'Yardbird' sings but fails to fly at Opera Philadelphia

I am not a big fan of the currently popular idea that an opera libretto must be edited and workshopped into submission before a composer can start work. But on Friday night, faced with Bridgette A. Wimberly's problematic libretto for "Yardbird," an opera about Charlie Parker that Opera Philadelphia gave its world premiere at the Kimmel Center, I thought more than once that in this case, someone should definitely have raised some red flags.