Now’s your chance.

The Faust legend is a popular one, having been told by many different authors in many different versions throughout the centuries. In short, Faust sells his soul to the devil (Mephistopheles, or Mephisto) for worldly pleasures. Like many romantic composers, Franz Liszt loved this story, so much so that he wrote a Faust Symphony for orchestra as well as a handful of Mephisto Waltzes for piano (which, like most of Liszt’s piano music, are devilishly difficult to play). The most famous (the first) tells a story of Faust and Mephistopheles walking by a village inn; Mephistopheles starts playing the fiddle, and Faust seduces a young woman, before running off with her into the woods …

On this day, in 1945, the first nuclear weapon, codenamed “Trinity“, was detonated in Alamogordo NM, as part of The Manhattan Project. The project’s leader, J. Robert Oppenheimer, lived a wild life as magical and worthy of any ancient Norse saga. It’s hard not to read about him without invoking an air of mysticism. For one, the codename “Trinity” came from a devotional poem by John Donne: “As West and East / In all flatt Maps—and I am one—are one, / So death doth touch the Resurrection.” and “Batter my heart, three person’d God.” More than that, Oppenheimer said the bomb test brought to mind words from the Hindu poem, Bhagavad Gita: “Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.”

American composer John Adams was commissioned to write an opera titled Doctor Atomic, in which Oppenheimer was to be portrayed as a modern-day Faust. The opera’s text was taken from declassified military and scientific documents, and sacred poetry. This politically edgy opera made quite a scene when it premiered in 2005, and was later performed at the Met (which is a HUGE deal for any contemporary opera.) Adams later adapted a “Dr. Atomic Symphony” for orchestral concert use. Musically, its style incorporates elements of neo-romanticism, film music, and post-minimalism (ok, I admit, I just made up that last word!)

Nobody understands me …

Well, Berlioz, let’s start with your hair. With a haircut like that, nobody is going to take you seriously!

Forget my hair! The hair is nothing. What I want is for people to understand my music!

Fair enough. So, what sort of music do you have for us today?

Ah, it’s my Damnation of Faust! I just adore this book by Goethe, even though it’s by a wretched German. As soon as I read it, I knew I had to write music for it.

Sounds good! So what did you write? a Faust Symphony like Lizst? an opera like Gounod?

Of course not! It has soloists, a choir, an orchestra …

Ah, so you wrote an oratorio! You know Schumann did that too …

Absolutely not an oratorio! Nobody wants another bloody boring cantata. My audiences made that clear when they first heard my masterpiece.

An opera then?

Well, it’s … eh … sort of … a “dramatic legend.”

Ok. So it’s an oratorio.

No, it is much more than that. My roles are to be acted and lived, not merely sung.

Ok, so let’s make it an opera.

We tried that already. My music is too magnificent to be brought down to the level of mere tomfoolery on a stage with idiotic costumes. *sigh* nobody understands me …

*pause* Well then, let’s talk about ways you might improve your hairstyle.