fe Opera and the Glimmerglass Festival have emerged as platforms for showcasing innovation, experimentation, and the vibrant array of voices within the operatic tradition. In 1957, the Santa Fe Opera was founded, then the only outdoor theatre in America exclusively designed for opera. It seated 480 and was opened with Puccinis Madama Butterfly. It was enlarged in 1968 and 1998 and now seats 2,128 plus 106 standees. It has achieved an longstanding reputation for carefully selecting young talented singers. The public can observe New Mexico sunsets and participate in traditional tailgate dining during the intermission.
Also the Wolf Trap Opera Company, established in 1971, became known as a premiere residency for emerging singers. It is located in Virginia, in the nations only National Park for the Performing Arts. Through an annual audition tour, its artists are selected from among the best classical vocalists in the USA. The Glimmerglass Festival, founded in 1975, is located in Otsego County in Upstate New York. Each summer, more than 40 performances of four operas are offered. First the operas were performed in the Cooperstown High School Auditorium, in June 1987 the Alice Busch Opera Theater was opened. Since then, it is the venue of the festival. Spoleto Festival USA was established by composer Gian Carlo Menotti in 1977 as a counterpart to the original Spoleto Festival in Italy, founded by Menotti in 1958. It is a multi-disciplinary festival with a strong focus on opera.
It is located in Charleston, South Carolina. In addition, there are summer seasons at the Opera Theatre of Saint Louis in Missouri, at the Des Moines Metro Opera in Iowa and at the Central City Opera in Colorado. They each present three to four operas every year.
Eight primadonnas
In the 19th century, it was considered good form to engage European singers for the leading roles. Americans mostly appeared only as comprimario singers. Two factors gradually changed this. Firstly, vocal training improved significantly at the turn of the century; secondly, step by step Americans embraced the art form as their own. The Metropolitan Opera was founded in 1883, and its first tour took place in 1884, visiting Boston, Philadelphia, Chicago, St. Louis, Cincinnati, Washington D.C., and Baltimore. The enormous success of Enrico Caruso in America between 1903 and 1920 also inspired many young Americans to pursue a singing career.
Besides Maria Callas and Marian Anderson, an alto, eight sopranos established themselves as opera stars worldwide during the 20th century: Rosa Ponselle, born just like Anderson in 1897, was frequently cited by peers as one of the greatest voices of all time. She became a legendary Met star. Leontyne Price, born 1927, was one of the defining voices of the 20th century, she became the first Black opera singer to achieve sustained international stardom. Beverly Sills, born 1929, revitalized the bel canto repertoire for American audiences and later-on became director of New York City Opera. Marilyn Horne, born 1934, was a virtuoso of coloraturas who single-handedly resurrected forgotten bel canto and Baroque roles. Grace Bumbry, born 1937, became the first Black Venus in Tannhäuser at the Bayreuth Festival.
Jessye Norman, born 1945, was known for her immense, dark-hued voice and unparalleled versatility. She was a major figure on the global stage for decades and a passionate advocate for the recognition of African American musical heritage. Renée Fleming is known for her elegance and the lightness of her cantilenas. Joyce DiDonato impresses the public with dramatic intensity and vocal agility in Baroque and Romantic works. There have to be mentioned also Eileen Farrell, who often sang with Leonard Bernstein, Cathy Berberian, a very versatile mezzo soprano, as well as the coloratura sopranos Roberta Peters and Reri Grist.
There were also a number of male colleagues from the USA who became opera stars in the 20th century – for example, the tenor Richard Tucker, the baritones Leonard Warren, Robert Merrill, Sherrill Milnes, and Thomas Hampson, the bass-baritones George London and Simon Estes, and the bass Samuel Ramey.
New and larger opera houses
In the second half of the 20th century, some truly gigantic opera houses were built in the USA. Their monumental style was intended to underscore the importance of these "temples of art." In 1966, the largest opera house of the world, the Metropolitan Opera in New York (with 3.800 seats and 175 standees) was inaugurated. Despite its enormous size, the acoustics are phenomenal. The main curtain, made of silk damask, is the largest in the world. The New Met is situated at the Lincoln Center on Broadway, Upper West Side. A massive, multi-million-dollar campaign was launched by artists, preservationists, and politicians (including the Mayor of New York and the Governor), its title was "Save the Met", meaning the Old Met at 39th Street and Broadway. They tried to get the building designated as a historic landmark, but failed. The Old Met was demolished in 1967.
The Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. was inaugurated in 1971. Its largest hall seats 2,465, it was the residence of the Washington National Opera until beginning of 2026, after the Trump takeover of the Kennedy Center. Home of the Houston Grand Opera is the Wortham Center for the Performing Arts, which opened in 1987. Its Alice and George Brown Theater has exactly 2,405 seats. Despite its size, the furthest seat from the stage is only 138 feet away, keeping the performances feeling relatively intimate. The Bass Performance Hall was completed in 1998, it seats 2,056 persons. Since its completion it is the home of the Fort Worth Opera.
Leonard Bernstein
One of the most influential figures in opera in the United States was the pianist, conductor, and composer Leonard Bernstein (1918–1990), although none of his stage works has ever been produced by the Met, either during his lifetime or since his death. A son of Jewish immigrants from Ukraine, he was born in Massachusetts. He began giving piano lessons at an early age, overcoming his father's opposition to a musical career. He studied music at Harvard University and quickly became known for his ability to communicate and share his enthusiasm about music. Much of his career took him outside the traditional paths of American opera. In 1953, he debuted at La Scala with Cherubini's Médée, starring Maria Callas, followed by Bellini's La sonnambula two years later. He was the first American music director of the New York Philharmonic (1958–1969).
He was very much appreciated by the Viennese public — both at the Musikverein with the Vienna Philharmonic and at the State Opera, where he debuted in 1966 with Falstaff and where he last conducted his own opera A Quiet Place in 1986. Other conducting engagements at the State Opera included a celebrated Fidelio production, Der Rosenkavalier, his own Mass, Beethoven's Ninth and Mahler's Second. At the Met, however, he only conducted three operas: Falstaff (1964), Cavalleria rusticana (1970) and Carmen (1972), starring Marilyn Horne and James McCracken. His musicals On the Town (1944), Wonderful Town (1953), Candide (1956, revised in 1974), and West Side Story (1957) premiered on Broadway. Especially West Side Story became a smashing hit worldwide.
The two operas Trouble in Tahiti (1952) and A Quiet Place (1984) center on Sam and Dinah, a seemingly successful married couple whose relationship has become distant. Most important for opera in the USA were his television appearances, in which he explained operas nationwide and gave free rein to his enthusiasm, for example the 1958 episode What Makes Opera Grand? at Omnibus.
American composers and global recognition
On January 27, 1972, the world premiere of Treemonisha by Scott Joplin took place in Atlanta, using the orchestration by T. J. Anderson. The work had been completed in 1911 and although the composer's widow tried hard, she did not succeed in getting the opera performed. Only 19 years after her death, Treemonisha was brought to the stage. It was an immediate success, several productions in the States and abroad followed. In the second half of the 20th-century, the number of American opera companies continued to grow, but operas written by American composers and librettists were often overlooked, receiving fewer performances and premieres.
In the mid-1980s, a collaboration between Opera America, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Rockefeller Foundation began, in hopes of reinvigorating the opera scene, particularly encouraging the creation and performance of American-written operas. The collaboration was seen as a success, particularly because of its outreach to a younger audience; additionally, technology now made it even easier to provide subtitles at performances, allowing for better comprehension of performances. During the post-war period, American composers such as Samuel Barber, Gian Carlo Menotti, and Leonard Bernstein emerged and gained worldwide recognition for their remarkable contributions to opera. Their works – for example Vanessa (1958), The Consul (1950) or Trouble in Tahiti (1952) – showcased a sense of confidence and individuality in American operatic expression.
Also Coplands The Tender Land (1954) and Wards The Crucible (1961) deserve to be mentioned. The American Opera Society (founded in 1951) played a crucial role in commissioning and promoting new American works, contributing to the global operatic repertoire.
End of the Met National Tours
The last Met National Tour took place from May 5 to May 31, 1986. It visited only four cities – Boston, Cleveland, Atlanta, and Minneapolis. Among the participating artists were Grace Bumbry, Cornell MacNeil and James McCracken; among the operas performed were such hits as Aida, Carmen, La traviata and Tosca. The decision to cease the tours was taken by General Manager Bruce Crawford because they were losing roughly $1 million per week. After the final performance in Minneapolis the sets and props and costumes per packed into the famous Opera Train who headed back to New York.
Opera in the movies
in Phantom of the Opera, 1943 Throughout cinema history, there have been very different approaches to integrating operas or arias into films: * Citizen Kane (1941) is an epic by Orson Welles about a millionaire constructing an opera house for his wife. Welles directed the film and played the title role. He had a completely fictional opera written to structurally mimic a real 19th-century grand production. His desperation to manufacture a talent leads to the screeching, terrified performance of his wife, portrayed by Dorothy Comingore, a tragic public humiliation driven entirely by the rich man's ego. * Carmen Jones (1954) is a direct, localized translation of the complete opera score of Bizet's Carmen. Director Otto Preminger adapted the story into a landmark African-American musical set during World War II, starring Dorothy Dandridge and Harry Belafonte.
The entire structure of Bizet's drama is preserved, tracking a tragic romance at a military parachute factory. * The Untouchables (1987) is famous for Brian De Palma intercutting the simultaneous scenes of the brutal murder of Al Capone's rival on the streets with mob boss Robert De Niro weeping tears while listening to "Vesti la giubba", the aria of the heartbroken clown from Leoncavallo's Pagliacci. * Pretty Woman (1990) showcases Julia Roberts stunned by her first opera, La traviata, at the San Francisco Opera House, invited by gentlemanly Richard Gere with champagne and a private jet. * The Age of Innocence (1993) presents an opera house as a fishbowl where the upper class watches, judges, and gossips about one another. Martin Scorsese uses Gounod's opera Faust to establish the rigid, suffocating social codes of New York in the 1870s.
The characters barely look on the stage. * The Shawshank Redemption (1994) shows Andy Dufresne lock himself in the warden's office and play "Canzonetta sull'aria" from Mozart's The Marriage of Figaro over the prison public address system. It has been called one of cinema's most transcendent moments. Although mostly a British production, we also want to mention the James Bond film Quantum of Solace (2008). It features highly-regarded sequences in modern action cinema: a giant eye from the Bregenz Festival's production of Tosca. In the US, 23,5 million tickets were sold for this movie.
Next generation of American composers
Three American composers gained recognition worldwide in the 1980s, the 1990s and at the beginning of the new century: * Philip Glass (born 1937) is widely regarded as the most important representative of Minimal music. He achieved instant fame with Einstein on the Beach (1976), a collaboration with director and set designer Robert Wilson, who was especially celebrated in Europe. Satyagraha (1980), Akhnaten (1983), The Voyage (1992), and The Perfect American (2013) followed. He also wrote the scores for Broadway productions such as the revivals of The Elephant Man (2002), The Crucible (2016), and King Lear (2019). For the latter he won the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Music in a Play. * John Adams (born 1947) is considered a post-minimalist composer.
His early fame rested on the immediate success of a documentary-style opera called Nixon in China (1987), followed by the scandal-ridden Death of Klinghoffer (1991) and Doctor Atomic (2005), a piece about J. Robert Oppenheimer in Los Alamos. Especially Nixon in China has been performed all over Europe and is still on the roster of many opera houses after forty years. * Jake Heggie (born 1961) describes himself as a theatre composer who is concerned with "serving the drama" and "exploring character." His first opera made a long lasting impression – Dead Man Walking, commissioned by San Francisco Opera, first performed at the War Memorial Opera House on October 7, 2000, and immediately acclaimed by public and press. Dead Man Walking is the first and only opera situated in a condemned row of a High security prison, it ends with the execution of Joseph De Rocher, a convicted murderer.
Thereafter Sister Helen, who had accompanied him during his time on death row and who wrote the book, stands over his body and sings her hymn one last time. This opera secured its place on the roster of major opera houses. Heggie struggled to replicate the success of his debut, five less successful operas followed. But with Moby Dick (2010), he achieved a second major success. The works of these composers demonstrate that the choice of themes in the USA is far more tangible and grounded in reality than current European opera productions. A significant discrepancy is also evident in the musical style: while Europe still somehow adheres to the twelve-tone technique, American composers do not shy away from accusations of prioritizing popularity and audibility.
Evan Johnson writes: "An 'American Composer', by contrast, operates – or can be successfully interpreted as operating – without the same sense of obligation to history as his European counterpart ; his or her concern is the present, the tightly bounded experience of a particular work by a particular audience as created by a particular composer with particular interests."
First trend toward literary operas
In Europe, at the turn between the 19th and 20th centuries, the genre of literary opera was created – with Pelléas and Mélisande, Salome, and subsequently The Cunning Little Vixen and Wozzeck as first examples – based on works by Maeterlinck, Oscar Wilde, Těsnohlídek, and Büchner.
This trend arrived in the United States much later and reached a peak at the end of the century: * Regina, the 1939 play The Little Foxes by Lilian Hellman, set in music in 1949 by Marc Blitzstein, * Of Mice and Men, the 1937 novella by John Steinbeck, set in music in 1970 by Carlisle Floyd, * A Streetcar Named Desire, the 1947 play by Tennessee Williams, set in music in 1998 by André Previn, * Little Women, the 1869 novel by Louisa May Alcott, set in music in 1998 by Mark Adamo, * The Handmaid's Tale, the 1985 novel by Margaret Atwood, set in music in 1998 by Danish Poul Ruders, and * The Great Gatsby, the 1925 novel by F. Scott Fitzgerald, set in music in 1999 by John Harbison In all these cases, the strength of the plot (and the prominence of the author) ensured that an audience far removed from modernity could be intrigued.
Of course, due to the powerful imagery of the film adaptations – as with The Great Gatsby or later The Shining – there was often a risk that the operatic reality might not live up to expectations, thus inevitably leading to disappointment.
LGBTQ themes
In the 1990s, two major operas with queer representation broke the rule of the unspeakable: * Stewart Wallace's Harvey Milk (1995), an adaptation of the life of famed San Francisco Supervisor, and * Paula M. Kimper's Patience and Sarah (1998), which showcased opera's first lesbian relationship. Both operas achieved mainstream success. Once the barrier was broken, also a successful Broadway play – Angels in America by Tony Kushner – and a Hollywood blockbuster – Brokeback Mountain by Ang Lee – could be converted into operas, the first one by Hungarian composer Péter Eötvös (), the latter by American Charles Wuorinen (Madrid 2014). Terence Blanchard's queer-themed operas Champion (2013) and Fire Shut Up in My Bones (2019), based on the memoir of journalist Charles M. Blow, both premiered in St. Louis. Both became major hits at traditional American opera houses like the Met.
In 2016, Gregory Spears presented his opera Fellow Travelers, following a romance between two men working in the U.S. government, set in the 1950s; it premiered at the Cincinnati Opera. American-Canadian singer-songwriter Rufus Wainwright created Hadrian, exploring the epic, historical love between the Roman Emperor Hadrian and Antinous; this opera premiered in Toronto in 2018. Finally, the 2014 chamber opera As One by Laura Kaminsky shows the transition journey of a transgender woman. Several contemporary composers were, or are, openly gay — Blanchard, Heggie, Puts, Spears, and Wuorinen. Two composers, Barber and Menotti, were living in a long-term relationship; Leonard Bernstein was bisexual.
Still, there aren't many openly LGBTQ singers in the USA today; they include Jamie Barton, Lucas Bouk, Michael Fabiano, John Holiday, Lucia Lucas, Holden Madagame, Brian Mulligan, Breanna Sinclairé, Russell Thomas, Davóne Tines, and the married couple Beth Clayton and Patricia Racette. Two music directors of the Met were, or are, gay: James Levine, who held the position from 1976 to 2017, avoided coming out throughout his life. He was dismissed following allegations of sexual harassment and died in 2021. His successor, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, is openly gay. He is married to the violist and chorus master Pierre Tourville..
21st century
The American opera scene has witnessed a surge in diversity during the 21st century, as various companies have embraced a broad spectrum of repertoire. In the first decades of the 21st century, women pushed their way into leadership positions in opera – first as conductors and directors, then also as composers and artistic directors. The trend to use monumental literary masterpieces for the operatic stage continued – with opera versions of novels by Herman Melville, or John Steinbeck, or a play by Noël Coward, even films like Breaking the Waves by Lars von Trier. Finally, some of the most important opera houses faced crises in the 2020s – for example, the Metropolitan Opera in New York due to financial difficulties, and the Washington National Opera due to the political restructuring of the Kennedy Center.
Opera education, Met Radio and Met Live in HD
The U.S. has become a hub for opera education, with institutions such as the Juilliard School and the Curtis Institute of Music fostering the training of aspiring opera professionals. The Metropolitan Opera's Lindemann Young Artist Development Program continues to nurture emerging talent. Opera's influence on American culture persists as it tackles modern-day concerns through inventive performances and partnerships. Composers such as Miguel del Águila have written numerous operas, among them Time and Again Barela, commissioned by the city of Albuquerque for its tricentennial celebration. In 2006, the Metropolitan Opera Radio was founded, it can be heard in 40 countries. In the same year the Metropolitan Opera Live in HD series began regularly broadcasting live, high-definition Saturday matinee performances via satellite to movie theaters across the United States and worldwide.
This modern iteration functions exactly like the "regular TV transmissions" of the past, using multi-camera arrays and live intermission interviews, but delivers the experience to a collective theater audience.
Literary masterworks set in music
Once again literary masterworks were used as librettos for a series of contemporary operas: * Brief Encounter, based on Noël Coward's play Still Life, set in music in 2007 by André Previn, * The Grapes of Wrath, the 1939 novel by John Steinbeck, set in music in 2007 by Ricky Ian Gordon, * Moby-Dick, the 1851 novel by Herman Melville, set in music in 2010 by Jake Heggie, * Cold Mountain, the 1997 novel by Charles Frazier, set in music in 2015 by Jennifer Higdon, * Bel Canto, the 2001 novel by Ann Patchett, set in music in 2015 by Peruvian composer Jimmy López, * The Shining, the 1977 novel by Stephen King, set in music in 2016 by Paul Moravec, and * The Hours, the 1998 novel by Michael Cunningham, set in music in 2022 by Kevin Puts.
Also Dead Man Walking (2000) by Jake Heggie, Fellow Travelers (2016) by Gregory Spears, Proving Up (2018) by Missy Mazzoli and Fire Shut Up in My Bones (2019) by Terence Blanchard fall into this category.
Female composers, female point of view
Until 2016, the Metropolitan Opera had only ever staged one opera by a woman: Ethel Smyth's Der Wald in 1903. This 113-year streak was finally broken by L'Amour de loin, an already successful opera by Finnish composer Kaija Saariaho from 2000 – paving the way for the current surge of American women's works on that stage, such as Jeanine Tesori, Gabriela Lena Frank and Missy Mazzoli. 2014 Suddenly and unexpectedly, around 2015, a brigade of female composers emerged in North America, making a name for themselves with new operatic works such as adaptations of successful films or explorations of social justice themes.
Three colleagues had helped pave the way: * Composer Thea Musgrave (born 1928), originally from Scotland, created among others Mary, Queen of Scots and Simón Bolívar, the latter first shown in 1995 in Norfolk, Virginia. * Meredith Monk (born 1942) creates total works of art that blends music, dance, film, and theater into a single, immersive experience. She often refers to her stage works as "Musik-Theater" or "Opera Epics", as they break almost every rule of the classical genre. Her most formal opera, Atlas, commissioned by Houston Grand Opera and for the first time performed in 1991, follows the journey of a young woman seeking spiritual enlightenment across the globe. * Libby Larsen (born 1950) is still one of America's most prolific and most performed living composers.
Her catalogue of compositions contains more than 500 works, she has worked for every genre of classical music, including 15 operas/chamber operas. In 1990, her opera Frankenstein: The Modern Prometheus premiered at the Minnesota Opera. The newcomers of the new millennium are: * Missy Mazzoli (born 1980) became known for dark, visceral soundscapes. She succeeded in 2016 with Breaking the Waves for Opera Philadelphia, an adaptation of the legendary film by Lars von Trier, and in 2018 with Proving Up for Washington National Opera, Opera Omaha and Miller Theatre at Columbia University, based on a short story by Karen Russell. Her fourth opera, The Listeners, premiered in 2022 at the Oslo Opera House, can be considered a modern gothic opera.
Due to her rapid career advancement, Washington Classical Review called Missy Mazzoli "a rock star of the classical world". * Ellen Reid (born 1966) won the 2019 Pulitzer Prize for Music for her opera Prism, which explores the psychological effects of trauma. * Jeanine Tesori (born 1961) created Blue (2019), focusing on police violence, and Grounded (2023), exploring the psychological toll of remote drone warfare. Blue premiered at the Glimmerglass Festival and has been performed at major opera houses, i.e. Chicago and Washington. It won Best New Opera, awarded by the Music Critics Association of North America. Grounded was commissioned by the Met. * Du Yun (born 1977) often blends operatic tradition with punk and experimental sound.
Her opera Angel's Bone is a harrowing allegory for the modern-day exploitation of vulnerable individuals, using angels to address human trafficking in today's world. The libretto was written by Royce Vavrek. The opera won 2017 Pulitzer Prize. * Gabriela Lena Frank (born 1972) frequently integrates her Peruvian-Chinese-Jewish heritage into her operatic work. In 2022, she presented El último sueño de Frida y Diego, a work co-commissioned by San Diego Opera, San Francisco Opera, Fort Worth Opera, and the DePauw University School of Music. It is considered one of the most successful "Bio-Operas" of the 21st century, i.e.operas based on historical figures. When the opera was presented at the Met in 2023, it was their first ever production in Spanish language.
The opera was shown also at the Lyric Opera of Chicago (in March 2026). * Laura Kaminsky (born 1956) is mainly known for As One, but she also composed Time to Act, commissioned by Pittsburgh Opera, Opera Montana and Boston Conservatory at Berklee, with additional funding by Opera Santa Barbara. The opera tackles the issue of school violence. With The Handmaid's Tale, composed by Danish Poul Ruders, the feminist scenario of Margaret Atwood was brought to the opera stage in 2000. Also Toni Morrison contributed vehemently to the implementation of the female view in the operatic world – first in 2005 in Detroit with the opera Margaret Garner, composed by Richard Danielpour, then in 2011 with the play Desdemona, created in cooperation with Peter Sellars and Rokia Traoré.
The opera is loosely based on actual events in the life of runaway slave Margaret Garner, who killed her two children to prevent them being returned to slavery.
The singers
at the National Memorial Day Concert, 2017 In 2014, Renée Fleming became the first opera singer to perform the national anthem at a Super Bowl. Her performance at Super Bowl XLVIII at MetLife Stadium was notable for its elegance and was seen by many as a significant moment for classical music in the American mainstream. Among the most successful US American singers of the 21st century are Matthew Polenzani, Joyce DiDonato, Christine Goerke, Stephanie Blythe, Lawrence Brownlee, Angela Meade and counter tenor Anthony Roth Costanzo. All of them perform regularly in Europa.
Times of crisis
The 2020s brought crisis to opera in the US, it suffered massive shortfall. The companies reported dwindling ticket sales, rising costs and slumping philanthropy. According to a report about the Detroit Opera by The Free Press contributions fell $1,889,226 from fiscal year 2023 to 2024, primarily due to a $1,744,477 loss of government grants. Public donations fell by $145,749. Two prominent institutions were hit especially hard: the Met and the Washington National Opera. The Met found itself in a desperate hunt for cash. It looked to a foreign government, to new strategies, even to outer space, in order to sustain the country's largest performing arts organization. Since 2024, the Met had to withdrew many millions from its endowment to address declining revenues, at least a third of its once sacrosanct fund.
General manager Peter Gelb sought help from Saudi Arabia – offering five winter seasons in Riyadh – and even courted Elon Musk, promising the tech billionaire – only half jokingly – to produce an opera in outer space, i.e. Tosca on planet Mars. In February 2026, the Met even considered selling its Marc Chagall murals at Lincoln Center, as long as the new owner accepts the condition that the art works remain in the opera house. In January 2026 it was announced that Washington National Opera is leaving the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, its home since 1971. Artistic director Francesca Zambello, who has led the company for 14 seasons, shared her regrets and her hopes, that the WNO ″remains committed to its mission and artistic vision″.
After the hostile takeover of the Kennedy Center by the Trump administration, there was no room any longer for productions such as Treemonisha or The Crucible. WNO returned to its origins, the Lisner Auditorium at George Washington University, a private institution. There, both Treemonisha and The Crucible received enthusiastic acclaim from the public and the press, sold-out performances and standing ovations. The Washington Post called Zambellos staging of The Crucible by Arthur Miller and Robert Ward ″gripping″.
First Hawaiian opera
Set in the mid-nineteenth century, the opera Kamalehua, The Shelteing Tree, is notably the first opera to be written and performed primarily in Hawaiian language (ʻŌlelo Hawaiʻi). It reveals the little-known history of the Hawaiian kingdom and its early struggles to maintain independence. The opera tells the true story of Timoteo Haʻalilio, royal secretary and lifelong friend to king Kamehameha III. In the years 1842 to 1845 Haʻalilio travelled to the United States, to Great Britain, Belgium, and France to secure treaties recognizing Hawaiʻi as a sovereign nation. He wanted to protect the kingdom from annexation by foreigners. Haʻalilio was accompanied by the Reverend William Richards, a trusted advisor. The opera premiered in 2026 at the Hawaii Opera Theatre.
See also
*Opera in Latin America *American Indian opera *List of North American opera companies
Further reading
*"Opera", entry in The United States Encyclopedia of History, vol. 13 * *