SWEET LAND
The Arrivals wash up on the shore. They make contact with another civilization they call “the Hosts.” And from there, the story splinters, following diverging perspectives. Starting as a procession through the LA State Historic Park, Sweet Land becomes an opera that erases itself. — The Industry
Reviews
NY Times Review: An Opera Erases and Rewrites the American Myth
“Sweet Land” is a parable of, and fantasia on, Manifest Destiny, performed outdoors at a richly suggestive site.
LA Times Review: ‘Sweet Land’ triumphantly moves online. It’s the best ticket in opera right now
An opera that was meant to be a very strong communal experience has become, as our quarantined lives have, utterly personal. An opera about the spirit of the land has become, itself, a spirit in the digital ether rather a physical presence.
The New Yorker Review: An Open-Air Opera, Cut Short by Social Distancing
The encroaching pandemic hung over “Sweet Land,” an opera performed in a Los Angeles park, but its tales of cultural violence would have been a gut punch under any circumstances.
