That is the message of “The Comet/Poppea,” an intriguing combination of Monteverdi’s 1643 opera “L’incoronazione di Poppea” and George E. Lewis’ “The Comet,” a Pulitzer Prize finalist this year. The ...

But while “The Comet/Poppea” tries to conjure a cyclone, whipping together past and present, Black and white, high class and low, naturalism and stylization, it ends up feeling more like a trudge.