James McCarthy



Charles Wuorinen's new opera based on Annie Proulx short story, Brokeback Mountain, will be free to watch on Medici TV from 6pm GMT (2pm EST) today and for the following 90 days. Reviewing the first night of the debut production from Madrid's Teatro Real, the New York Times called the opera 'a serious work, an impressive achievement'.

Proulx's original short story about the love between two cowboys found worldwide fame in 2005 when Ang Lee's film Brokeback Mountain won three Academy Awards (best director, best adapted screenplay and best score – by Gustavo Santaolalla).

The Teatro Real's production is directed by Ivo van Hove, conducted by Titus Engel and stars bass-baritone Daniel Okulitch and tenor Tom Randle.

Wuorinen's music has been frequently reviewed in Gramophone, most recently in July 2011, when his First String Quartet and Second Piano Quintet featuring the Brentano String Quartet on Naxos received a very positive review from Laurence Vittes: 'Throughout, Wuorinen finds humanity in the otherwise forbidding abstract interplay of line and structure by the dexterity with which he uses it to find moments of beauty and intricate sounds that delight the ear. The result is absorbing on an intellectual plane while making thoroughly modern music that is compassionate, American and convincing in its tone.'

Visit medici.tv for further information.