Opera Summaries
Opera Works by Sharon J. Willis
1. The Opera Singer
The struggles of young operatic hopefuls aspiring to become successful opera artists. The work features an opera within the opera titled “Sissieretta” who could have been the first woman of color to sing at the Metropolitan Opera had it not been for several disgruntled white patrons preventing her from being offered a contract.
The Herndon Home (excerpts) – 9/1999 East Point City Auditorium – 4/2000, 10/2000 (Premiere) North Atlanta High School – 4/2001
2. The Herndons: The Opera
Scenes in the life and times of Alonzo Franklin Herndon, who became the south’s first black millionaire. Herndon was born a slave in Social Circle, Georgia seven years before the Civil War. He would earn his wealth by opening the finest barber shop across America in Downtown Atlanta serving white clientele only. He eventually sold his interest in the business subsequently founding Atlanta Life Insurance Company. Atlanta Life Insurance Company (Wedding Scene) – 2/2001
LaGrange College, LaGrange, Georgia (Wedding Scene) – 9/2001
Herndon Home (Wedding Scene) – 9/2001 Beulah Baptist Church -10/2001
First Congregational Church – 4/2002 (Premiere) Hoosier Memorial UMC – 2/2003
Liberty Theatre Cultural Center, Zeta Phi Zeta Sorority, Columbus, Ga.- 3/2003
Trinity United Methodist Church – 9/2004
3. LaRoche
Joseph Phillipe LeMercier LaRoche was the only black passenger on the ill-fated Titanic when it sank after striking an iceberg in the North Atlantic Ocean. Born in Haiti, Joseph’s parents sent him to France to receive his formal education. After failing to secure employment that could sustain his wife and family, he decided to return to Haiti on the Cunard ship line before exchanging his first-class tickets for second-class passage on the Titanic where he and his family would not be separated.
Callanwolde Fine Arts Center – 7/2003 (Premiere) Morris Brown College – 7/2005
Friendship Baptist Church – 7/2005 Atlanta Metropolitan College – 4/2012
4. The Candlers of Callan
Three vignettes about the Candlers from England and Ireland to America where Asa Candler would purchase the Coca Cola formula from Dr. John Pemberton becoming one of the wealthiest entrepreneurs and philanthropists in the south.
Callanwolde Fine Arts Center – 2/2005 (Premiere)
First Presbyterian Church – 5/2006 14th Street Playhouse – 4/2010
Porter Sanford Performing Arts and Community Center – 4/2010
5. The Great Divide
The story of York, the slave who crossed the Great Divide with Lewis and Clark on their expedition of discovery across the West. He was owned by William Clark and upon their return to the east coast was denied his request to be manumitted. Morris Brown College – 11/2005 (Premiere)
Friendship Baptist Church – 11/2005
Clark Atlanta University – 9/2006
6. Pink Lady
The struggles of three women and their battle, perception, and choices in dealing with breast cancer. The opera is preceded by a panel of survivors and medical professionals in a forum to discuss the impact this illness has on women of color.
Friendship Baptist Church – 10/2006 (Premiere) Clark Atlanta University – 10/2006
14th Street Playhouse – 11/2008 Porter Sanford Performing Arts and Community Center – 10/2015
7. Madam C. J.
The life and times of Madam Charles Joseph Walker (Sarah Breedlove), America’s first woman millionaire who made her fortune creating hair products for black women. She was an entrepreneur, philanthropist, and social activist.
Callanwolde Fine Arts Center – 1/2007 (Premiere)
Clark Atlanta University – 2/2007 Mount Carmel Baptist Church – 4/2007
Columbus State University, Zeta Phi Beta Sorority, Columbus, Ga – 2/2008
Ivy Community Center, Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority – 10/2013
8. The Seduction of King Solomon
King Solomon was known to be the wisest king in the Bible, but his lust for foreign women and their idolatry befalls the king. He is visited by the Queen of Sheba and falls in love with her, but she refuses to become his wife.
Friendship Baptist Church – 9/2007 (Premiere) The International Theological Center – 9/2007
Benjamin E. Mays High School – 9/2009 Porter Sanford Performing Arts and Community Center – 9/2009
9. 3kings and a PRINCE
This delightful and humorous Christmas opera for all ages is about the three kings and their journey to find the “Prince of Peace.” On their journey, they visit King Herod for a period of rest but soon come to realize that Herod means the child harm.
Callanwolde Fine Arts Center– 12/2007, 12/2008 (Premiere)
Porter Sanford Performing Arts and Community Center – 12/2009
10. Carmen J.
Carmen J. mirrors the original opera written by George Bizet but adapted to a pre-Civil War plantation setting in Virginia. The composer uses selected arias and choruses from Bizet but develops the story and the majority of the opera music to suit the background of plantation life, Carrie Mae’s escape (who becomes Carmen J.), her riotous tavern life, and her eventual fate with death. Porter Sanford Performing Arts and Community Center – 5/2009 (Premiere)
Ray Charles Performing Arts Center, Morehouse College – 9/2014
Clark Atlanta University – 9/2014
11. The Bridge
Opera story highlights the life of homelessness in Atlanta under the Washington Street Bridge near the State Capitol. Although most of the residents under the bridge have lived there for years, one new resident ends up there through no fault of his own, which brings him to a revelation about people less fortunate than himself.
Morris Brown College – 10/2010 (Premiere) Spring 4th Auditorium – 10/2010
12. Three-Dream Portrait
This opera is three operas in one: Vashti about the queen, in the Old Testament, who refused to obey her husband by displaying herself before his male guests only to be renounced before her banishment from the city; Robeson featuring scenes in the life of Paul Robeson, and The Maid’s Dream set in the 50s. A maid working for a famous opera singer dreams that she too can achieve such a goal. Against all odds and her domineering husband, she determines to pursue her dreams in New York. Friendship Baptist Church – 3/2011 (Premiere)
Allen Temple A.M.E., A Women's Day Fundraising Program (“Vashti”) – 9/2013
13. The Night Watchman* - (Christmas Operetta)
Written for the Department of Music at Clark Atlanta University, the Voice Chair was unable to premiere the work (TBA).
The story takes place in an imaginary town on Christmas Eve. The Night Watchman, because of his youthful mischievousness is bound to watch the night every Christmas Eve until he can prove himself worthy of redemption. The town’s people are just as lost in their own illusions of happiness until a strange thing happens.
14. The Goddesses of Quasar
A science fiction setting. Three goddesses who were once warriors, over time, discover a portal to the Quasar, a place of perfect peace, until the portal is breeched by two warriors from earth. In pursuit of that which was stolen from them, they abandon their vows of peace but lose their souls in the battle.
Spirit and Truth Sanctuary – 9/2017 (Premiere) First Baptist Church of Riverdale – 9/2017
East Point First Mallalieu United Methodist Church – 9/2017
Alexander Memorial AME Church – 10/2017
15. Sing, Marian, Sing (Recital Opera)
A Recital Opera written in tribute to Marian Anderson. Written in two parts: Act I finds Marian on stage with the character of doubt on her left side and the character of encouragement on her right side. The recital tells her many stories enhanced by a song that voices the circumstance. The final act is a resetting of Verdi’s A Masked Ball, Act I, Final Scene. It is the opera where Marian Anderson makes her début performance with the Metropolitan Opera, the first woman of color to do so. Spelman, Sister’s Chapel – 10/06/2019 (Premiere)
16. Sissieretta Jones the B.P. of Vaudeville (One-Act Opera)
One-Act or Petite Opera written in tribute to Matilda Sissieretta Joyner Jones, who had one of the longest and most illustrious careers of a black classical artist on the Vaudeville stage. Although, she sang before British Royalty, presidents of the United States and other world leaders, she was rejected as a potential Metropolitan Opera Star because of her color. This Petite Opera is a presentation of short scenes or vignettes of the singer’s life. Premiere Date, June 24, 25, 26, 2022.