Kevin Day has composed well-received works for orchestra and jazz combo, but nothing has stretched his horizons quite like Lalovavi: An Afrofuturist Opera in Three Acts — his debut opera, which will premiere at the Cincinnati Opera, as part of its Black Opera Project, in the summer of 2026. "It's a combination of all of my musical training, all of my life experiences in this music," Day says. "There's the jazz elements, there's the classical; there's all the things that kind of make me who I am."
Set 400 years in the future, Lalovavi — an original opera that Day conceived with librettist Tifara Brown — tells the story of Persephone, a princess in a dystopian society called Atlas. When it's discovered that she possesses a gene for immortality, she flees captivity and embarks on a journey through the wilderness. Day's musical design, like the story itself, reflects a perspective that some cultural scholars have termed the "Black Radical Imagination," rich with poignancy and possibility.
Day, who now lives in Las Vegas, stopped by WRTI when he was in town this spring for Play on Philly's Jubilee Concert, which featured the premiere of his double concerto Autumn Fantasia. Sitting at the piano in our performance studio, he talked about — and graciously played themes from — his grand, ambitious work-in-progress.
"It's an Afrofuturist epic opera that has not been done before, and at a grand scale," he says. "We're hoping it's receptive to audiences, and we're hoping that it speaks to the human experience — leaning more into Black joy, rather than Black trauma."
