When Osvaldo Golijov’s Ainadamar premiered at Santa Fe Opera in 2005, the reviews were ecstatic. “The best new opera in half a century,” proclaimed Fanfare. “Among the great musical achievements of our time,” wrote The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. The New York Times praised the work’s “luxuriously lyrical and sometimes tormented vocal lines.”

Ainadamar (INE-ah-dah-MAR) is an ancient word meaning “fountain of tears” and refers to the location where Federico García Lorca, the great Spanish poet, was slain. Reprising the roles they created, mezzo-soprano Kelley O’Connor is Lorca, and Dawn Upshaw is Margarita Xirgu, the poet’s muse and defender, in this tale of loss and longing.