TELEVISION REVIEWS : ‘TREEMONISHA’ SUNDAY ON KCET

The Houston Grand Opera production of Scott Joplin’s 1908 musical parable “Treemonisha” has been a national treasure for more than a decade now: celebrated in print, reproduced and marketed on both records (by DG) and home video (by Sony) until Joplin’s extraordinary mixture of pop, classical and folk idioms seems utterly natural if not commonplace.

On Sunday afternoon at 2:30, the Houston “Treemonisha” arrives on KCET Channel 28, with stereo simulcasts scheduled on KUSC-FM (91.5) and KCPB-FM (91.1). Once again, all the switcheroos between highfalutin arioso, down-home barbershop harmony and sophisticated ragtime syncopation serve to honor the rich academic and popular traditions that shape 20th-Century American art.

In the same way, Joplin’s libretto (about a black Southern community after emancipation) adopts a multicultural perspective, suggesting that people can abandon superstition and follow the path to formal education without abandoning their roots. It is a lesson that many waves of American immigrants have been slow to learn.

Staged by Frank Corsaro and designed by Franco Colavecchia, the opulent, neoprimitive Houston production manages to preserve the deliberately naive sensibility of the incidents in the opera while adroitly clarifying its profound underlying issues and themes.

Expertly conducted by John DeMain, the cast is a strong one, with Carmen Balthrop (Treemonisha) especially adept at giving Joplin’s declarative outbursts great purity of heart (and tone) without ever seeming rigid or simplistic. And she leads the high-kicking “Real Slow Drag” finale zestfully.

Curtis Rayam (Remus) powerfully delivers the big tenor aria, “Never Treat Your Neighbors Wrong”; Delores Ivory (Monisha) handles pages of narrative exposition with unstinting sweetness; Dorceal Duckens (Ned) is appropriately crusty, though he never fully descends to the occasion when the vocal line demands a low D; Obba Babatunde (Zodzetrick) oozes nastiness and croons deftly.

Sidney Smith’s TV version (recorded in 1981) is straightforward and intelligent, but, unfortunately, the studio-taped introductions and synopses by Ossie Davis and Ruby Dee are allowed to run over the music. The information is pertinent--but why praise Joplin in a manner that obliterates his work?