Scott Joplin's Treemonisha

In 1911, famed ragtime composer Scott Joplin wrote Treemonisha, the first opera about life post-slavery by a black person. Musically, it fused classical, folk, and gospel, and bore ragtime’s syncopations. Thematically, it was ahead of its time. Joplin never saw the work fully staged—he died in 1917 and was buried in a pauper’s grave, bankrupted by the expense of publishing Treemonisha. In a new adaptation by Leah-Simone Bowen and co-librettist Cheyl L. Davis, with new orchestrations and arrangements by Jessie Montgomery and Jannina Norpoth and choreography by Jawole Willa Jo Zollar, Treemonisha is reborn for the 21st century.