Fortune's Bones: The Manumission Requiem

Tickets and Information

Visit the Fortune's Bones: The Manumission Requiem website:
http://claricesmithcenter.umd.edu/2010/c/performances/performance?rowid=13725

Who was Fortune?

In life, he was an African-American slave who served a doctor in post-Colonial Connecticut. In death, he became a medical specimen and later a walk-by exhibit at the Mattatuck Museum, a skeleton known only as "Larry." But Fortune was also a husband, father and human being and, stirred by the true story of this man, Connecticut poet-laureate Marilyn Nelson wrote Fortune's Bones: The Manumission Requiem.

The book fell into the hands of Dr. Ysaye Barnwell, composer and artistic director of Sweet Honey in the Rock; she was so gripped by the story's power she set the text to music. Her cantata, performed as the evening's second half by a full symphony and choirs, is the centerpiece of a program that celebrates the fullness of African-American life, following as it does a first-half presentation of spirituals by the Heritage Signature Chorale and soloists. Together, these artists metaphorically set Fortune's bones to rest. As Dr. Barnwell notes, "God's Blessings on Fortune ... da bell done rung."