Composer John Adams reflects on the evolution of opera and artificial intelligence

Euronews Culture sat down with composer and conductor John Adams ahead of Barcelona's Liceu theatre's premiere of 'Antony and Cleopatra'.

Transcript

00:00 I have three extraordinary singers that I've been working with for years.

00:05 Julia Bullock, who is, I think, just this role. I wrote it for her. She's the ideal Cleopatra.

00:14 She has all of the personal qualities. She has great emotion. She's very erotic.

00:21 She can play a very paranoid person when she thinks she's lost her lover.

00:28 And she has an incredible capacity for tragedy. She's a young American singer. I think she's

00:35 going to be one of the big stars, and it's a privilege to have worked with her.

00:40 This orchestra here at the Liceo is an extraordinary group. There are a lot of

00:55 younger musicians in it. I have worked over the last 10 years in Spain, both here in Barcelona

01:04 and Madrid. They were okay. The performances were okay. But as you indicate, there's a learning

01:14 curve about the style of music, which is very rhythmically driven, like a lot of American

01:20 music is. But I just had a wonderful time. And I think that this orchestra here at the Liceo is

01:27 one of the better opera orchestras in the world. And I love working with them.

01:33 You know, there are a lot of opera houses are very anxious about new operas. They're afraid

01:46 people won't come. But I've known Victor, the wonderful artistic director here. And

01:54 when I told him I was going to do this opera, he immediately said he wanted to be part of the

02:01 consortium, which is now San Francisco Opera and the Metropolitan Opera in New York.

02:07 So I don't usually conduct my operas because it means being away from home and work for

02:14 six, seven weeks. But, you know, if you have to suffer, Barcelona is the place to suffer.

02:37 You know, when I was in my 20s, they were hardly ever operas, new operas presented,

02:46 at least in the major opera companies. You know, the Metropolitan Opera might do one new work and

02:51 once every five years or something. Part of that was the composers were writing very difficult and

03:00 inaccessible music. But now, actually, a rather miraculous thing is happening,

03:08 at least in the United States. There is a huge appetite for new operas and the Metropolitan

03:14 Opera, which was for ages, it was kind of the most conservative, wonderfully high musical standards,

03:22 but the same repertoire over and over and over again. I don't know how many Tosca's and Boehm's

03:28 and Madame Butterfly's that they kept pumping out. And now they've absolutely revolutionized

03:36 their thinking and they realize that audiences want to hear new operas. So that's very good.

03:43 It's not only good for me, but it's good for, you know, composers who are 20, 30, 40 years younger

03:49 than me. I live quite close to Silicon Valley. I live in Berkeley, California. So I'm right across

04:05 the bay from Facebook and X, formerly known as Twitter, as they always say. You know, there's

04:17 a lot of noise about technology, about how great it is and how omnipresent. But I, you know,

04:28 obviously I use technology myself. I use it conducting. I check my iPhone, you know,

04:34 while I'm always reading the news and things like that. But I think it's important not to lose sight

04:40 of fundamental human values. And I know that there's a huge buzz about artificial intelligence.

04:47 It's going to bring great gifts to humanity and it's going to provide great challenges and problems.

04:56 But so did the printing press and so did the railroad and so did electricity. So we adapt.

05:05 - Thanks, John Adams, for joining us today. - Thanks very much.

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