Black, British Hip Hop Opera TONES Comes to Edinburgh Fringe This August

Tones: A Hip Hop Opera is a brand new show featuring grime, hip hop and drill from the creative minds behind Wound Up Theatre and award winning actor Gerel Falconer. Gerel plays Jerome - a black man, and an outsider. He feels constantly tested from all sides. His skin tone others him in a white world, yet his voice - his tone - is deemed not quite black enough to fit in with his peers.

Produced by Wound Up Theatre and directed by Jonny Kelly, the team behind highly-acclaimed shows Bismillah! An ISIS Tragicomedy and It'll Be Alt-Right on the Night, Tones - A Hip-Hop Opera fuses a subcultural soundscape with gig theatre and autobiographical references to explore Black- British identity, class and belonging.

Tones is the one-man show written and performed by Gerel Falconer as Jerome (aka The Professor), a working-class, British man of Jamaican heritage.

Tones combines the sounds of grime, hip-hop and drill with the melodrama of opera as we follow Jerome on his journey from childhood to adulthood, his sense of self pushed from pillar to post. As he tries to navigate societal expectations and cultural norms, we witness Jerome reach hard won conclusions about his own identity and purpose. The schism of not fitting in completely with either race - a very real issue facing young black people today - results in an identity crisis as Jerome tries to find safety from isolation.

It's 2023, the sounds of grime, hip-hop and drill are well-established and hugely popular across the UK, yet don't often feature in musical theatre. Tones is a strong example of the kind of work that needs to exist for the much-needed evolution of musical theatre to occur.

Gerel Falconer (aka G or rapper G-R3AL) is an award-winning actor and writer at HighRise Theatre. The cross pollination of Gerel's passion for theatre and roots in underground music scenes has flourished throughout his work with HighRise. Honing the skill set of story-telling through bars has earned Gerel the title of "Rapaturg" and seen him become an important voice in the ever evolving musical theatre industry.

Tones: A Hip Hop Opera will be performed at 3pm in Pleasance Courtyard (Upstairs) from 2nd - 28th August.

 

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