After two years of postponements, the world premiere of the opera "Omar" is slated for this year's Spoleto Festival USA. With the 2022 lineup for the major performing arts event now available, we're revisiting our episode about the namesake for this highly-anticipated opera, Omar ibn Said. Photographer Gavin McIntyre and reporter Jennifer Berry Hawes shared what their reporting process, which took them all the way to Senegal, revealed about the life of the Muslim scholar was enslaved and sold in Charleston, S.C.
This month, Spoleto Festival USA, a major performing arts event that’s held annually here in Charleston, announced its 2022 programming lineup.
That’s always exciting, but it especially is this year, after two years of the COVID-19 pandemic. For the first time since 2019, the festival will host international performers.
And, after being postponed twice, Spoleto audiences are going to see the world premiere of a highly-anticipated opera.
Called "Omar," and it’s based on the autobiography of Omar ibn Said, a Muslim scholar who was made to board a ship bound for Charleston where he was enslaved and sold.
We told Omar’s story on this podcast June 2021, and we thought that now, with the show on the calendar for Spoleto 2022, would be a great time to revisit it.
When we first shared this episode last year, photographer Gavin McIntrye and reporter Jennifer Berry Hawes had just published a big project on Omar’s life. They did research here in Charleston, traveled to North Carolina where Omar lived out his later years and made a reporting trip to Senegal to try to find the place that Omar called home.
In this episode, they shared what that reporting process was like and what their trip revealed about Omar Ibn Said's life.
You find more details on "Omar" from Spoleto Festival USA here.
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