Intermountain Opera / Iritziak

Arizona Opera opened its 2022-23 season on Saturday with a new opera about the military. “The Falling and the Rising,” the Zach Redler and Jerre Dye opera about a wounded soldier’s comatose journey to healing, could also fit into the musical theater world. It’s both, actually. The genius of Redler and Dye’s piece, co-commissioned by Arizona Opera and several other companies along with the U.S. Army Field Band and Soldiers Chorus, is their ability to marry opera and music theater. Redler’s score has flashes of New Orleans jazz and quintessential Broadway pop intermingled with the soaring vocals and lush orchestral melodies that define classic opera. Dye’s libretto employs soldier’s language, curse words and all, for authenticity as we peer into military life through a soldier’s lens.