PRESS REVIEWS: "Clear, appealing score" of Golden Gate "not only eminently singable but effective."

January's sold-out workshop of Conrad Cummings' The Golden Gate at the Rose Studio in Lincoln Center garnered positive reviews from The New York Times and Musical America. Steven Osgood conducted a cast directed by John Henry Davis that included David Adam Moore, Hai-Ting Chinn, Katrina Thurman, Kevin Burdette, and Keith Jameson.

Steve Smith at The New York Times remarked, “In creating an opera based on [Vikram] Seth’s novel, the composer Conrad Cummings has fashioned an equally improbable fusion: lithe melodic lines that flow and entwine in the manner of Monteverdi, peppered with musical references to Henry Mancini and the punk band Black Flag.” “The singers…offered rich, engaged performances. Constantly shifting between firsthand declamation and third-person observation, they achieved a gabby intensity more often encountered in Stephen Sondheim’s musicals than in the opera house.” Read full review

At Musical America, Patrick Smith praised the composer, stating that "Cummings has always had a gift for opera, and his vocal line is not only eminently singable but effective in giving the accompaniment a feeling of being complimentary rather than at odds with the voices. And, like all good opera composers, his music-making keeps the dramatic impetus moving.” Read full review