FREEDOM

This snippet is an excerpt from the 14-minute FREEDOM scene in my blended-roots Opera, MELIOR Opus Griot. The clip is of me at home recording music instrumentation and FX sounds onto computerised software via my digital piano for the musicians to study before our next rehearsals and theatre performance are scheduled. I also recorded myself singing all the lead and harmony vocals. The footage includes imagery by visual artist Sandra Whetham and video editing by David Merritt. 

I originally wrote this work about the nearly three-decade long incarceration of Nelson Mandela. He was still on Robben Island when the music came to me as I was driving on the multi-highway interchange in Atlanta, Georgia, en route from work to pick up my child. My stepfather Bobby Byrd, who was on child-minding duty when I arrived at his house, recognised the music creator look in my eyes. He instinctively instructed his grandkids to “go outside and play” so that I could get to the piano and record the melodies, harmonies and motifs that were swirling around in my mind. I used an audio cassette player, the only resource for recording that I had back then.

In 1988, I composed music solely for myself, mainly for my personal healing. Singing for my supper was not in my life plan. The following year, Pops implored me to serve as the opening act for his Bobby Byrd and the JB All Stars Revue at the Town & Country Club in London (now called the O2 Forum in Kentish Town). This led to me being introduced to Marco Nelson and Femi Williams, the founders of the Young Disciples. They invited me to write music for their album “Road to Freedom”, which was released in 1991 and included my song, FREEDOM.

Over thirty years later, I’m now rearranging this music I composed all those decades ago to suit a scene in my aquatic-themed dramatic music theatre story. The Nelson Mandela theme is expanded to represent oppressed people all over the world struggling to be independent of tyranny.

MELIOR Opus Griot is a fantasy about an ideal ocean-floor society whose main character, Cassie, is a time-travelling Artist Messenger who flows between her spiritual training in the deep Sea to delivering harmonious messages to land dwellers over many centuries. The music combination of Gospel, Jazz, Soul and Opera is to be accompanied by an eclectic 20+ Music Chamber Ensemble, a 48-member Choreographed Opera Chorus plus filmic imagery. Since its successful preview at Hall for Cornwall in November 2022, MELIOR Opus Griot had very well received showcase at London’s SxSW Premiere in June 2025.

MELIOR Opus Griot aims to establish a platform for a fresh approach to the theatrical staging of music stories that existing and emerging artists can build upon. But, above all, it seeks to share harmonious uplift to those who choose to receive it.