The Santa Fe Opera Presents World Premiere Performances of "This Little Light of Mine" About Voting Rights Activist Fannie Lou Hamer on October 28, 29 & 30

Cast

Fannie Lou Hamer Nicole Joy Mitchell
Dorothy Jean Hamer Kearstin Piper Brown
June Johnson/SNCC Worker Heather Hill
Chorus Albuquerque’s Gospel Choir Community 

Instrumentation

2 violins, viola, cello, double bass, steel-stringed guitar, piano, light percussion (one player)

About This Little Light of Mine

This Little Light of Mine with music by Chandler Carter and words by Diana Solomon-Glover illuminates the efforts of Civil Rights hero, Fannie Lou Hamer, to secure voting rights for Black Mississippians.  Centered around Hamer’s appeal to the 1964 Democratic National Convention Credentials Committee to replace Mississippi’s all-white delegation of “Dixiecrats” with the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party, an interracial delegation she helped found, Hamer, daughter Dorothy Jean and fellow freedom fighter, June Johnson, tell the story of Hamer’s courageous battle to raise the status of Mississippi’s Black inhabitants to “first-class citizens.”  Hamer’s personal sacrifices leading up to that moment – the violent harassment she and her family face, starvation, medical terrorism, loss of livelihood and the horrific beating she suffers at the hands of local police – imbue her with an unassailable moral authority and provide an explosive testimony that sends shockwaves throughout the nation and alters the course of American history.

About the Creative Team

Chandler Carter’s work focuses on historical stories that cross the boundaries of race and power. In addition to works for the stage, Carter has composed over 50 songs and numerous choral, chamber and orchestral pieces which have been performed internationally by distinguished recitalists, choirs and ensembles.

Diana Solomon-Glover’s career and talents have been showcased on the operatic stage, in concert, oratorio, recital, musical theater, cabaret and on radio and television across the United States, Canada, Europe, the Caribbean and in Central America, and have long served humanitarian and social efforts. In 2001,  Solomon-Glover created the role of Winnie Mandela in the premiere of Carter’s No Easy Walk to Freedom, an opera based upon the life of South African President, Nelson Mandela.

Beth Greenberg has more than 25 years of experience producing, directing and managing live, large-scale concert and theatrical productions in both indoor and outdoor venues. Greenberg is renowned for her work with the New York City Opera and has staged world premieres and traditional works for Opera Colorado, Fort Worth Opera and the Phoenicia Voice Festival, among other U.S. companies.

Heralded as one of today’s leading female conductors, Jeri Lynne Johnson first made history in 2005 as the first Black woman to win an international conducting prize when she was awarded the Taki Alsop Conducting Fellowship. She has broken barriers in Europe and the U.S. as the first African American woman on the podium for many orchestras and has conducted the Philadelphia Orchestra, Dallas Symphony Orchestra, Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra (U.K.) and Weimar Staatskapelle (Germany), among others. Maestra Johnson established her own orchestra in Philadelphia, the Black Pearl Chamber Orchestra, to serve as a model for the 21st-century American orchestra, combining artistic excellence with cultural diversity and innovative community engagement. 

Scenic Designer Lawrence E. Moten III is a designer based in Brooklyn NY and works across the country. Most recently his work has been seen on Broadway with Chicken and Biscuits at Circle In The Square, and off-Broadway with the world premiere play Patience produced by Second Stage and STEW produced by Page 73. Lawrence is beginning his 6th year of teaching at Princeton University and recently started at Queens College as a faculty member for the 2022/2023 School year. He earned his BFA in Design from Ithaca College.  

Costume Designer Brooke Stanton has worked in theater, film and television. During her five years with George Lucas’ ILM, she built creatures for the Star Wars Special Edition Trilogy and The Phantom Menace. She has toured internationally and nationally designing for Peter Sellars. Other clients include Disney, Columbia Pictures, CBS, American Repertory Theater, American Conservatory Theater, Aspen Music Festival, Berkshire Opera Festival, Boston Symphony Youth Orchestra, Commonwealth Shakespeare, S.F. Shakespeare, New England Conservatory and Odyssey Opera.

Jason Lynch is a Chicago-based lighting designer for theater, dance, opera and other live performance art. He is honored to have his recent work on the Goodman Theatre’s real-time, online ‘Live’ series and an immersive 360° production of The Wild Party at the Denver Center for the Performing Arts featured in American Theatre Magazine. He was also the recipient of the 2019 Michael Maggio Emerging Designer Award which recognizes emerging theatrical designers within the Chicago area.

Hair and Wig Designer, Cookie Jordan’s work has been seen on Broadway in The Piano Lesson, Into the Woods, Trouble In Mind, Clydes, POTUS, Slave Play, Choir Boy, The Cher Show, Once On This Island, Sunday in the Park with George, In Transit, Eclipsed, Side Show, After Midnight, Fela, A View From the Bridge, and South Pacific. Off-Broadway credits include Girls, Fefu and Her Friends, Aint No Mo, Fairview, Toni Stone, If Pretty Hurts, The Secret Life of Bees, Boseman and Lena, Fabulation, Our Lady of 121st Street, In the Blood, Daddy, and Hercules.

Projections Designer Katherine Freer is a multimedia artist, filmmaker, organizer and educator whose artistic practice lives at the intersection of story, technology and civic engagement. Frequent collaborators include Ping Chong, Ty Defoe, Kamilah Forbes, Steve H. Broadnax III, Lux Haac, Porsche McGovern, Liza Jessie Peterson, Talvin Wilks and Tamilla Woodard. She is a proud member of Wingspace Theatrical Design and United Scenic Artists, Local USA 829; a core collaborator in All My Relations Collective; and Interim Head of Integrated Media Program at the University of Texas at Austin.

About the Cast

The role of Fannie Lou Hamer is created by powerhouse contralto Nicole Joy Mitchell, a proud native of Brooklyn, New York. She has sung with opera companies around the country and world and made her Metropolitan Opera debut as part of the ensemble in the GRAMMY-winning production of the Gershwins’ Porgy and Bess. She returned to the Metropolitan Opera in their 2021/2022 season in several productions, including Terence Blanchard’s historic opera Fire Shut Up in My Bones. As a member of the ensemble for the 2022/2023 season, she will appear in several productions including Aida, Lohengrin, Dialogues des Carmélites and Terence Blanchard’s Champion in addition to several other works. Nicole also has experience in film and narration.

Soprano Kearstin Piper Brown sings the role of Dorothy Jean Hamer. Brown’s career has spanned opera and musical theater, including appearances with San Francisco Opera, the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, Opera Kazan, Skylight Music Theatre, Dayton Opera, Virginia Opera, Utah Festival Opera and the Belarusian State Philharmonic Orchestra. A native of Alexandria, Virginia, Brown is a graduate of both Spelman College and Northwestern University.

The roles of June Johnson and SNCC Worker are presented by soprano Heather Hill. Hill’s career encompasses appearances in opera, oratorio, musical theater, television and film. She recently performed with the Broadway production of The Phantom of the Opera and the Broadway revival of Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess. Other recent performances include the role of Ravine Marauder in the premiere of the new Musical Other World at the Delaware Playhouse; and the role of Angelica in Orlando: Hero of Love by G.F. Handel with Opera Praktikos in New York City. 

About Opera for All Voices

Opera for All Voices (OFAV) is committed to co-commissioning and co-producing new operatic works for audiences of all ages that bear the same artistic integrity and depth of storytelling as the festival season. There is additionally a commitment to social impact and the representation of diverse voices through the development of these new and important works. OFAV was guided by a consortium of opera companies led by the Santa Fe Opera including Lyric Opera of Kansas City, Minnesota Opera, Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, San Francisco Opera, Sarasota Opera and Seattle Opera — resulting in the commission of four new works, flexible in both scope and scale, which can be performed in a variety of venues. The teams behind the commissioned works were selected through an invitational process and adjudicated by a jury of twelve distinguished individuals in the field of opera.

Projects selected through the OFAV invitational are moving through the development process, each receiving workshops, the opportunity to premiere the opera at one of the partner companies, as well as the opportunity for subsequent performances at other partner companies. Commissions to date include Augusta Read Thomas and Leslie Dunton-Downer’s Sweet Potato Kicks the Sun (premiered October 2019), Laura Kaminsky and Kimberly Reed’s Hometown to the World (premiered December 2021) and David Hanlon and Stephanie Fleischmann’s The Pigeon Keeper. The Santa Fe Opera gratefully acknowledges the following development partners: Kentucky Opera, the American Spiritual Ensemble and Florida International University for This Little Light of Mine; and San Francisco Girls Chorus for The Pigeon Keeper.

Commissioning and development support for Opera for All Voices have been provided by the Melville Hankins Family Foundation, Principal Education Sponsor of the Santa Fe Opera; The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation; and two OPERA America Innovation Grants generously funded by the Ann & Gordon Getty Foundation.