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[0:14] Andrew Child: Hi, I'm Andrew Child, and welcome to Fifty Key Stage Musicals, the podcast, a companion piece to the Routledge Press publication Fifty Key Stage Musicals, which is available for purchase by going to Routledge.com or clicking the link below in today's show description.

[0:32] Andrew Child: Today's episode focuses on chapter 8, Porgy and Bess, and with us today is performer, writer, and educator Davóne Tines.

[0:32] Andrew Child: Davóne Tines is a pathbreaking artist whose work not only encompasses a diverse repertoire from early music to new commissions by leading composers, but also explores the social issues of today.

[0:56] Andrew Child: A performer at the intersection of many histories, cultures, and aesthetics, he is engaged in work that blends opera, art song, contemporary classical music, spirituals, gospel, and songs of protest as a means to tell a deeply personal story of perseverance that connects to all of humanity.

[1:17] Andrew Child: Tines is co-creator of The Black Clown, a music theater experience commissioned and premiered by the American Repertory Theater.

[1:24] Andrew Child: Tines is Musical America's 2022 vocalist of the year and a recipient of the 2020 Sphinx Medal of Excellence.

[1:32] Andrew Child: He is a graduate of the Juilliard School and Harvard University, where he also serves as guest lecturer.

[1:32] Andrew Child: Davóne, thank you so much for being here. Do you, as a Black opera singer, as a composer, do you naturally have any sort of connection to or relationship with the show in question today with Porgy and Bess?

[1:57] Davóne Tines: Very much.

[2:08] Davóne Tines: And many different aspects of claiming one's identity in various spaces. And just a little more context, I'm often misconstrued as some sort of activist or somebody that's trying to center the Black voice. When in actuality, I like to think of it in a more expansive way that I'm just an artist trying to engage who I am. And if that happens to, you know, connect to certain political ideas or social context where engaging my Black identity is seen as political, then that seems to be a byproduct rather than my own intention. But that being said, and having done that kind of work, Porgy and Bess has always existed in kind of the negative relief of my career. You know, it kind of creates the other space that I don't tend to inhabit.

And that's partly because I think I'm continuing to try to square what Porgy and Bess is. I first came to know it, you know, I think as many people had listening to the song "Summertime," you know, that kind of an indelible American classic that many people have engaged in many different contexts and versions and different singers. You know, that being the quote unquote hit single of the opera. And then, you know, as a younger person and understanding, oh, this is from an opera that has an entirely Black cast written by legendary American composer George Gershwin. When I was younger, I was deeply in love with "Rhapsody in Blue." I was a real nerd and had like six different recordings and liked different pianists' interpretations of different parts, but I had never really understood the entire, you know, bigger work of Porgy and Bess until a lot later.

And you come to find out that "Summertime" is not sung by the title character, which I think a lot of people make the assumption it is. It's sung at the very beginning of the show by a character, a secondary character named Clara. And then you come to find out that Bess is actually a very complicated heroine who is addicted to some sort of substance called happy dust. And there's various interpretations of what that could be. And that her, you know, counterpart, Porgy, is a crippled man who is, you know, forsakenly or forlornly in love with Bess, and Porgy and Bess is actually the story of a tragedy of the inability for this relationship between two, you know, hindered people in various ways to exist or to actually hold their relationship.

It's a very sad story of, you know, the death of a possibility. And that is cast against the backdrop of a large seaside community, a Black community, you know, in the rural mid-Atlantic region, essentially. And my association and my association with that piece continues to try to contend with what does it mean that this is the only narrative that is within the operatic canon in which Black people are called for as the performers of that piece? And what does it mean for us to try to create work that counterbalances or counters that narrative?

[5:26] Andrew Child: So, and I mean you called it like a negative relief. Would you say, is it fair to say that Porgy and Bess is something that your work is inherently responding to as this sort of standalone in the operatic canon?

[5:47] Davóne Tines: In a way, in an inadvertent way, you know. There is a continued future of producing Porgy and Bess in American opera or in global opera at large. I think that there is a possible future for the production of Porgy and Bess. I mean, it will definitely persist within arts institutions, if only from a financial standpoint, which is a quite fascinating aspect of the show in and of itself. It continues to be something that sells out on opera seasons around the world and is always seen as a, you know, deeply dependable financial success. So for the various contexts in which nonprofit arts want to be successful in financial realms, Porgy and Bess will continue to persist simply because of its fiscal viability.

But for its artistic viability, I think it's important to continue to re-engage the subject matter of things that have made it to canon by contextualizing it within modern perspectives and modern aesthetics. Some pieces of work that have existed and are beloved within the canon continue to bear that kind of interrogation, like "The Magic Flute" or like "Don Giovanni." There are other works that might lend themselves to that kind of interrogation, like "Rigoletto" or "Traviata," you know, dealing with other human and mental health aspects. But Porgy and Bess seems to exist in a sort of stasis. You know, its setting and its score is very particular, and its music seems to be of a particular time and aesthetic.

But I don't think, or at least to my knowledge, and my knowledge is not exhaustive, I'm aware of a large-scale production that really takes into account how do we tell this story today. So I'm quite interested personally, maybe even to creatively produce one day or be a part of making a Porgy and Bess that situates that community and that situation in a context that is actually more real to Black life currently and actually holds those characters in a certain nuance and specificity that I don't think many productions allow it.

[8:09] Davóne Tines: I mean, the last few productions of Porgy and Bess I've witnessed have done the tragedy that I think a lot of other productions to other operas do, which is to simply mount the work, to simply put it on a stage and have it realized for its most surface and base possibilities or intentions, and not trying to think, well, what is it to engage these kinds of stories in psychologies today? I think we're at a very special inflection point in cultural society where we can't exactly be nebulous or anonymous about why we are telling stories. So just as any piece of canon needs to be re-engaged with a certain sensitivity and specificity, Porgy and Bess needs that as well.

[8:53] Andrew Child: So when you talk about productions of this piece that you've seen or that you've engaged with, were you, I'm not sure about the timeline here, but would you have been at Harvard at the ART when they were mounting their production that eventually went on to Broadway?

[9:13] Davóne Tines: Um, I was not around when that production was being made, no.

[9:17] Andrew Child: Okay, but was that a production that you caught or that you saw either in Cambridge or later in the Broadway run?

[9:25] Davóne Tines: No, that existed before my even deeper understanding of what the piece was as a whole. You know, I knew that there were certain popular songs, and I knew that it was amazing that Audra McDonald would be taking on those songs, and of course, hearing her performance of those things, but knowing that the wonderful Diane Paulus had translated it into another context, but not having even engaged the piece more depthfully at that time to even understand what she might have done.

[9:52] Andrew Child: And then is the most recent production at the Metropolitan Opera, is that one of the ones that you have engaged with at all?

[10:01] Davóne Tines: Very much. I've seen that production in many different contexts. Um, it went around in Europe before it ended up at the Met. And so I've seen it in, you know, various casts and various timings, and it persists as an example of what I'm talking about.

[10:19] Andrew Child: So if you were to helm a production of Porgy and Bess in 2022 or in 2025 or in 2035, what would you say is sort of in the front of your brain when you are starting to take on that process? What are your priorities? What are your major questions?

[10:43] Davóne Tines: My major questions are what is the essence, the core essence of that story in the relationships that are presented between community and individual? And how does that connect to the current identities of communities and individuals that are in ancestry or in lineage with those characters? How do those storylines, you know, with respect to race, because the story is very specifically, even litigiously in the score connected to race? How do those aspects of the story still play with or against the identities of that lineage today? So it would involve a lot of conversation with Black people of many different contexts, people that are exposed to the piece, people that have, you know, more socio-historical knowledge, people that work in the dramaturgical context within theater to really excavate why is this story necessary for being told? What service can it do to the communities it connects to? And how is it actually moving a conversation of engagement of those particular dire situations?

[11:47] Davóne Tines: You know, addiction and bodily harm.

[11:51] Davóne Tines: How are we holding those things with care and with the intention of moving people forward?

[11:59] Davóne Tines: And would you say are those questions, are those priorities, are those ideals, are those usually coming into the room with you on the works that you are working on?

[12:10] Davóne Tines: Or are those sort of specialized to addressing something that is from the 1920s?

[12:20] Davóne Tines: That is something I try to walk into a room with every single time. I mean, it's something that's been able to evolve and you know, a way of working that I've been able to beautifully develop with colleagues and have discovered from other artists that I appreciate.

[12:34] Davóne Tines: And just the simple notions of what is the reason we are telling this story, and what work is the telling of that story doing in the world?

[12:46] Davóne Tines: A pretty simple way of diagnosing, you know, the efficacy of a project.

[12:52] Davóne Tines: Why are we telling the story and what work is it doing in the world?

[12:56] Davóne Tines: So I'd love to sort of turn those two questions back at you if you don't mind.

[13:02] Davóne Tines: And would you be able to sort of walk us through the answer to those questions or your attempted answer to those questions with your work on the Black Clown?

[13:15] Davóne Tines: Like what were you doing? Why were you doing it? And what was the effect you were looking for on the audience and the world as a whole?

[13:25] Davóne Tines: Definitely. I mean, seeing as you know, the creation of the Black Clown was an over an eight-year process, there's a lot there, and we could talk for hours about all the implications of those things.

[13:35] Davóne Tines: But put in a somewhat simplified way, the original impetus for telling the story, the most personal answer to why the story was being told was when I encountered that poem, I saw something I needed to say to people that I didn't know I needed to say, and put in a way that I didn't know it was possible to say it.

[13:58] Davóne Tines: The way was extremely succinct, the way it was also very poetic, but also very encompassing of the entire context. You know, growing up in rural Northern Virginia in a sort of preppy horse country context, and then going to Harvard University as a young Black man from a certain socioeconomic context, then going to Harvard as a young Black man from a certain socioeconomic context, I was finding myself constantly in situations where I felt treated in a way that was irrespective of my larger historical context.

[14:36] Davóne Tines: And I had come to the idea that if people actually understood and held the weight of American history as it pertains to Black people, then people would actually treat minorities and Black people better.

[14:48] Davóne Tines: So when I read that poem, I said, this is what I need to say and have communicated to as many white people and people within the United States or beyond as possible, because with the understanding of broader context and history, then there can be some sort of connection to empathy.

[15:04] Davóne Tines: And I quickly realized in sharing that poem with family and friends and colleagues that this was not something I needed to say alone. You know, Langston Hughes essentially wrote a manual for the expression of this broader history for people to pick up and engage.

[15:20] Davóne Tines: And I took it as my raison d'être with that piece to try to pump it out to as many people as possible, which is why that poem and that show takes the form of a dazzling musical.

[15:30] Davóne Tines: You know, what part of theater performance do we have that is the most ubiquitous and most spreadable than musical theater?

[15:39] Davóne Tines: So that is a little bit of the why is this story being told.

[15:43] Davóne Tines: And then the what work is this story doing in the world? You know, that exists on a spectrum from the personal to the more universal, and working from the personal, the work that it's doing is giving a real place and a name to feelings and inquiries that I personally have had, friends and colleagues have had, but also the ability to share that opportunity for connection and catharsis with larger minority communities that may not have been provided that space, especially in a commercial theater context.

[16:18] Davóne Tines: So the work that I think the Black Clown is doing in the world is offering a space and an option for acknowledgement, offering a space for people to feel seen and understood, and even more so contextualized, so that they can also feel as empowered as I did to stand up in the glory of my current existence based on the history of my ancestry, and knowing that a brilliant ancestor, Langston Hughes, was already trying to set that sort of communication forth, was trying to give us a blueprint as it were, to engaging our broader history so that we can have some sort of possibility of empathy and way of walking forward.

[17:06] Davóne Tines: Do you think with all of that in mind and all of that considered, would you count the Black Clown in its initial run and then a later remount? Would you count that as successful in those goals?

[17:23] Davóne Tines: Very much. But also it the thing with those goals is they are things to be revisited. You know, those things are not stuck, those things are not things where you can check a box and say, oh, we did it.

[17:36] Davóne Tines: You know, as people change, as history changes, as context continues to grow and change, so do the possible answers to those questions, and so do the possible boundaries of what your intentions were originally.

[17:48] Davóne Tines: And that's kind of the beauty of anything, right? Of being alive, of being able to self-reflect and self-assess in order to think about how to move forward.

[17:56] Davóne Tines: I wouldn't want to be judged by the rubrics I held for myself, you know, two months ago, let alone years ago.

[18:07] Davóne Tines: But it's one thing to evaluate, you know, here's where we were. We tried to do it with as much integrity and intention as possible.

[18:14] Davóne Tines: And here's now what we can do based on what we now have learned and where we currently are.

[18:19] Davóne Tines: Do you feel like from eight years ago to now, your rubrics for yourself and for your work have shifted and changed?

[18:27] Davóne Tines: Deeply.

[18:29] Davóne Tines: Do you have any specific thoughts about ways that they've changed, or just you know, they're very different now?

[18:37] Davóne Tines: Um, I mean, you know, it might take four years to talk about eight years of change, but and that's trying to give the cliff notes.

[18:47] Davóne Tines: But I guess I could give one particular example of a change in a way of working. A very pivotal moment in the development of the Black Clown was in our second staged workshop, where we tried out a staging for the song 300 years.

[19:05] Davóne Tines: And that portion of the poem is kind of in Langston Hughes's conception, a portal back in time, looking at the beginnings of Black oppression within America, so slavery, essentially.

[19:18] Davóne Tines: And it was very necessary to in some way represent that time on stage.

[19:24] Davóne Tines: Um, we had a lot of inspiration from the imagery of Kara Walker, who looks at those periods in sort of grotesque and finite ways.

[19:33] Davóne Tines: And we wanted to understand, you know, how can we bring some of the horrificness of this context to life?

[19:42] Davóne Tines: And what we found, which was a complete surprise, but looking back on it now, just seems, you know, idiotic that it was even a surprise to myself was, you know, asking Black people to embody the actions of slavery on stage is a deeply traumatic act if it's not properly invited and contextualized for those people, you know, to be assumptive that people would want to or be able to put their bodies in those contexts that are in lineage with some of the darkest oppression of the train of human history has real effect.

[20:19] Davóne Tines: And I think in my own, you know, neophyte nature of being a theater maker, you kind of dream up what something can be or what something can look like.

[20:28] Davóne Tines: And in terms of the growth or change of my own values, I at that time didn't consider as depthfully what it meant to ask people to bring those visions and imaginings to life.

[20:41] Davóne Tines: So there was a very pivotal moment in which we had to slow down and think, you know, these actors, these incredible performers are not pawns.

[20:51] Davóne Tines: They're not people that we are having, you know, enact some sort of plan to tell the story.

[20:57] Davóne Tines: But in fact, they are our partners in telling this story.

[21:00] Davóne Tines: And we all need to be in a community and a compliance and an open communication about safety and what it means to invite people to tell certain aspects of narratives.

[21:11] Davóne Tines: So that's just one aspect of you know how I hope my own sensitivity and work can continue to grow, which is being respective of the individuals and collaborators with which I interact, so that we can make things that are responsible and healthy and intentional.

[21:29] Davóne Tines: I think that is so interesting because I remember as an audience member coming to see the Black Clown, it was accompanied by, and I don't remember the exact wording, but one of the most specific and thoughtful sort of content warnings that I've ever and to this day seen for a show that had very much specificity about what we were about to see and the moments that could be potentially harmful or triggering to audience members.

[22:04] Davóne Tines: Was that something that you and the rest of the artistic team had a hand in, sort of this audience care that sort of comes off of what you were just sort of talking about?

[22:17] Davóne Tines: Oh, most definitely.

[22:19] Davóne Tines: I mean, you know, the work of contextualizing that show continued to be its own train of development while we were creating the piece, and especially when it was in final production.

[22:31] Davóne Tines: Um how one engages the audience, you know, working with my brilliant collaborator, director Zach Winnaker, we've come into a way of working in which the interaction between the stage and the audience is actually a material of the show.

[22:47] Davóne Tines: It's not a happenstance, you know, occurrence, but actually trying to judge for or prepare for what sort of situations emotionally and physically you're inviting an audience into or that you are creating actually is the material of the storytelling.

[23:05] Davóne Tines: Now I know that in some commercial and musical theater contexts, you know, you're thinking about how to place a button or how to, you know, drum up excitement at a certain place.

[23:15] Davóne Tines: And I'd like to think we're trying to think in those directions, but in a somewhat deeper, if not more sensitive way, because the Black Clown is all about juxtaposition.

[23:24] Davóne Tines: I mean, it's in the text, you know, strike up the music, let it be gay. Only in song can a clown have his day, 300 years in the cotton and the cane.

[23:33] Davóne Tines: Those two images deeply juxtaposed. One is very joyful and open and sprightly, and you're inviting the audience to be having a good time. And then you literally punch them in the stomach by saying, Oh, this is contextualized within, you know, years, hundreds of years of enslavement. So in the text, Hughes plays with the audience's comfortability, and then in translating that to the stage, our material of engagement and storytelling is a more three-dimensional embodied version of playing with the audience's comfortability and expectations. So, how you contextualize that experience before an audience enters, you know, that playground essentially of their own physicality and emotions is very important. I'd love to know a little bit more about how you, when you are specifically in the role of performer, sort of bring these ideas of contextualization into the room with you.

[24:31] Davóne Tines: Like I'd love to know something like you're doing right now, um, Anthony Davis's X, The Life and Times of Malcolm X with Detroit Opera. Um, are these considerations that sort of come into the room when you're in that role as well?

[24:48] Davóne Tines: Yeah, I mean, we we haven't, you know, delved into that full process just yet, but in terms of my own personal preparation, um I've been very inspired by director Robert O'Hara's take on how he'd like to position the show, which is that X, you know, being an important and deeply seminal figure for American history, and the opera will tell his story in a sort of historical way. X can also operate as an Uberman, as an everyman, you know, that I think the larger legacy of Malcolm X is that his work and what he modeled can carry forward. And so preparing that show has also meant my own connecting to what his intentions were and kind of distilling, you know, what was he actually trying to say and model about a black person or a person from any community doing to support and protect their community? Um, so in terms of building the larger context for that, I've actually been engaged in a pretty long process that I kind of call my meta preparation for the show.

[25:52] Davóne Tines: Um, so uh when I was invited to do the role of Malcolm X, I was also invited to have an artist residency with Detroit Opera. And in thinking about what I wanted that residency to be about, I wanted to, you know, take reality as it was. Um, I'd be playing a character that was very near and dear um to Detroit, and you know, his life was very much embedded in that city. But I was coming as a performer as an outsider. So I didn't want to make a situation which I showed up, did a few shows of Malcolm X, this character that is deeply embedded within this community's history, and then leave and not be respective of what is the purpose or you know, the work that my engagement within the story within this community is doing. So I made the thrust of the residency getting to know Detroit.

[26:43] Davóne Tines: I've visited Detroit every month, month and a half over the past year or so, and wanted to make that engagement about getting to know the broader Black arts community and various other entrepreneurs within Detroit and just understanding what are people doing to keep the culture of Detroit alive. What are people actually doing to breed support for community within Detroit? And how can I actually make organic connections to those places at many scales? So that when I further engage that community by telling this story or this idea of an every man that's engaged with community protection and support, it can actually be grounded in knowing the people that make the context in which the show is happening true and connected. And it's led to many beautiful things.

[27:27] Davóne Tines: I mean, I've gotten to know certain people, um, an amazing artist named Jessica Care Moore, who is a spoken word artist, um who's very much a node of the Black cultural life within Detroit. And getting to know her over months and months and months, we've collaborated on work now that has been seen internationally, and her essentially writing around the idea of why do I still need to prove my humanity today. Another aspect has been getting to know the Osborne Neighborhood Alliance, which is a really incredible clearinghouse for smaller Black community led organizations, you know, people trying to install solar panels in their communities that have been left behind by the larger system, or trying to raise money to put in a speed bump so that their children can play safely, or trying to install community gardens in places where you know the city and state's revenue has not exactly been um abundant, if not apparent.

[28:21] Davóne Tines: Um, but getting to know these organizations by multiple visits and saying, you know, what can I actually do to offer you anything I potentially have? And that might come in the way of collaboration, um, as I've done with Jessica, but also with students from the Detroit School of the Arts over time. And how can that even lead to potential financial support? You know, um, bringing a show to a certain context and uh co-opting a story is not doing the right thing unless you can say, well, how about I personally model what X was trying to do, at least in the capacity that I personally have.

[28:59] Andrew Child: Would you say that? I don't know. I don't I don't want to make assumptions or put words in your mouth, but now you've sort of walked us through two processes where uh years and years or months and months of research and consideration are being put into your work. Is that something that you feel like we should be seeing more of in American theater, in American opera, um, or in commercial theater, commercial opera worldwide?

[29:36] Davóne Tines: I hope so. I mean, I don't want to be assumptive about anyone's process, but um, I have found the most depthful and rewarding experiences are the ones that have taken time. They're the ones that have taken, you know, consideration and deep conversation with colleagues to understand what really is the impetus of this work and how is it simply existing in a world in a way that doesn't do harm? And I think if people continue to ask those questions in whatever processes and scales they have available to them, we'll continue to make good work.

[30:08] Davóne Tines: I guess I feel like that is an important sort of caveat in there, whatever scales and processes are available. Because when we talk about putting work in to this performance for months and months or for years and years, I'm sure there are people out there who are listening who are saying, Oh, yeah, wouldn't that be great? But all they can think about is the money and the resources that that takes. Um, but would you say um we can kind of go back, I guess, a little bit to the black clown because I know um X that opera hasn't been performed yet. Would you say coming soon?

[30:45] Davóne Tines: Coming soon.

[30:46] Andrew Child: Would you say that with the Black Clown, for instance, was there payoff for having a eight years long process, like in audience responses, in feedback?

[30:59] Davóne Tines: Deeply. Um, you know, if it's possible, I think iterative process is really critical in that you create something, you show it, or you know, kick the tires on it in context that um allow real and healthy critique, and then you can continually go back to the drawing board. But you know, the show that we had three years into the process, I think was deeply inadequate to the show that we had eight years into the process because we did go through all of those natural stumbling blocks and you know, incubations and opportunities to learn about what our deeper values were. Time tends, at least in my experience, to breed depth.

[31:43] Davóne Tines: And was with that process, was there ever a point where you sort of hit a wall, or you sort of said, maybe the act of putting this on stage is just is not going to do what we set out to do, what we wanted to do?

[32:02] Davóne Tines: Not exactly a wall, but also but a place of not knowing which direction to go. Um, you know, this idea of how do we dramatize this work in a way that honors Hughes's, you know, aesthetic that breeds through his own life and the Harlem Renaissance, but also the imagery that he calls upon. How do you bring that in front of people in a way that respects the context from which the poem is happening, but also further moves it into a language that um is engaging the subject matter?

[32:38] Andrew Child: Wait, wait, let me let me remind. So, like a new answer to this question. Can you just ask them once more?

[32:45] Andrew Child: Yeah, sure. At any point in this years-long process, did you sort of hit a wall or come to a place where you were saying this is not doing what we set out to do or not answering the questions we set out to answer?

[33:00] Davóne Tines: We didn't exactly hit a wall, but we did come to a place of not knowing exactly what direction to go. And I think it came from when we began to lean too much into the caricaturization of the piece. You know, there is a lot of Audvilian language. There is a lot of um, you know, potential zaniness or goofiness that can come from engaging that material metaphorically. And when we leaned too far into the kind of um, you know, symbolism of the piece as opposed to the literalness with the words, it veered into undercutting the depth of what Hughes was actually trying to say.

[34:42] Davóne Tines: And I think, you know, bringing my friend collaborator Zach Winnaker on stage and kind of, or sorry, bringing my friend and collaborator Zach Winnaker into the process. Um, and that being a huge part of the growth of our relationship together, made us start working in this way of what is the integrity of the text. You know, we're not actually trying to create some sort of situation in which this text can exist. We're trying to simply realize what is there. Um we came to a deeper value of not wanting to put anything on Hughes' text. I mean, we did that literally by not adding or changing any words, but we realized that we needed to do that aesthetically by not trying to interpret what is being said, but rather just present it as it is and trust text.