His most recent, "Rain," had its world premiere on Feb. 6 at Lincoln Center's Alice Tully Hall.

Not bad for someone who did not try his hand at the art of opera until he was 30 and all while handling a career as a trial lawyer and a federal judge.

Though he was a late bloomer as a music writer, his appreciation of opera began at age 4, when his father, Carl M. Owen, then a name partner at Willkie Owen Farr Gallagher and Walton (now Willkie Farr & Gallagher), took his son to the Metropolitan Opera to see "La Boheme."

"A great attender of the opera," Judge Owen said of his father. "He couldn't carry a tune, but he loved to go."

Indeed, Judge Owen's father and mother, Shirley Barnes Owen, a homemaker, would take a car service from their home in Bronxville to the Metropolitan Opera every Monday night.

His father passed on that enthusiasm to his son.

Judge Owen attended the opera religiously throughout high school. But the pleasure was interrupted when he went to Dartmouth, became a lieutenant in the Army Air Corps (now the Air Force) during World War II, and then entered Harvard Law School.

Immediately after law school, however, he returned to New York and to the opera. He was inspired to write, he said, when he found modern operas to be well below the quality of those he remembered when he was younger.

Judge Owen, who writes the music and the librettos of all his operas, was an associate at his father's firm in 1952 when he began taking night classes at the New York College of Music. He was nervous about telling his father, himself a Harvard Law grad, about his musical ambitions. Although an opera lover, the senior Owen was born poor in Ohio and "really believed that your nose should be to the grindstone."

But, to Judge Owen's surprise, his father "very wonderfully said to me, 'Go for it.' It's something I'll never forget."

Not all Willkie Farr partners were as supportive. One, clearly annoyed at the young associate's extra-

curricular activity, said to him, "Young man, how much time a week do you spend writing that music?"

"Probably no more than you spend watching television," Judge Owen replied.

As soon as the words left his mouth, Judge Owen, who writes music from 6:30 a.m. to 9 a.m. on weekdays, thought his time at the firm would soon end. But he was not fired -- saved perhaps by the fact that his last name was on the firm's letterhead.

In addition to the College of Music, he spent part of a summer studying at the Berkshire Music School while he was an assistant U.S. attorney. There, he caught the eye of one female student -- mainly because he was wearing a suit and a Panama hat while everyone else was in casual dress. The next day, that same student caught Judge Owen's eye, or ear, rather, while she was singing in an opera. He introduced himself to Lynn Rasmussen and the two began dating. The next spring Lynn starred in Judge Owen's first opera, "Dismissed with Prejudice," produced for a concert series at the Association of the Bar of the City of New York.

The two married four years later and Lynn Owen, in addition to graduating from The Juilliard School and performing at the Metropolitan Opera, would continue to star in six more of the judge's operas, including "Rain," which is based on Somerset Maugham's short story of the same name. It follows the relationship that develops between prostitute Sadie Thompson and a missionary when they are stranded on a tropical island.

The Owens have a son who is a lawyer at Cahill Gordon & Reindel and another, a professional composer, who conducted "Rain."

High-Profile Cases

Judge Owen, who was appointed to the federal bench by President Richard Nixon in 1974, has presided over many high-profile matters. Among them was Alger Hiss' son's unsuccessful effort to have his father's conviction for perjury reversed, and Ronald Mack's suit against George Harrison, in which Judge Owen found the late Beatle to be a subconscious plagiarist in writing the song "My Sweet Lord."

Recently, he presided over the case that sent porn star Katherine Gannon (whose acting name is "Marylin Star") to jail for profiting from an insider trading scheme along with her lover, James McDermott, the former CEO of the investment firm Keefe Bruyette & Woods.

Judge Owen's chambers in the federal courthouse at Foley Square are adorned with pictures of his operas (which include "Tom Sawyer," "Mary Dyer," and "Abigail Adams"), as well as a photograph of the judge at the finish line in the 1983 New York City Marathon at age 60, and another of him piloting his racing yacht to victory in a national tournament.

At 80, the square-jawed, gray-haired Judge Owen exudes endless energy, which seems to keep him from sitting still. He said he sees no need for slowing down anytime soon.

"As long as I'm having fun, I see no reason to stop," he said.