Erik Johns (1927 – December 11, 2001) wrote the libretto for
Aaron Copland's only full-length opera, ''The Tender Land.''Partner Aaron Copland, Jack Kelly
Erik Johns (1927 – December 11, 2001) wrote the libretto for
Aaron Copland's only full-length opera, ''The Tender Land.''
Johns was born Horace Eugene Johnston in Los Angeles and began his career as a
dancer. When he was 19 in 1946 he met Copland at a New Year's Eve party in New
York, and the two began a relationship. Johns remained in Los Angeles with
Copland visiting him while working on film scores until 1948, when Johns
moved into Copland's house in Sneden's Landing, N.Y. For the next several
years Johns was Copland's secretary.
In
1952 Copland and Johns began work on an opera based on ''Let Us Now Praise
Famous Men,'' the James Agee and
Walker Evans book of photographs of
Depression-era sharecroppers. Johns devised the story of a poor farming
family in the Midwest changed by the arrival of two drifters, and he wrote the
libretto under the pseudonym Horace Everett.
The
work was commissioned as a television opera by NBC but was later rejected by
the network. The New York City Opera performed it at its premiere at City
Center on April 1, 1954, in a short two-act version. Over the next year
Copland and Johns expanded it into a longer, three-act version. Copland's
only other opera was ''The Second Hurricane,'' a short piece written in 1936.
Copland and Johns parted in 1954 but remained close, and Johns served
as an adviser to the board of Copland House, a composer's retreat in Copland's
residence in Peekskill, N.Y. Copland died in 1990.
In the
1950's Johns formed the company Party Decorators with
Jack Kelly. The
company decorated the inaugural dinner of President John F. Kennedy in 1961
and the inaugural parties of President Jimmy Carter in 1977. The two men also
ran an antiques business. Kelly died in 1989.
Johns later wrote the librettos for ''Tea Party,'' an opera by Jack Gottlieb,
and ''Mission to the World,'' an oratorio by John Schlenck commemorating the
centenary of the Vedanta Society of New York, which espouses a philosophy
based on Hindu scriptures. Johns became an active member of the society in
1955.
My published books:
https://www.nytimes.com/2001/12/18/arts/erik-johns-74-librettist-of-copland-s-tender-land.html