#julies aria

Rhiannon Giddens performs “Julie’s Aria,” a song from Omar, the new opera she wrote with Michael Abels, in a new recording with multi-instrumentalist Francesco Turrisi and guitarist Bill Frisell. You can hear it here.Omar, which receives its long-awaited world premiere at Spoleto Festival USA in Charleston, SC, next Friday, is based on the life and autobiography of enslaved Muslim scholar Omar Ibn Said, who was forcefully brought to Charleston from Africa in 1807. 

“My work as a whole is about excavating and shining a light on pieces of history that not only need to be seen and heard, but that can also add to the conversation about what’s going on now,” Giddens says. “This is a story that hasn’t been represented in the operatic world—or in any world.”

Omar will also be performed by LA Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Boston Lyric Opera, San Francisco Opera, and Carolina Performing Arts at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill.