They fall in love, however, and when Rucker is shot and killed by robbers in his store, we (and the townsfolk) learn that Love is pregnant with his child. A wealthy and eccentric businessman – called Rucker Lattimore in the opera – makes a marriage of convenience to a much younger woman named Love Simpson, just three weeks after his wife has died – much to the consternation of the gossipy locals, who shun the couple cruelly. The title is the name of a small town in Georgia, the time 1900. "The inspiration for Cold Sassy Tree is a popular 1984 novel of that name by Olive Ann Burns. Cold Sassy Tree has an active future performance schedule guaranteed as it is a co-commission between Houston and the opera companies in San Diego, Baltimore, Austin and North Carolina. The premiere, conducted by Patrick Summers and staged by Bruce Beresford with Dean Peterson, Patricia Racette and John McVeigh in the principal roles, was a major celebratory occasion for Houston Grand Opera, being the company's 25th new opera nurtured during David Gockley's period of leadership.
Carlisle Floyd's new opera, Cold Sassy Tree, was premiered at Houston Grand Opera on 14 April, a first comic work by the composer to set alongside his darker-toned stageworks Susannah and Of Mice and Men which have in recent years been enjoying increased success in North America and new stagings in Europe.
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