Let me say, however belatedly, that I liked it. Most importantly, I liked it musically first and foremost: flamenco rhythms and melodies, Latin percussion, moorish-sounding chorus, many Sephardic touches. The occasional electronica was not overly domineering. The music has strong momentum, and the scenes flow pretty well together. Dawn Upshaw is characteristically excellent in the lead, and there is some very, very beautiful music for the low mezzo trouser role of Lorca.
As for the libretto, and the deeper meaning, well, my interest remains musical. I am not fascinating by Lorca, and Ainadamar did not engender any such interest. I think, for the record, that a lot of the libretto is paraphrased from Lorca's own poetry. As with much modern art, the meaning may or may not be present and may or may not be deep; either way, the opera doesn't motivate me to expend much effort teasing it out. I am inclined to purchase the new recording, and listen to it sans libretto.
As a post-script, let me point out that new operas are held to absurdly high standards. They are mercilessly compared (consciously or not) to the classics of the standard repetoire, which represent a tiny fraction of opera. Taking a wide historical view, I'd say that while Ainadamar might not belong in the company of the true greats, it is at least as successful as 80-85% of all operas. It's also much better than almost anything from the last 60-70 years. Finally, I quite approve of Golijov's approach of plundering ethnic musics for complex and listenable sounds. Classical music might actually have a future in such a dalliance.
