Curtain rises on new Pete Townshend rock opera

Pete Townshend, guitarist for The Who, premiered his new rock opera at a theatre festival in upstate New York this weekend.

The Boy Who Heard Music is described as a "hallucinatory tale about the rise and fall of a band made up of three teenagers from different ethnic backgrounds as seen through the eyes of an aging rock star."

Neither Townshend, the show's actors nor the director would speak to the media, preferring to release a statement saying the two-hour musical was "still in such an embryonic state."

"When you hear it, you can definitely hear that it is Townshend," Ed Cheetham divulged. Cheetham is the producing director of the New York Stage and Films' 23rd Powerhouse Theatre festival for developing new work.

The Boy Who Heard Music played once on Friday night and twice on Saturday at Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, the location of the festival.

Townshend, 62, who wrote more than 100 songs for The Who, introduced the world to his rock operas Tommy and Quadrophenia more than 30 years ago.

The guitaristfirst wrote the new piece as an internet novella.

Reports say the show includes a few songs from The Who's 2006 release, Endless Wire.