Adamo's first opera, Little Women, was an immediate success, and has been produced more than 60 times by smaller companies around the U.S. His second, based on Aristophanes' Lysistrata, was originally scheduled to premiere in Houston in 2002, then postponed; it finally premiered on March 4, 2005 and has received similarly good notices. With only two evening-length operas behind him, Adamo is already considered a major composer, with Playbill calling him "the Gian Carlo Menotti of his time."
Adamo was composer in residence at New York City Opera from 2001 through 2006. He is the partner of composer John Corigliano.
Operas
Little Women, opera in two acts Libretto by the composer after the novel by Louisa May Alcott. March 13, 1998, Houston Opera Studio, Houston, Texas
Avow, chamber opera (1999)
Lysistrata, or The Nude Goddess Libretto by the composer after the Lysistrata of Aristophanes. March 4, 2005, Houston Grand Opera
The Gospel of Mary Magdalene Libretto by the composer. [commissioned by the San Francisco Opera for a planned June, 2013 premiere]