One of the reasons for taking on "The Ballad of Baby Doe" was, of course, the many secondary and cameo roles it has. There are Tabor's cronies (J. Carl Ficarrotta, Jeff Marshall, Robert Lays and ...

and Augusta Tabor, the opera tracks their lives from Horace and Baby Doe’s meeting to the death of Horace. “Always Through the Changing” is a postscript ending foretelling Baby’s death.