Santa Fe Opera 3: Dots Connected

It is hard to deny that Steve Jobs, for good or ill, altered the way we listen to music, the way we communicate with other people, the way we work and the way we kill time. Yet his innovations were matched by a capacity for mythmaking that allowed him to cultivate the image of a visionary who gave the world what it didn’t even know it wanted. That myth was largely upheld in The (R)evolution of Steve Jobs, a co-commission from the Santa Fe, Seattle and San Francisco Operas, which received its world première in Santa Fe this summer. Although the opera – composed by Mason Bates to a libretto by Mark Campbell – did not shy away from placing the flaws of its protagonist on prominent display, it remained at heart an old-fashioned and completely engaging tale of one man’s struggles and triumphs on his way to changing the world. The opera had,…