Other than the cherry tree in George Washington's backyard, the most celebrated American victims of an ax are Andrew and Abigail Borden, who were cut down in their Fall River, Mass., home on a hot summer morning in 1892. Although their daughter Lizzie was acquitted of the crime, legend—in the form of books, plays and even a ballet—has found her guilty. Last week the New York City Opera presented Lizzie again as the strong-willed woman of the legend in a striking new opera by U.S. Composer Jack Beeson.
In this opera, commissioned by the Ford Foundation, Librettist Kenward Elmslie has taken dramatic liberty with both fact and legend. Lizzie (Soprano Brenda Lewis), actually the younger Borden daughter, has become the older one, obsessed by fears of approaching spinsterhood, painfully exposed in a scene in which she tries on her sister's wedding dress. A domineering, miserly father and a self-centered, vindictive stepmother create a stifling, explosive atmosphere in which Lizzie's chilling actions become more plausible.
The score is a modern patchwork, ranging from bouncy rural rhythms to streaks of dissonance, used most effectively in underlining Lizzie's mounting anxiety. But for the most part, it is unobtrusive by design. Says Beeson: "The whole focus is on the stage, not the pit."
The opera begins softly, with Lizzie leading a rehearsal of a children's Sunday school choir in her living room, mounts in intensity and fury until it reaches a climax in the murder scene.
Beeson's association with opera began in his boyhood back home in Muncie, Ind., when he tuned in Metropolitan Opera broadcasts on two radios —for the stereophonic effect—then accompanied the Met singers on his piano. Since then, while teaching composition at Columbia University, he has written four operas, several orchestral and chamber works.
At 43, Beeson wryly and accurately describes himself as "a little-performed composer." He is apt to continue to be if he insists on composing operas which involve a huge commitment of time and money by anyone daring enough to produce them. Beeson does insist. "It is a crazy passion and there is not much sense to it," he explains, "but I like to write opera."