Meet the Composer

Robert Aldridge

Based on the satire by American novelist Sinclair Lewis (which was also the basis for an Academy Award-winning film starring Burt Lancaster and Jean Simmons), Elmer Gantry mixes traditional operatic forms with vibrant gospel hymns and ensemble to explore the complex and sometimes conflicted role of religion in American life. This quintessentially American story of love and corruption follows a fraudulent womanizer through both his rise to power and fall from grace in early 20th century rural America.