Music by Kevin Day
Libretto by Tifara Brown
Sung in English and Tut* with projected English captions
WITH EACH STEP, LOVE'S BEACON SHALL SHINE BRIGHT.
Set 400 years into the future, Lalovavi (lah-low-VAH-vee) is an Afrofuturist adventure that follows Persephone, the youngest daughter of the ruler of Atlas, the city formerly known as Atlanta. Currency and status in Atlas are determined based on the presence of Syndica, a gene that promotes vitality and longevity. When Persephone is found to possess a version of Syndica that confers immortality, she is betrayed by her family and must run for her life. She is thrust into an epic journey, uncovering a hidden past that leads her to discover love’s true meaning and the power to determine her destiny.
*Tut is a language that is indigenous to Black Americans and passed down from their enslaved ancestors, who developed Tut as a mechanism for learning how to read and write when it was illegal for them to do so. The title of the opera, “lalovavi,” is the Tut word for “love.”