The opening night audience applauded politely at the curtain, but with nothing like the wild enthusiasm that greeted 2012’s Nixon in China. Caption slip reads: 'Photographer: Monteverde. Overall, Girls of the Golden West is a dispiriting experience, given the potential in the source material and John Adams’s enormous compositional skills. Sellars's previous collaborations with Adams have included premiere productions of Nixon in China, The Death of Klinghoffer and Doctor Atomic (for which Sellars also wrote the libretto). Sharon Girot Janet Worthington Judi Anderson Rose Ann Longo Preston Jenuine Lorraine Inco. According to Sellars, "These true stories of the Forty-Niners are overwhelming in their heroism, passion and cruelty, telling tales of racial conflicts, colorful and humorous exploits, political strife and struggles to build anew a life and to decide what it would mean to be American." Adams wrote, "To be able to set to music the authentic voices of these people, whether from their letters or their songs or from newspaper accounts from their time, is a great privilege for me." Sellars, who also directed the opera, conceived the libretto while doing research for a production of Giacomo Puccini's 1910 opera La fanciulla del West (based on David Belasco's 1905 play The Girl of the Golden West), which also deals with the gold rush period. Recorded nearly 30 years after the duo’s heyday when they were one of the most popular country acts on radio and on record, here are 27 hauntingly beautiful recordings Dolly and Millie Good made in the early 1960’s. A night of harmonies hosted by Nora O’Connor with special guests Liam Davis, Amalea Tschilds, Mary Dee Reynolds, Steve Frisbie & Danny Black. The libretto is also sourced from other literature of the period, including newspaper articles and the writings of Mark Twain. Tomorrow night Living out more of my Trio fantasies. Clappe published the letters under the pen name Dame Shirley. The opera is inspired by the 1851/1852 letters of Louise Clappe, who lived for a year and a half in the mining settlement of Rich Bar (now Diamondville, California) during the California Gold Rush. The opera was premiered in San Francisco on November 21, 2017. Girls of the Golden West is a new exhibit at the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum, Tuesday, June 23, 2020. Doug Hoke/The Oklahoman The Potter, Maria (Martinez) by Willard Stone. The San Francisco Opera commissioned the work jointly with Dallas Opera, the Dutch National Opera (De Nationale Opera) and Teatro La Fenice in Venice. Girls of the Golden West is a new exhibit at the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum, Tuesday, June 23, 2020. Girls of the Golden West is an opera in two acts with music by John Adams and a libretto by Peter Sellars.