New York saw the premiere of a new opera on Wednesday night – “Miss Lonelyhearts,” by Lowell Liebermann. Mr. Liebermann and his librettist, J.D. McClatchy, have achieved a success: an opera that is worth seeing, hearing, and absorbing.

Mr. Liebermann is a composer in his mid-40s, and he is not to be confused with a composer who has a similar name: Peter Lieberson. Mr. Liebermann has written one other opera, “The Picture of Dorian Gray” (1996). All three of his degrees – bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral – were earned at the Juilliard School. It was Juilliard that commissioned “Miss Lonelyhearts,” for its centennial; and it was in the school’s theater that the opera was premiered.

Mr. McClatchy is a poet who teaches at Yale, and serves as the editor of the Yale Review. He has written many opera libretti, including those for Ned Rorem’s “Our Town” (2006), Tobias Picker’s “Emmeline” (1996), and William Schuman’s “A Question of Taste” (1989). The late Schuman, remember, was president of the Juilliard School.

“Miss Lonelyhearts,” you know – that is, you know Nathanael West’s dark, ghastly, religionsoaked novella from 1933. It has been made into at least one play and a couple of movies (including the 1959 flick starring Montgomery Clift and Myrna Loy). “Miss Lonelyhearts” is one of the greatest titles in all of literature.The Clift-Loy movie mangled it by calling itself “Lonelyhearts.”

The story is about a New York newspaperman who, lightheartedly, accepts an aswsignment as his paper’s advice columnist: Miss Lonelyhearts. But soon things turn far from lighthearted.The letters from readers affect his brain and his soul. He goes mad. He’s tortured by religious visions, and, toward the end, he’s uplifted by them.That’s right before he is murdered.

This is a nasty little story – filled with every kind of depravity – and Messrs. Liebermann and McClatchy have fashioned a nasty little opera. Sometimes they lay it on too thick. A touch of evil can be more effective than wagonloads. But at least the artists make their point.

The opera opens with the click-clack of a manual typewriter – that helps set the time. Then the orchestra commences a prelude, which is very, very American, as the whole opera proves to be: I thought, first, of Walter Piston, and some other giants of our mid-century. The score is well paced and well crafted. It has energy and tension (though that tension is relieved). It is neither too long nor too short. And it is almost never dull.

Like other American scores – especially operatic ones – it is very eclectic. We hear some atonality,American-style, and some Romanticism (also Americanstyle). We hear some jazz, some tent-revival music, some pop standards. One device is overly familiar, to me: A carefree song plays on the radio while strings are dissonant and ominous in the pit. I have heard this in one too many American operas. But that’s okay.

Mr. Liebermann provides a nice balance between simple composition and complex. He does not write in a showoffy style. When only a few notes will do, he uses them. The piece has a couple of good arias – or aria-like stretches – and some good and rather unusual duets. A tenor-mezzo duet at the end of Act I is striking: he earnest and grave, she insouciant and vulgar.

And Mr. Liebermann has no trouble painting what needs to be painted. We hear a bustling newsroom, for example. And when the protagonist and his girl are out on a farm, the music is bucolic. Sometimes, Mr. Liebermann is obvious, but he’s conscious of being so.A character mentions Jews – and we get a Hebrew wail. And when he mentions a Protestant – a snatch of a hymn. For Buddhists, a dollop of Orientalism.And so on.

Because this tale is full of madness, there must be madness in the score – and this is not easy to bring off. Composers often overdo it, perhaps going a little mad themselves. But Mr. Liebermann keeps his wits about him, as others are losing theirs. And the love music is affecting, in part because it avoids sentimentalism.

May I mention a curious detail? One of Mr. Liebermann’s main motifs reminds me of Samuel Barber’s famous quintet at the end of “Vanessa” (“To leave, to break”).Whether this is deliberate, accidental, or just me, I can’t say.

Many composers have difficulty ending a piece – especially a long piece, such as a symphony or opera – but Mr. Liebermann’s denouement is fantastic: It builds excitingly, fearsomely, hitting you in the gut. And it remembers to conclude; it doesn’t linger a moment too long. Mr. Liebermann’s final notes, in this nightmarish show, are light – a creepy and effective touch.

The story may seem a little dated, for it is now more than 70 years old. References are made to Havelock Ellis and Kraft-Ebing. At one point, a character asks,”Who’s for a highball?”And the libretto and action are very, very coarse – ugly. We have fornication, assault, perversion, and other forms of brutality, to go with madness and murder.

I have mentioned that I think the opera goes too far. I have in mind, particularly, a letter to Miss Lonelyhearts, read in Act II. A crippled woman relates that her husband abuses her and her children. She, and the libretto, go on and on and on. The listener is simply bludgeoned, I believe – and it’s unnecessary, and unhelpful. People can grasp evil, fairly quickly.

But Mr. McClatchy is a skillful practitioner, and the stage direction of Ken Cazan – who works at the University of Southern California – is arresting.

“Miss Lonelyhearts” was accorded a good performance for its premiere.The cast and orchestra were competent, when not better. Juilliard is supposed to attract the best students, and, by the evidence of Wednesday night, it does. Andreas Delfs, conductor of the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra,was in the pit, and he did an assured, sympathetic job.

Mr. Liebermann’s work joins a long list of recent American operas based on cherished American texts. There is Mr. Rorem’s “Our Town.” And William Bol com’s “AView from the Bridge” (2001), John Harbison’s “The Great Gatsby” (1999), Mark Adamo’s “Little Women” (1998), Andre Previn’s “A Streetcar Named Desire” (also 1998), etc. Last December, the Metropolitan Opera premiered an opera based on a story not unlike “Miss Lonelyhearts”: full of religiosity and murder.That was Tobias Picker’s “An American Tragedy.”

My guess is that “Miss Lonelyhearts” will last as long as any of those; although such guesses are hard to make.

And if you go to the Juilliard School to see the opera, they have a warning for you. At the entrance of the auditorium, a sign says, “Please be advised, gunshots and herbal cigarettes are used in this performance.”

Gunshots and herbal cigarettes! Oh, my! Never mind the humping, the masturbation, and the most wretched human sorrow. If that sign’s not a supreme reflection of life in modern America, I don’t know what is.