Opera Diversifies as it Makes the Shift to Virtual Performances

ABC News is exploring the ways in which opera has been able to diversify since making the shift to virtual productions due to the health crisis.

Lincoln Center's Mostly Mozart Festival was set to include a timely opera called Blue, but production was halted. Blue was written by Tazewell Thompson, and composed by Jeanine Tesori.

Blue has since moved to a radio format, streaming on WQXR.

"When the curtain is over, when the radio is turned off, when the computer is shut down, and you've experienced 'Blue,'" Thompson said, "it's a reminder that we are all brothers and sisters, all together on this earth, and some of us really need to go a little extra and to prove, to show by your actions that you are not racist, that you do not hate Black people, that you do not wish Black people to be swept away from the earth or lynched publicly."

In addition, Opera Philadelphia has moved its production of "Cycles of My Being" from this September to next.

"Rather than canceling things, we're trying to postpone everything and trying to think long-term," said Sarah Williams, new works administrator at Opera Philadelphia.

In the meantime, Opera Philadelphia is launching the Opera Philadelphia Channel, a streaming site that will not only air previously recorded material, but entirely new material.

"In this pandemic we can only do so much, and so I think one of the many reasons that we've had the response that we've had to George Floyd's murder, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery ... I think there's an attention span you can't deny," Williams said. "We have people's attention, and I think using that and walking into that in any way possible, it's absolutely necessary."

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