ABSTRACT
John Adams's musical characterization of Henry Kissinger, who was national security adviser of the United States at the time of Nixon's visit, is both limited and unflattering. Aside from Kissinger's scathing but prominent dual role as a lecherous landlord in the ballet in Act 2, scene 2, Kissinger plays a very minor role in this opera. Furthermore, according to Richard Valeriani, the short timing of the meeting arrangement also reflected Mao's view of his own position as the Chinese leader: For all his love of permanent revolution and proletarian protocol, Chairman Mao retained some of the customs of imperial China, at least in its imperiousness. Musically, Adams makes the playful nature of Nixon's comment clear through a metrical shift to an implied compound-duple meter and especially the use of a whole-tone based melody. As the Chinese leaders gleefully take up this train of thought, they focus on the surreptitious aspects of the famous movie character.
