Opera
Dancer Courtney Cook, countertenor Key’mon Murrah, and the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra conducted by Robert Spano performing Earth 2.0.
Earth 2.0
I was thrilled to be invited to write the libretto for a new opera by composer Jake Heggie, whose work I’ve admired for a long time (Dead Man Walking, Songs for Murdered Sisters, Camille Claudel: Into the Fire). Together we developed Earth 2.0, a 40-minute opera featuring the point of view of the Earth on its relationship with humanity. After eons of togetherness, Earth is beginning to wonder if it’s time to break up. The future is at stake – but is there enough trust left to carry on?
The Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra premiered Earth 2.0 on Dec. 6, 2024, conducted by Robert Spano. Countertenor Key’mon Murrah performed the role of Earth. Earth 2.0 hasn’t been recorded, but I want you to hear Key’mon’s amazing voice. Here’s a clip of him singing with his brother, Kay’mon.
Urban Bush Women dancers Courtney Cook and Bennalldra Williams performed the choreography for Earth 2.0 by director Jawole Willa Jo Zollar.
Stay tuned for updates on future performances! Earth 2.0 is expected to make a comeback in summer, 2026.
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Composer Jake Heggie is on the left, I’m in the middle in the flowered tux.
Dancers Courtney Cook and Bennalldra Williams with countertenor Key’mon Murrah.
Photos by Karen Almond
Critical Acclaim
“The orchestral writing is an expressive mélange of sounds and styles. Wind twitters evoke songbirds, but dissonant, stabbing dance music suggests forests of concrete rising beneath their flights; a suggestion of a spiritual supplies refuge. A sultry, bluesy trumpet solo represents Earth’s evolving artistry. Orchestral wreathings wrap around a wish for human care — and imagined extraplanetary adventures. To a flute solo, words recall birds’ evolution from dinosaurs and their function as pollinators. ‘The Admirer’ celebrates human bodies in jazzy music. Heggie effectively exploited Murrah’s powerful countertenor voice and vivid delivery, with blazing high notes in soprano range.” - Dallas Morning News
“Heggie brought the awesome communicative power of music to reiterate increasingly disastrous predictions about global warming. Maybe delivering this dire warning with such effective musical postage will change a mind or two. It just might. That is because Heggie’s work, really a concert opera, displays his absolute mastery of musical dramatic delivery. In a surprising turn, the text by the Iranian-American writer Anita Amirrezvani lets the Earth itself cry out for mitigation... Earth 2.0 sports a variety of musical influences from modernism to Broadway, with stops at folk, jazz, and the blues along the way. Murrah’s cri du coeur of ‘Cleanse Me’ at the opera’s climatic moment was unforgettable. Two dancers writhed in tortuous motions – perhaps they are us, suffering in the extreme heat, hurricanes, catastrophic floods, and uncontrollable wildfires we have foisted on ourselves. The audience was captured by Earth 2.0 and were all given a well-deserved ovation.” - EarRelevant
