At the time of its Parterre publication, I heartily concurred with Alex Baker’s astute and very positive review of the National Symphony Orchestra’s January 2025 presentation of Barber’s Vanessa. I would have given Nicole Heaston in the title role higher marks: no, she didn’t have as much sheer horsepower as the announced Sondra Radvanovsky would have delivered, but she remains a marvel of technical security and compelling musicianship (not to mention radiant high notes). She also had great chemistry with J’Nai Bridges’s luminous Erika.

But all the principals, including Matthew Polenzani as Anatol and Susan Graham and Thomas Hampson, stealing scenes as the Baroness and Old Doctor, respectively, were deluxe. And the NSO under Noseda has been playing consistently better by far than they have in the 45 years I’ve been a sometime Washingtonian. This was precisely the type of programming the orchestra in our nation’s capital can and should point to with pride as Exhibit A of what they can do uniquely well: serious, loving curation of a major 20th-century American score, not heard here in nearly a quarter-century.

But context and timing are huge: what holds Vanessa back from greatness in winning our hearts (and a permanent place in the repertoire) is Gian Carlo Menotti’s book, which has aged poorly, rather than Barber’s score. People around me chuckled at some of the campier lines, but Washingtonians also pride ourselves on recognizing and avoiding narcissistic personality disorders, drowning as we are in them among our elected officials. And some distinguished Anglophone sopranos have avoided singing Vanessa precisely because she suffers from Leading Character Syndrome without being clever enough to prevent her seemingly obsequious niece from stealing the spotlight.

And yet it turned out the joke was on us: the week following this pair of performances, Donald Trump announced his takeover of the Kennedy Center’s Board of Directors, with results we are still feeling as of this writing, but which have included immediate and disastrous impacts on the NSO and WNO box office revenues and donations. And, despite legislation mandating that no federal memorial can be renamed without congressional approval, Trump has subsequently added his name to the building as of December 19. How will all this play out 10 and 20 years hence? All we can do is hope for the best—while recognizing that the 2025 NSO Vanessa may turn out to be what some will reference in future as a memento of “Different Times.” And Washingtonians who began ironclad boycotts a year ago may also feel the heroine’s lines in the final scene with special poignancy: “Let me look around once more. Who knows when I shall see this house again?”