Kansas City Lyric Opera clicks on something different: Rise and fall of Steve Jobs

Some might think that the life of computer super geek Steve Jobs is not exactly the stuff of opera. Composer Mason Bates would strongly disagree.

Bates believes that opera has a long history of celebrating artists, from “The Tales of Hoffmann” to “La Boheme” to “Death in Venice.” For Bates, Jobs is a “technological creative,” an artist whose eventful life is most worthy of the operatic treatment.

The Lyric Opera of Kansas City will present Bates’ “The (R)evolution of Steve Jobs” March 11 to 13 at the Muriel Kauffman Theatre.

Apparently many opera fans agree that Jobs is a compelling subject. When “The (R)evolution of Steve Jobs” was first performed by the Santa Fe Opera in 2017, demand for tickets was so high, the company had to add a performance. According to Santa Fe Opera, it was one of the bestselling new operas in its history.

“That was pretty exciting,” Bates said. “We were just thrilled to see that people were so into it.”

In 2019, “(R)evolution” was recorded and won a Grammy Award for best opera recording of the year.

But Bates is racking up a long list of other successes as well. In 2008 he received a Guggenheim Fellowship and won the Van Cliburn American Composer Invitational First Prize. Since then, he has also won many other honors. According to a 2018 survey of American orchestras, Bates is the second most-performed living composer.

His music is also some of the most distinctive new music out there. Having grown up on English psychedelia, Bates is not afraid to use the latest technology in his music, a quality used to great effect in “(R)evolution.”

“If you look into the music of Pink Floyd, The Beatles and The Moody Blues, a lot of their music had very big productions,” Bates said. “There’d be a rock band but there could be an orchestra in the background, there could be a chorus, there could be electronics. The kind of storytelling that involves a wide range of sounds, particularly the integration of electronic sounds and instruments, really informs the electronic approach I bring to orchestras.”

Bates’ technological innovations couldn’t be put to a better use than in an opera about the ultimate technological innovator.

“The first sounds you hear are samples of old Macintosh gear,” Bates said. “You hear keyboards, you hear little beeps. I thought it would be fascinating to open the opera with the actual sounds the protagonist created. We also hear Buddhist meditation sounds that have been recorded and electronically processed to represent the world of Kobun, Jobs’ spiritual adviser.”

Bates says that Kobun Chino Otogowa, an American Zen priest, influenced Jobs’ search for simplicity and his Japanese approach to design. Spirituality is a major theme in Jobs’ life. After reading Paramahansa Yogananda’s “Autobiography of a Yogi,” Jobs was inspired to travel to India in 1974, four years before he co-founded Apple with Steve Wozniak.

But Jobs was not some guru dispensing peaceful wisdom and enlightenment. In fact, to many of his colleagues and people who worked for him, Jobs was a jerk.

“The way I think of him is that he has two charges,” Bates said. “He has a positive charge in that he was very charismatic and creative and brilliant. And he had a negative charge. He was very controlling, cold and uncaring. And the ground between those two charges was his wife, Laurene Powell Jobs.”

The cutting edge sets, costumes and production also capture Jobs’ technological brilliance and design savvy.

“Luckily in this case, the director and the production designer and projection designer were just phenomenal,” Bates said. “The set can transform from an apple orchard to the Apple corporate headquarters and back again. It’s a very immersive, kinetic opera from start to finish. ”

7:30 p.m. March 11 and 12 and 2 p.m. March 13. Muriel Kauffman Theatre, Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts. $47.50-$188.50. 816-471-7344 or kcopera.org

Haley Myles

Pianist Haley Myles is an artist to watch. The Kansas City native, who now lives in France, is starting to gain quite a bit of attention. The Young Steinway Artist has recorded the complete nocturnes of Chopin, which received positive reviews from NPR, Gramophone Magazine and others.

Myles will be coming home to give a recital of her favorite composer, Chopin, March 10 at the Steinway Piano Gallery in Lenexa. The concert is free but reservations are required.

7 p.m. March 10. Steinway Piano Gallery, 9512 Marshall Drive, Lenexa. Free. For reservations, steinwaykc.com. To learn more about Myles and purchase her album, visit haleymyles.com.

Te Deum Vespers

Some peace would be welcome right about now. Te Deum choral ensemble led by Matthew Christopher Shepard will present Vespers, an ancient evening liturgy meant to end the day in calm and contemplation, March 13 at St. Mary’s Episcopal Church.

Dating from the earliest years of the Church, Vespers alternates psalms, prayers and canticles. Keeping with age-old monastic tradition, Te Deum will chant the Vespers in Latin. The gothic interior of St. Mary’s is the perfect setting for such transcendent music.

5 p.m. March 13. St. Mary’s Episcopal Church, 1307 Holmes St. Free. te-deum.org/chant.

You can reach Patrick Neas at patrickneas@kcartsbeat.com and follow his Facebook page, KC Arts Beat, at www.facebook.com/kcartsbeat.