Whether artists and musicians regard the birth of Christ in Bethlehem as history or poetry, it’s always been a potent narrative for them to adapt to the agenda of their times. And an example of our own time is John Adams’s dramatic oratorio El Niño, which was done in concert at the Barbican the other week by the London Symphony Orchestra and Chorus with the composer over from America to conduct.
The choice of title is significant. In scientific usage El Niño is a hurricane-force wind with the capacity to turn lives upside down. More broadly it’s a “boy-child”. And although this child is clearly Jesus, he’s a Jesus of today: born, as the Spanish usage indicates, in South America. A continent that North Americans (or at least, those who vote for Trump) associate with squalor, drugs and trouble.
