HONG KONG — This city was host last week to a world premiere of a major, Western-style opera: “Dr. Sun Yat-sen,” by the young Chinese-American composer Huang Ruo, was performed before an enthusiastic audience in the Grand Theater of the Hong Kong Cultural Center.

But that world premiere occurred by default. The opera, which was written to commemorate the centennial of the 1911 revolution that ended the Qing dynasty, was to have been performed in Beijing on Sept. 30 at the National Center for the Performing Arts, known as the Egg, where it was expected to add luster to the center’s fast-growing offerings of opera.

But in late August came word that the production would be indefinitely postponed for “logistical reasons,” a decision by Communist Party officials that immediately gave rise to suspicions of censorship. So last Thursday, the first of the four scheduled Hong Kong performances became the opera’s initial outing.

Before the premiere, The New York Times reported that Opera Hong Kong, which commissioned and produced “Dr. Sun Yat-sen,” was told that the opera was not politically serious enough. Members of the audience, however, were left to formulate their own theories about what might have motivated the authorities to suppress the absorbing, problematic work.

In time-honored fashion for operas about historical figures, the libretto by Candace Chong, a Hong Kong playwright, gives pride of place to a love interest — Sun Yat-sen’s involvement with Soong Chingling, who in the course of the opera becomes his third wife.

Chingling was one of three illustrious daughters of Charlie Soong, a colorful missionary-turned-businessman who helped finance Sun’s revolution. (The other sisters, including May-ling, who married the Nationalist leader Chiang Kai-shek, conveniently go unmentioned in the opera.)

Sun Yat-sen, too, is no ordinary historical figure to the Chinese. He is revered by people here of all political stripes. His failures were as numerous as his successes — he lost power within months of the 1911 revolution — but from the opera one surmises that his setbacks in a way serve the Communist regime, since his ups and downs were all part of an initial revolutionary process that the Communists can claim to have brought to fruition.

“Dr. Sun Yat-sen” is shot through with revolutionary zeal, beginning with the initial scene in Charlie Soong’s Shanghai home — a fund-raising reception ostensibly benefiting a new church but really intended for the revolution. The opera then treats Sun’s exile in Japan and marriage to Chingling over her father’s objections, and it culminates with the dying Charlie’s reconciliation with Chingling and Sun at a time of political hardship.

The authorities in Beijing may have felt squeamish about portraying the venerated leader’s romance with a woman 26 years his junior and his decision to part from his then wife, even though Ms. Chong’s text masks any unseemliness with lofty revolutionary ideals that supposedly motivate all concerned.

Then, too, Mr. Huang’s music probably did not sit well with the authorities, who, in a throwback to actions against progressive composers like Shostakovich in Soviet Russia, would surely have preferred a simpler, more overtly melodic style. Mr. Huang studied in the United States at Oberlin College and the Juilliard School, and much of his music composed for American audiences has a distinctly avant-garde flavor.

Wisely, Mr. Huang taps this musical idiom judiciously in “Dr. Sun Yat-sen.” American Minimalism, suggested by recurring musical patterns, is also part of the mix. The many choruses have a forthright musical vigor. And Mr. Huang has developed an often arresting, distinctly Chinese-sounding melodic style, but one that has little of the rousing nature likely to stir patriotic sentiments.

Instead, the music frequently recalls the slow-moving patterns of Chinese opera or other Chinese narrative music. Simple sentiments are often expressed in music that sounds overly elaborate to the Western ear, particularly in the context of a work that otherwise behaves like a Western opera.

The inexperience of Mr. Huang and Ms. Chong in opera also shows, above all in an irrelevant, modern-day subplot in which, in spoken dialogue, an American museum official attempts to buy from an elderly owner a dress Charlie belatedly gave Chingling as a wedding present. Still, most of the opera was engaging, especially Act III, which emerged as almost consistently satisfying.

The plucky Opera Hong Kong did itself proud. Chen Xinyi’s direction, while often rudimentary, was rarely offensive, and Gao Guangjian designed a splendid set that was suitably elaborate yet flexible enough to accommodate diverse locales. Blanc de Chine’s costumes were also handsome, barring a garish blue uniform for Sun in Act III.

The all-Chinese cast of internationally acclaimed singers was headed by Opera Hong Kong’s artistic director, the tenor Warren Mok, who gave a vibrant portrayal of Sun, and the soprano Yao Hong, a lovely, fresh-voiced Chingling. Gong Dongjian and Yang Guang sang strongly as Charlie and his wife. Yuan Chenye, Liang Ning and Yuki Ip also made vital contributions.

Yan Huichang presided over a colorful, assertive performance by the Hong Kong Chinese Orchestra, with its pure-toned strings, honking winds and myriad percussion instruments.

“Dr Sun Yat-sen” is a pièce d’occasion, unlikely to have much of a future elsewhere. It is a pity that the growing audience for opera in Beijing was denied the chance to experience and evaluate it on its own.