William Grant Still, Highway 1, USA (1962)

I wanted to highlight this, as I'm thinking about operas by black composers lately.  Still was--per wikipedia--known as the "Dean of Afro-American Composers," so there you go.  This is rarely performed, but it was recently put on by the Opera Theatre of Saint Louis; it was streaming, but no longer, unfortunately.  I don't know what to tell you.

It's a short, hour-long piece; as here produced, it does have an all-black cast, but the story isn't specifically about the African American experience.  Bob and Mary are a couple.  They have worked hard and they own a service station, so they're doing okay.  But there's also Bob's brother Nate; they sacrificed to put him through college, Bob having promised their mother.  But now what?  They're trying to build a future together, but Nate's just hanging around, not doing anything, overeducated and ungrateful, just being a drain on everyone.  One day when he's alone with Mary, he tries to put the moves on her, and when she rejects him, he stabs her and KILLS her!  DEAD, I tell you!  Everyone comes back and is horrified by the killing, naturally.  Nate's going to be arrested, but Bob, still unable to defy his self-abnegating instincts, is going to let himself take the blame.  But then, wait, it turns out Mary's not dead after all.  And her injury is so totally superficial that it's extremely unclear how anyone could've thought she was.  So they decide, screw you, Nate, and let him be taken away.  And NOW the future's so bright they gotta wear shades, I tell you.

The music here is super-dang-gorgeous.  Nothing avant-garde here; just beautiful tonal music with light jazz overtones.  No complaints there.  The only problem is that the story is pretty anemic.  You think that there's going to be some sort of real family drama, with Bob and Nate hashing out their resentments in some way.  But no!  It's very anti-climactic: "what will we do about Nate?  Oh wait he tried to kill you?  Screw you, Nate!"  I mean...dang, man.  I'm certainly not saying Nate has to be psychologically complicated or sympathetic, but this really isn't interesting.

Still worth seeing, for sure.  I hope this performance becomes available in some format again; it would be a shame for it to be lost.  And I'd love to see more of Still's operas, though I don't think any of them are performed any more often than this is.