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How flat. It's the most cliched and inescapable reaction imaginable as the taxi speeds along Highway 65/69 from the Des Moines Airport. As far as the eye can see, there are cornfields baking in the early-summer sun - a carpet of green, broken only by an occasional signpost offering encouraging words such as "PREPARE TO MEET THY GOD." It hardly seems a likely environment for opera, but for the past thirty-one years, Des Moines Metro Opera - actually located in Indianola, a bedroom community of around 13,000 located some twelve miles from Des Moines proper - has produced an annual festival that has earned acclaim for its wide-ranging repertory choices and high production standards.
Des Moines Metro Opera is the main summer event in Indianola. It seems unlikely that the town is going to reinvent itself as a major tourist destination anytime soon: once you've picked up a few easy spares at the Indian Lanes Bowling Alley, there isn't a whole lot left to do. You'll have better luck amusing yourself if you're not a vegetarian: you could easily spend several days passing from one steak-house to another. One night, Jerilee Mace, Des Moines Metro's executive director, treated me to a twelve-ounce sirloin at Johnny's Steak House, a meal that still lingers in the memory. "Well, I'm not surprised that it's good," said Mace as she gestured toward a nearby field. "Three hours ago, it was probably scampering around out there."
When Des Moines Metro Opera began, in 1973, Iowa had no real opera history whatsoever. According to Mace, "They were weaned on opera just exactly the way we presented it to them." The company's simple formula for success has not varied much since its maiden season: present three operas, stage and perform them as well as possible, and try to include at least one twentieth-century work - or, at the very least, a lesser-known work by a major composer. That first season was something of a double-dog dare in terms of audience familiarity: Albert Herring, La Rondine and a double bill of Albert Benjamins The Prima. Donna and Menotti's The Medium. Since then, the number of performances has grown from eight to sixteen over consecutive weekends each June and July.
Like most well-run organizations,...