''The Emperor Jones'' is an

opera Opera is a form of theatre in which music is a fundamental component and dramatic roles are taken by singers. Such a "work" (the literal translation of the Italian word "opera") is typically a collaboration between a composer and a libr ...

in two acts with a prologue and interlude composed by

Louis Gruenberg Louis Gruenberg ( ; June 10, 1964) was a Russian-born American pianist and prolific composer, especially of operas. An early champion of Schoenberg and other contemporary composers, he was also a highly respected Oscar-nominated film composer in Ho ...

to an English-language libretto adapted by the composer from

Eugene O'Neill Eugene Gladstone O'Neill (October 16, 1888 – November 27, 1953) was an American playwright and Nobel laureate in Nobel Prize in Literature, literature. His poetically titled plays were among the first to introduce into the U.S. the drama tech ...

's 1920 play, ''

The Emperor Jones ''The Emperor Jones'' is a 1920 tragic play by American dramatist Eugene O'Neill that tells the tale of Brutus Jones, a resourceful, self-assured African American and a former Pullman porter, who kills another black man in a dice game, is jailed, ...

''. It premiered on January 7, 1933, at the

Metropolitan Opera The Metropolitan Opera (commonly known as the Met) is an American opera company based in New York City, resident at the Metropolitan Opera House at Lincoln Center, currently situated on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. The company is oper ...

in New York City with

Lawrence Tibbett Lawrence Mervil Tibbett (November 16, 1896 – July 15, 1960) was an American opera singer and recording artist who also performed as a film actor and radio personality. A baritone, he sang leading roles with the Metropolitan Opera in New York ...

in the title role. Set on an unnamed island in the

West Indies The West Indies is a subregion of North America, surrounded by the North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea that includes 13 independent island countries and 18 dependencies and other territories in three major archipelagos: the Greater A ...

, the opera tells the story of

African American African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American" generally denotes descendants of ens ...

Brutus Jones, a former

Pullman porter Pullman porters were men hired to work for the railroads as porters on sleeping cars. Starting shortly after the American Civil War, George Pullman sought out former slaves to work on his sleeper cars. Their job was to carry passengers’ bagga ...

and ex-convict who escaped to the island, set himself up as its tyrannical "Emperor", and became rich by exploiting the natives. The natives start a revolt against him, and as he tries to escape through the jungle, he is haunted by visions of his past life and the man he had murdered. As the natives close in, he commits suicide using the silver bullet which he had worn around his neck as a good-luck charm. With a score that incorporates elements of

jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a major ...

and

negro spiritual Spirituals (also known as Negro spirituals, African American spirituals, Black spirituals, or spiritual music) is a genre of Christian music that is associated with Black Americans, which merged sub-Saharan African cultural heritage with the e ...

s, ''The Emperor Jones'' was the eleventh American opera to premiere at the Met, and has continued to be performed into the 21st century, albeit rarely.

Background

Shortly after becoming General Manager of the

in 1908,

Giulio Gatti-Casazza Giulio Gatti-Casazza (3 February 1869 – 2 September 1940) was an Italian opera manager. He was general manager of La Scala in Milan, Italy, from 1898 to 1908 and later the Metropolitan Opera in New York City from 1908 to 1935. Biography ...

had set a goal of producing new English language operas by American composers. During his time at the Met, the company staged the world premieres of thirteen American operas. However, while the composers of these operas were American, only three of them actually had American subjects— Charles Cadman's ''

Shanewis ''Shanewis'' (or ''The Robin Woman'') (1918) is an opera in one act and two scenes by American composer Charles Wakefield Cadman with an English-language libretto by Nelle Richmond Eberhart. They collaborated with Tsianina Redfeather Blackstone, ...

'' (1918),

Howard Hanson Howard Harold Hanson (October 28, 1896 – February 26, 1981)''The New York Times'' – Obituaries. Harold C. Schonberg. February 28, 1981 p. 1011/ref> was an American composer, conductor, educator, music theorist, and champion of American class ...

's '' Merry Mount'' (1934), and

's ''The Emperor Jones''. ''

'' by American playwright

had premiered in 1920 and was immensely popular. After reading the play, Gruenberg approached O'Neill with the idea of making it into an opera and discussed the possibilities with him over a two-year period. In 1930 O'Neill gave Gruenberg the rights to adapt the play making any changes he saw fit but refused to have anything to do with creating the libretto, despite the urging of the composer. In the end it was compiled by Kathleen de Jaffa in collaboration with Gruenberg. The actual lines were taken almost verbatim from the play. The only two significant changes were the addition of a chanting chorus for the orchestral prelude and interlude, similar to a

Greek chorus A Greek chorus, or simply chorus ( grc-gre, χορός, chorós), in the context of ancient Greek tragedy, comedy, satyr plays, and modern works inspired by them, is a homogeneous, non-individualised group of performers, who comment with a collect ...

, and the death of Emperor Jones. In the play, he is killed by the natives while in the opera he shoots himself with a silver bullet as they are closing in on him. The libretto was finished by 1931, and Gruenberg rented a cottage in Old Orchard, Maine, where he composed the opera over a period of fourteen months. When the vocal score was complete, Gruenberg showed it to the Austrian conductor

Erich Kleiber Erich Kleiber (5 August 1890 – 27 January 1956) was an Austrian, later Argentine, conductor, known for his interpretations of the classics and as an advocate of new music. Kleiber was born in Vienna, and after studying at the Prague Conservato ...

, who at the time was music director of the

Berlin State Opera The (), also known as the Berlin State Opera (german: Staatsoper Berlin), is a listed building on Unter den Linden boulevard in the historic center of Berlin, Germany. The opera house was built by order of Prussian king Frederick the Great from ...

and known for championing new works. Kleiber was impressed and offered to give its world premiere in Berlin. Gruenberg planned to spend the next few months in Germany completing the orchestration. In the end, the premiere was postponed. The rise of

Nazism Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Na ...

meant that an opera composed by a Jew with a black man as the central character was bound to cause trouble in Germany.Sturm (1981) (Two years later, Kleiber resigned from his post at the Berlin Opera in protest at the Nazi policy of banning Entartete Musik, "degenerate music", a label applied to virtually all works by Jewish composers). In the meantime,

Olin Downes Edwin Olin Downes, better known as Olin Downes (January 27, 1886 – August 22, 1955), was an American music critic, known as "Sibelius's Apostle" for his championship of the music of Jean Sibelius. As critic of ''The New York Times'', he ex ...

, the critic for ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'', had also seen the score and recommended it to Gatti-Casazza, who accepted it for production during the Met's 1932/1933 season.

Performance history

''The Emperor Jones'' had its world premiere on January 7, 1933, at the Metropolitan Opera with

in the title role and was also broadcast live on radio. Although both Tibbett and Pearl Besuner used

blackface Blackface is a form of theatrical makeup used predominantly by non-Black people to portray a caricature of a Black person. In the United States, the practice became common during the 19th century and contributed to the spread of racial stereo ...

for their roles, the dancers were from

Hemsley Winfield Hemsley Winfield (April 20, 1907 – January 15, 1934) was an African-American dancer who created the New Negro Art Theater Dance Group. Early years He was born Osborne Hemsley Winfield to a middle-class, African-American family in Yonkers, New Yo ...

's New Negro Art Theater, with Winfield himself taking the role of the Witch Doctor. Initially the Met had wanted to use white dancers in black makeup, but backed down when Tibbett threatened to quit the production unless Winfield and his troupe performed. However, the Met billed the ensemble as the "

Ballet" instead of its real name and apart from Winfield did not credit any of the other dancers by name on the playbill. The premiere performance was conducted by

Tullio Serafin Tullio Serafin (1 September 18782 February 1968) was an Italian conductor and former Musical Director at La Scala. Biography Tullio Serafin was a leading Italian opera conductor with a long career and a very broad repertoire who revived many 19t ...

and directed by

Alexander Sanine Alexander is a male given name. The most prominent bearer of the name is Alexander the Great, the king of the Ancient Greek kingdom of Macedonia who created one of the largest empires in ancient history. Variants listed here are Aleksandar, Al ...

. The sets and costumes were designed by

Jo Mielziner Joseph "Jo" Mielziner (March 19, 1901 – March 15, 1976) was an American theatrical scenic, and lighting designer born in Paris, France. He was described as "the most successful set designer of the Golden era of Broadway", and worked on both sta ...

who was 32 at the time and went on to create the stage designs for more than three hundred plays and musicals, including the original productions of ''

Death of a Salesman ''Death of a Salesman'' is a 1949 stage play written by American playwright Arthur Miller. The play premiered on Broadway in February 1949, running for 742 performances. It is a two-act tragedy set in late 1940s Brooklyn told through a montag ...

'' and ''

Guys and Dolls ''Guys and Dolls'' is a musical with music and lyrics by Frank Loesser and book by Jo Swerling and Abe Burrows. It is based on "The Idyll of Miss Sarah Brown" (1933) and "Blood Pressure", which are two short stories by Damon Runyon, and also bo ...

''. Although it is a two-act opera, the Met performed it without an interval for a total running time of one hour and fifteen minutes and presented it as the first half of a double bill with

Leoncavallo Ruggero (or Ruggiero) Leoncavallo ( , , ; 23 April 18579 August 1919) was an Italian opera composer and librettist. Although he produced numerous operas and other songs throughout his career it is his opera ''Pagliacci'' (1892) that remained his ...

's ''

Pagliacci ''Pagliacci'' (; literal translation, "Clowns") is an Italian opera in a prologue and two acts, with music and libretto by Ruggero Leoncavallo. The opera tells the tale of Canio, actor and leader of a commedia dell'arte theatrical company, who m ...

''. Despite the mixed reviews, ''The Emperor Jones'' enjoyed a fair amount of initial success and won Gruenberg the

Bispham Memorial Medal Award The Bispham Memorial Medal Award was an award for operas written in English language, English which was named for baritone David Bispham, who was a great proponent of performing opera in English in the United States. It was traditionally awarded to ...

for opera in English. It has continued to be performed into the 21st century (albeit rarely), long after the other American operas premiered in the Gatti-Casazza era had sunk into oblivion. The opera had fifteen performances over two seasons with the Met company which also took it on tour to

Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...

Brooklyn Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...

Hartford Hartford is the capital city of the U.S. state of Connecticut. It was the seat of Hartford County until Connecticut disbanded county government in 1960. It is the core city in the Greater Hartford metropolitan area. Census estimates since the ...

and

Baltimore Baltimore ( , locally: or ) is the List of municipalities in Maryland, most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland, fourth most populous city in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic, and List of United States cities by popula ...

. Apart from the Met performances, it was also staged in Philadelphia, Chicago, Los Angeles, and San Francisco in 1933 with Tibbett in the title role and was revived again in Chicago in 1946. In Europe it was performed in Amsterdam in 1934 with

Jules Bledsoe Julius Lorenzo Cobb Bledsoe (1898 – July 14, 1943)
by John Troesser. Retrieved ...

in the title role followed by performances in Brussels, Vienna, Milan, and London. The

Teatro dell'Opera The Teatro dell'Opera di Roma (Rome Opera House) is an opera house in Rome, Italy. Originally opened in November 1880 as the 2,212 seat ''Costanzi Theatre'', it has undergone several changes of name as well modifications and improvements. The pre ...

in Rome performed it in 1951, and

Michigan Opera Theatre Detroit Opera is the principal opera company in Michigan, USA. The company is based in Detroit, where it performs in the Detroit Opera House. Prior to February 28, 2022, the company was named the Michigan Opera Theatre. Each year it presents an ope ...

staged a major revival in 1979 with African American baritones Andrew Smith and

David Arnold David Arnold (born 23 January 1962) is a British film composer whose credits include scoring five James Bond films, as well as ''Stargate'' (1994), '' Independence Day'' (1996), ''Godzilla'' (1998) and the television series '' Little Britain'' ...

in the title role, conducted by Robert Willoughby Jones. After its last performance at the Metropolitan Opera House in February 1934, it was not seen again in New York City until 2001 when it was revived by a small company, Operaworks, in a 55-seat theatre using a digitized virtual orchestra in place of musicians with baritone Fredrick Redd in the title role. In 2009, the opera was revived in Italy for two performances at the Teatro delle Muse in

Ancona Ancona (, also , ) is a city and a seaport in the Marche region in central Italy, with a population of around 101,997 . Ancona is the capital of the province of Ancona and of the region. The city is located northeast of Rome, on the Adriatic S ...

with Nmon Ford in the title role and a full orchestra and chorus conducted by

Bruno Bartoletti Bruno Bartoletti (Sesto Fiorentino, 10 June 1926 – Florence, 9 June 2013) was an Italian operatic conductor. His active international career lasted from 1953 to 2007, and he specialized in the Italian repertory and contemporary works. He was ...

Roles

Synopsis

''Setting: An unnamed island in the

in the early part of the 20th century'' ;Orchestral prelude A chanting chorus calls for the death of Emperor Jones and an insistent drumbeat is heard in the distance.

Act 1

Brutus Jones, an

ex-

, gambler, and escaped convict had stowed away from the United States to an island in the West Indies several years previously. There, he had set himself up as the island's Emperor and during that time made himself rich at the expense of the natives as well as earning a reputation as a cruel tyrant. He now sits in his "palace" in the final days of his reign. His underling, the

cockney Cockney is an accent and dialect of English, mainly spoken in London and its environs, particularly by working-class and lower middle-class Londoners. The term "Cockney" has traditionally been used to describe a person from the East End, or b ...

trader Smithers, tells Jones that the natives are planning a revolt against him. Full of bravado, Jones tells Smithers of the power which he has held over the island and that he has convinced the natives that he can only be killed by a silver bullet which he wears around his neck on a chain. Nevertheless, he tells Smithers that he is retiring as Emperor, has hidden supplies in the jungle, and plans make his escape to

Martinique Martinique ( , ; gcf, label=Martinican Creole, Matinik or ; Kalinago: or ) is an island and an overseas department/region and single territorial collectivity of France. An integral part of the French Republic, Martinique is located in th ...

with all the money he has stolen from the islanders. ;Orchestral interlude Again a chanting chorus is heard

Act 2

Jones lies exhausted in the jungle, unable to find any of the supplies he had hidden. As darkness falls, and the drumbeats become louder and more insistent, he is beset by hallucinations from his past life. When he sees a vision of the man he had murdered in a craps game, he starts running through the jungle, tearing off pieces of his uniform until he is left in rags. He then has visions of a convict gang with a guard, and a slave auction with the auctioneer calling Jones to the block. He fires his gun at the phantoms until he has used up all his bullets save the silver one he wears around his neck. In a moment of lucidity, he reflects on his past life and probable fate and sings a

, "It's Me, O Lord, Standin' in de Need of Prayer". At dawn, he is still trying to find his way out of the jungle when a

witch doctor A witch doctor (also spelled witch-doctor) was originally a type of Folk healer, healer who treated ailments believed to be caused by witchcraft. The term is now more commonly used to refer to Alternative medicine, healers, particularly in region ...

appears. He grabs Jones and starts dancing wildly around him. When he is surrounded by the soldiers and natives who have been hunting him, Jones realizes that all is lost, puts the silver bullet into his gun, places the gun against his head and fires. Smithers stands over the dead Emperor and utters the final words of the opera: "Dead as an 'erring. Well, Gor blimey, yer died in a grand style any'ow."Smithers speaks

Cockney Cockney is an accent and dialect of English, mainly spoken in London and its environs, particularly by working-class and lower middle-class Londoners. The term "Cockney" has traditionally been used to describe a person from the East End, or b ...

English in both the play and the opera. The line in Standard English would be: "Dead as a

herring Herring are forage fish, mostly belonging to the family of Clupeidae. Herring often move in large schools around fishing banks and near the coast, found particularly in shallow, temperate waters of the North Pacific and North Atlantic Oceans, i ...

. Well, God bless me, you died in a grand style anyhow" The curtain falls as the drumbeats fade and the natives carry off Jones's body.

Recordings

There are no complete commercial recordings of ''The Emperor Jones''. The most famous piece from the opera, "It's Me, O Lord, Standin' in de Need of Prayer", was recorded on 19 January 1934 by Lawrence Tibbett and released by

RCA Victor RCA Records is an American record label currently owned by Sony Music Entertainment, a subsidiary of Sony Corporation of America. It is one of Sony Music's four flagship labels, alongside RCA's former long-time rival Columbia Records; also Aris ...

(Victor 7959, CS 81087–2) Lebendige Vergangenheit 89576, Germany. shortly after the premiere. Tibbett's recording was later re-issued on LP by

New World Records New World Records is a record label that was established in 1975 through a Rockefeller Foundation grant to celebrate America's bicentennial (1976) by producing a 100-LP anthology, with American music from many genres.Nimbus Records Nimbus Records is a British record company based at Wyastone Leys, Ganarew, Herefordshire. They specialise in classical music recordings and were the first company in the UK to produce compact discs. Description Nimbus was founded in 1972 by t ...

''Prima Voce'' series, on ''Souvenirs From American Operas'' from the International Record Collectors' Club, and on ''Lebendige Vergangenheit: Lawrence Tibbett''. A recording of the same piece sung by George London appears on ''George London: Of Gods and Demons'' from the

Sony , commonly stylized as SONY, is a Japanese multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. As a major technology company, it operates as one of the world's largest manufacturers of consumer and professional ...

''Master Works'' series.

Notes and references

Sources

*Ewen, David (1944/2007)
"Gruenberg"
''Music for the Millions - The Encyclopedia of Musical Masterpieces''. Read Books. (originally published in 1944 by Arco Publishing Company) *Gauss, Rebecca B. (1994)

''The Eugene O'Neill Review'', Volume 18, Nos. 1 & 2, Spring/Fall 1994. *Hipsher, Edward Ellsworth
''American Opera and Its Composers''

Theodore Presser Company The Theodore Presser Company is an American music publishing and distribution company located in Malvern, Pennsylvania, formerly King of Prussia, Pennsylvania, and originally based in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania. It is the oldest continuing music pub ...

(1934) *Hurwitt, Elliott S. (2004) "New Negro Art Theater" in Cary D. Wintz, Paul Finkelman (eds.) ''Encyclopedia of the Harlem Renaissance'', Vol. 2, p. 895. Routledge *''

Il Resto del Carlino ''il Resto del Carlino'' is an Italian newspaper based in Bologna, and is one of the oldest newspapers in Italy. Its rather evocative name means "the change you get from a ''carlino''", which the smallest part of the Papal ''baiocco'' (no longer ...

'' (January 21, 2009)
"Prima assoluta sul palco delle Muse, Venerdì arriva 'The emperor Jones'"
*Kirk, Elise Kuhl (2001)
''American Opera''
University of Illinois Press. *

Archives
''The Emperor Jones''
MetOpera Database *Nash, Joe (2001)

PBS The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcasting, public broadcaster and Non-commercial activity, non-commercial, Terrestrial television, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly fu ...

*Nettles, Darryl Glenn (2003)
''African American Concert Singers Before 1950''
McFarland. *Pegolotti, James A. (2003)
''Deems Taylor: A Biography''

UPNE The University Press of New England (UPNE), located in Lebanon, New Hampshire and founded in 1970, was a university press consortium including Brandeis University, Dartmouth College (its host member), Tufts University, the University of New Hampsh ...

. *Shapiro, Marjorie Mackay (1994)
"A Strange Case: Louis Gruenberg's Forgotten 'Great American Opera'—''The Emperor Jones''"
in John Louis DiGaetani, Josef P. Sirefman (eds.) ''Opera and the Golden West: The Past, Present, and Future of Opera in the U.S.A.'', pp. 233–243. Fairleigh Dickinson University Press. *Sturm, George (1981

''MadAminA!''. Music Associates of America *''

Time Magazine ''Time'' (stylized in all caps) is an American news magazine based in New York City. For nearly a century, it was published weekly, but starting in March 2020 it transitioned to every other week. It was first published in New York City on Mar ...

'' (May 23, 1932)
"Native Opera"
*''Time Magazine'' (January 16, 1933)

*

Tommasini, Anthony Anthony Carl Tommasini (born April 14, 1948) is an American music critic and author who specializes in classical music. Described as "a discerning critic, whose taste, knowledge and judgment have made him a must-read", Tommasini was the chief ...

(February 16, 2001)
"The Emperor Jones"
''

'' * The Eugene O'Neil Review (Spring/Fall 2000) Shafer, Yvonne. The Eugene O’Neill Review of "The Emperor Jones", vol. 24, no. 1/2, Penn State University Press, 2000, pp. 148–51, http://www.jstor.org/stable/29784694.

External links

Audio clip: "It's Me, O Lord, Standin' in de Need of Prayer"
sung by Lawrence Tibbett from the Metropolitan Opera's website. It can also be accessed from thei
Sounds of The Met
page (track 55).
Lawrence Tibbett as Emperor Jones in Act 1
photograph from the Metropolitan Opera Archives
Lawrence Tibbett in his Act 2 costume
on the cover of ''

'', January 16, 1933
Louis Gruenberg: ''The Emperor Jones''
on G. Schirmer music publishers with information on the orchestration {{DEFAULTSORT:Emperor Jones, The Operas 1933 operas English-language operas Opera world premieres at the Metropolitan Opera Operas by Louis Gruenberg Operas based on plays Operas set in the Caribbean Adaptations of works by Eugene O'Neill