Three Decembers • Press Coverage
Critical Acclaim
“The opera provides a vastly rewarding evening of music drama and aptly demonstrates a raison d’etre for Heggie’s viability as an opera composer: his music is primarily character-driven. Time and again, we are aurally reminded of someone’s affective experience… Heggie’s people move us because they have musical souls.”
Opera News
“Three Decembers is a modern masterpiece, and it documents the unusually intense collaboration between Heggie and librettist Gene Scheer, his partner also in Moby-Dick. It is a triumph for Central City… Heggie’s voice remains his own – closer here to Broadway than the Met. It is music that speaks to the heart; it provokes feeling and demands emotional reaction. He is clearly America’s No. 1 opera composer.”
Opera Today
“It’s sharp and witty and poignant… Heggie has provided smart, simple, accessible music to flesh out the characters’ tangled emotions, with long stretches of instrumentally-driven parlando giving way to tender lyrical episodes. The score reminds you how achingly expressive a simple song can be. Heggie loves the singing voice and he writes beautifully for singers.”
Chicago Tribune
“Like earlier works by Heggie, such as Dead Man Walking, the music here is tuneful and expressive, with his usual affinity for the human voice. But the composer’s complex uncompromising language gives the score backbone and never allows it to sink into sentimentalism.”
Denver Post
“The opera provides a vastly rewarding evening of music drama and aptly demonstrates a raison d’etre for Heggie’s viability as an opera composer: his music is primarily character-driven. Time and again, we are aurally reminded of someone’s affective experience… Heggie’s people move us because they have musical souls.”
Opera News
“Jake Heggie and Gene Scheer have created a first-rate modern American work that proves that the new American opera is alive and well.”
Opera Online
“It is so lovely to come across a new, vibrant modern chamber opera that both enchants and soothes. So is the case with Jake Heggie’s Chicago premiere of Three Decembers…the finest modern opera I’ve seen. Who said that no one is writing enchantingly wonderful new operas? See Jake Heggie’s marvelous new work, it’ll dazzle you. The opening night audience gave Three Decembers a roaring standing ovation. It sure deserved it.”
Chicago Critic
“It’s hard to imagine any work in recent years that has filled us with so much hope for the survival of the art form. Heggie… even played one of the two pianos himself, with a dexterity and sensitivity that recalled those scratchy recordings of Gershwin playing his stuff. Three Decembers is intimate, thought-provoking, clearly heartfelt by all concerned and touching from beginning to end.”
Arts Houston Magazine
“Heggie’s music is tuneful and emotionally engaging, perfectly supporting the wide-ranging moods of the action. All the elements that make a great opera were present and they worked together perfectly.”
Edinburgh Music Review
“Any opera featuring the luminous mezzo Frederica von Stade at its center already has a lot going for it… And our composer has given her some wonderful musical moments that play to all her interpretive strengths … The music was typically tuneful, dramatic Heggie.”
Opera Today
“Conceived and written for Frederica von Stade, the principal role of Madeline is admirably created for her… The music has the merit of being eminently singable with an immediate melodic charm. The orchestration is enveloping, with beautiful moments as in Charlie’s second act monologue, with a declamation approaching Britten.”
Opéra Magazine
“When Heggie is on stage there’s no Capriccio-style clamour about words versus music. He’s a setter of words, a composer first of songs, then of operas and musical scenes in which the text comes first. [Three Decembers] is lush and listenable, warm and warming; it’s accessible and affirmative in gesture.”
Opera Now