Inset photo: composer Edmond Dédé; photo courtesy of Opera Lafayette. Large photo: The world premiere of a concert version of Dédé’s Morgiane was given on January 24 at the St. Louis Cathedral in New Orleans, led by Opera Lafayette Artistic Director Designate Patrick Dupre Quigley and featuring musicians of the Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra and vocalists. Photo by Amber Johnson/HNOC.
In Monday’s (1/27) Early Music America, Patrick D. McCoy writes, “Like many artists of color with the opportunity, Edmond Dédé fled the antebellum United States. After a time in Mexico, he eventually settled in France, where his talents as a composer and conductor were soon recognized … and later forgotten. Among Dédé’s surviving works is a four-act opera, Morgiane, ou Le Sultan d’Ispahan, which was never performed or published in his lifetime. Morgiane … was finished in 1887, making it perhaps the oldest-known complete opera by a Black composer born in the United States…. Next week, Morgiane will receive its world premiere, fully staged, with shows in the Washington D.C. area (Feb. 3 and 7) and New York City (Feb. 5). It’s a co-production of the D.C.-based Opera Lafayette and OperaCreole from New Orleans…. (A 90-minute excerpt was performed last week in New Orleans.)… Givonna Joseph, co-founder of OperaCreole, [said], ‘The world needed to know that a free Black man from New Orleans not only composed over 100 works, but also a complete French grand opera.’ ” The world premiere of a 90-minute concert version of Morgiane was co-presented in New Orleans on January 24 by the Historic New Orleans Collection, OperaCréole, and the Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra, courtesy of the production partnership between OperaCréole and Opera Lafayette.
