It will be three weeks past Easter when the Met premieres the Latino-inflected John Adams Christmas opera-oratorio El Niño, but that’s OK. The soprano and John Adams specialist Julia Bullock, who leads the cast, has presented an abbreviated chamber version in New York at Yuletide on two previous occasions, and a better advertisement for the Full Monty (whatever the time of year) would be hard to imagine. Of course, it’s also fair to ask, Will More Be Less? Let the record show that we’re thinking positive. Lileana Blain-Cruz, whose carnivalesque revival of Thornton Wilder’s The Skin Of Our Teeth had Lincoln Center Theater audiences begging for more, is on board to direct this more delicate property. She’s new to the Met, as is the conductor Marin Alsop, who hereby adds another fancy plume to her well-feathered hat. —Matthew Gurewitsch