A Cabrillo veteran may recall semi-nostalgically the days of Gerhard Samuel, Carlos Chavez and Dennis Russell Davies, the many adventurous (if often unsuccessful) expeditions in the direction of the future, the weird and wacky days of the very young and the very old (Nicolas Slonimsky, in his 90s, playing the piano with an orange, in Aptos — yes, he did). Still, until recent years, and especially this weekend, Cabrillo has never had anything like this large number of virtuoso instrumentalists playing together so wonderfully well.

The came from all over the world: concertmaster Yumi Hwang Williams from Denver, assistant concertmaster Melissa Forshaw from Scotland, principal violist Leslie Van Becker from Michigan, principal cellist Lee Duckles from British Columbia, principal flautist Shery Henze from New York, the especially amazing principal oboist Karen Wagner from Oregon, the flawless, thrilling horn and trumpet players from Colorado, Louisiana, Florida and many, of course, from Northern California.

Along with mezzo Cherry Duke, singing the principal role in Adamo's work, it was the orchestra that made the afternoon event memorable. Then, at night, Alsop unleashed the band in the very loud, joyful noise of Rouse's works, described by the personable composer himself as Boston Pops goes to hell.

Your heart really must go out to contemporary opera composers, caught between conflicting demands for the new and unusual (which then turns out to be something done 60-70 years ago) and for the tried and true of something "you can whistle." For every "what a noise!" protest, there is somebody in the audience at the other extreme who leaves in the intermission because "my diabetes is acting up." The sad reality is that you can't attract an audience if you hang out on the limb too far, but even when you're as "sweet," melodic and accessible as Little Women, the 800-seat Civic Auditorium is only half full . . . or empty. (Reportedly opening night, on Friday, had better attendance.)

Adamo, 40, is a major promise on the opera scene. His libretto from the Louisa May Alcott novel is excellent. The chorus opening and closing the work has perhaps Adamo's most remarkable music, but the text was unintelligible both times as Peter Kazaras directed the singers to perform upstage with their backs turned to the audience. The delivery of the text, so important for this opera, was good to excellent for the rest of the performance, depending on the singer.

Duke, whose character dominates every scene, is a singer who communicates both the music and the text impeccably. In this former sports stadium cut in half, even with electronic "enhancement," it takes "heroic diction" to do that and Duke surely has the helden-delivery.

The three sisters — sung well by Quinn Patrick (Meg), Natalie Taormina (Beth) and especially Cara Johnson (Amy) — also enabled the audience to follow the affecting story of the March family. Among the men, tenor Wesley Roger (Laurie) sang and acted most impressively, although audibly tiring toward the end; and John Packard (the original Dead Man of Jake Heggie's opera) did well with the role of John Brook, a part that didn't project his fine baritone to its full advantage.

Adamo's music is both rewarding and frustrating. He writes more striking and enjoyable phrases than just about anybody in opera today, but they are brief and unconnected. His melodic and harmonic inventions are fragmentary, not sustained, but still memorable. Much to his credit, Adamo doesn't sound like anybody else, there are only resonances in his music as varied as Debussy-Ravel colors and Sondheim recitative cadences. I'd hope a masterpiece may yet emerge from where Little Women came from.

Rouse is a force of (good) nature. His music is loud, brassy (and beyond percussive, with five musicians banging away on everything under the sun, in the 1985 Phantasmata and the 1986 Phaethon), consistently interesting and engaging, but frequently short on substance, running in place.

Rouse did better with the 1997 Kabir Padavali, a song cycle to text by a 14th century Indian poet. With some shimmering passages, worthy of Richard Strauss, and a fine vocal line, there is music here beyond the "big sound." The singer was Valdine Anderson, introduced by Rouse as the soprano said by (the polite and generous) Dawn Upshaw to sing the work "better than I did." (Upshaw introduced the work originally). This turned out to be a surprising and dubious statement in light of the skillful but lackluster performance Sunday night.

When Rouse hits his stride, he presents a glimpse at one of the best contemporary American composers. Case in point: the conclusion of the 1995 Envoi, a Death and Configuration work written when his mother passed away. Rouse first portrays the stopping of the heart in his own way (not as an imitation of the Mahler Ninth) and then follows up with a superb extended passage that grabs the listener and stays with him long after the concert, especially when played with as much passion and commitment as the Festival Orchestra did. Instead of transcendence, Envoi presents a resigned, accepting lament, a gentle meandering night music. The power and beauty of this work would have been the perfect finale to the evening, instead of yet another mighty contest of speed and volume, fun as that was.

(Janos Gereben, a regular contributor to www.sfcv.org, is arts editor of the Post Newspaper Group. His e-mail address is janos451@earthlink.net.)

©2002 Janos Gereben, all rights reserved