"The Conquistador" covers too much time and doesn’t
exploit the operatic vocal talents of its cast

The world premiere of San Diego composer Myron Fink's "The Conquistador" was touted for months in advance as the artistic event of San Diego’s 1997 performing arts season. Sizable amounts of time, talent, love, sweat and money - at last count about $1.2 million -were expended to bring this very large work to the public.

    However, my reigning feelings following the opera's March 1 opening at San Diego’s Civic Theatre were of disappointment and sadness. Why? Many of the elements that make opera opera, while in evidence, were either ineffectual or counter-productive in application.

    This is not to say the production was without its positive aspects. Deborah Dryden's rich and historically accurate costumes projected a sense of 16th-century Spain and the Mexico of its Spanish conquerors. Color was almost a crime at the time; black prevailed. Dryden allowed enough subtle color to show to give, in particular, the massed tableaus a likeness to the magnificent tapestries in use at the time. Her ecclesiastical and Indian costumes added the ultimate shimmer to the total effort.

    Well-known stage director Sharon Ott, in her opera debut, proved to be an excellent choice, as "The Conquistador" is, in reality, a play with extensive musical accompaniment rather than an opera.

    This is the first contradiction.

    Still, Ott's hand was strong throughout, excelling in the arrangement of powerful stage pictures. She dealt with the transitions required by the work's notably episodic construction with as much ease as librettist Donald Moreland's stiff, over-explained transitions allowed.

    "The Conquistador's" episodic construction is such that the only reason for its two intermissions is to allow the audience to stretch. With scenes such as protagonist Don Luis de Carvahal's final apologia from prison appropriately reduced and other superfluous material removed, the work could probably play in a single act of about an hour and a half. Indeed, the overall dramatic effect would be intensified.

    Kent Dorsey's settings were spare and sere, mere suggestions of place without any true reflection of the stark opulence of the period as reflected in the likes of the Escorial. Perhaps his approach could be considered appropriate for the colonies of the time. They contributed almost nothing to the work's sense of place.

    The opera orchestra's usual high level of performance was occasionally marred by inept solo playing, the first trombone being the notable case in point. San Diego Opera associate conductor Karen Keltner imbued the score of "The Conquistador" with her usual vibrancy, drive and assurance.

    "The Conquistador" requires massive forces, about 300 all told, about 100 actually seen. It also requires great depth in the leading singer ranks. There are at least 17 roles that require superior voices; at least 11 of these must have the very best. Tenor Jerry Hadley in the title role of Don Luis, sopranos Elizabeth Hynes, Adria Firestone and Kerry O'Brien, mezzo Vivica Geneaux, baritone Louis Otey and bass Kenneth Cox gave outstanding performances in the top seven slots.

    The basic dramatic motivation of the opera, a true story, is not new: Man's inhumanity to man, the persecution of Jews by the Spanish Inquisition in the New World in the name of religious correctness, with the Spaniards, in turn, persecuting the indigenous Indians in the name of Christ.

    As the opera unfolds, Don Luis de Carvahal, born a Jew but raised a Catholic, has become increasingly influential as a result of his relentless and highly successful expansion of Spanish interests in Mexico. He brings his sister and her large family to Mexico not knowing that, although ostensibly Christians, they are secretly practicing Jews. When intimations of this reach those whose wealth and position are threatened by Don Luis' ever-expanding power and control, the Inquisition, commercial interests and Mexico's Viceroy see a possible means of getting at de Carvahal. Manipulating the suspicions about his family, they succeed in bringing him down. De Carvahal, stripped of his wealth and position by the Inquisition, mysteriously dies in prison. Almost all of his family is eventually burned at the stake in Mexico City.

    The most serious question concerning "The Conquistador" remains whether or not it is an opera. Cross-fertilizations between art forms have long been a fact. It’s completely appropriate that "The Conquistador" reflect theatrical elements introduced by film, television and legitimate theater. Being episodic, moving rapidly within time and space, is certainly acceptable as a dramatic structural device in our time. Contemporary audiences make such leaps easily. However, in this instance, depths of character and true ambience of place remained undiscovered because of the device. The work covers too much time and territory. It fails as opera on this count.

    Composers have long striven for compositional styles in opera that more genuinely reflect the way humans speak while designing music to intensify, enrich and explain characters and plot. Debussy's "Pelléas et Mélisande" may have been the first opera to subsequently languish because of such a style. The concern has continued throughout the 20th century.

    Fink's style of vocal writing is certainly conversational, but the musically dramatic lyric is almost completely missing. Like Debussy, he assigns most of these concerns to the orchestra. His vocal line is consistently declamatory. Conquistador is not unlike enduring three hours of recitative.

    Vocal lines are made even less interesting by Fink's relentless use of the same or very similar short rhythmic patterns for every character's dialogue, no matter the speaker or the dramatic situation. The opera fails to be opera here, too.

    The composer's mastery of large ensembles can be awe-inspiring, however. The quartet, massed chorus and orchestra in the Act 2 finale, "He is too powerful, too ambitious," is a stunning example. The a capella "Hosanna in Excelsis" opening Act 3 should be in every professional chorale's repertoire.

    Fink's musical vocabulary is singular, his ability as an orchestrator prodigious. But again the qualities counteract. Fink's musical vocabulary consistently employs clusters of notes separated by the smallest intervalic values. This muddies structure and makes performance difficult, particularly for singers. Fink's frequent and seemingly willful misdirection of melodic route and harmonic destination aggravate the problem. Again, failure.

    "The Conquistador" depends primarily on acting and stage direction. Singers must be fine actors yet also possessed of superb voices to sing what Fink has occasionally penned. Yet Fink never exploits the beauty of those voices in the best interest of intensified artistic experience.

    And finally, the sadness capping the disappointment. The quality and quantity of forces and resources required for "The Conquistador" are beyond most American companies. Chances of future productions, therefore, are slim to none.

    An author, lecturer and consultant, John Willett has critiqued music, dance and the arts for more than 16 years.