Music: Spring Opera

In their search for operatic material, modern composers have been diligently flailing the literary bushes. Three of the latest finds have livened the slack springtime opera season:

¶ German Composer Werner Egk (rhymes with peck), who at 56 has five other operas behind him (including The Magic Violin, Columbus, Irish Legend), was casting about last year for the makings of a comic opera ("I didn't want to see them leave unhappy") when he reread Gogol's The Inspector General. Egk decided it was just the kind of thing he needed. He hacked down Gogol's sprawling list of characters to a manageable 13, set...

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