Walter Russell III as Char’es-Baby and Will Liverman as Charles in Terence Blanchard’s “Fire Shut Up in My Bones.” PHOTO: Ken Howard / Met Operaīlanchard, who has composed scores for Spike Lee’s films, tells stories with music. Matching a soaring soprano with earthy warmth, Latonia Moore is the family’s fiercely loving matriarch, Billie. Blue also plays Greta, a woman Charles yearns for. Each is personified by soprano Angel Blue, who injects these roles with seductive appeal. Performed with unaffected dignity by Walter Russell III, 13, the boy counters other forces shaping Charles: Destiny and Loneliness. Making palpable his inner world, Charles is joined by his 7-year-old self, nicknamed Char’es-Baby. The story begins and concludes as the adult Charles, poignantly portrayed by baritone Will Liverman, returns to his mother’s house wielding a gun, ready to kill his visiting cousin. Deft lighting, projections and minimalist sets sketch such scenes as abandoned shacks, a barroom, and a road at night in a narrative that is an extended flashback. The Met’s staging, like the music, conjures the inner life of Charles.
As he writes, “I had to resort to the most useful and dangerous lesson a damaged child ever learns - how to lie to himself.” Blow, a columnist for “The New York Times.” His account spans his childhood in rural Louisiana, where at age 7 he was sexually abused by an older cousin, and a young adulthood haunted by this trauma. Will Liverman as Charles and Angel Blue as Greta in Terence Blanchard’s “Fire Shut Up in My Bones.” PHOTO: Ken Howard/Met Operaįirst presented in 2019 by the Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, the opera is based on the 2014 memoir by Charles M.
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