Dialogues on Opera and the African-American Experience

Opera audiences around the world are swept away by the magnificent voices of African-American singers like Leontyne Price, Kathleen Battle, and Jessye Norman. But growth opportunities for African-American opera singers are comparatively recent. Thus, Cheatham's work is especially timely and relevant. He engages in conversations with ten prominent African-American operatic artists: Carmen deLavallade, Andrew Frierson, Everett Lee, Sylvia Olden Lee, Dorothy Rudd Moore, Benjamin Matthews, Wayne Sanders, George Shirley, Shirley Verrett, and William Warfield. In their conversations with Cheatham, these artists candidly discuss the uniqueness of being African-American within the operatic mainstream. They also articulate their inspiration, their dedication, and their travails as they rose within the opera world. With photographs.