Trained in classical music at Howard University, Mary D. Watkins has composed three operas and has written for symphony orchestras, chamber and jazz ensembles, film, theatre, dance, and choral groups, in addition to being a popular recording artist for Olivia records in the 1970s.
Watkins’ recent recordings include Prayer for Peace, a meditational CD, and Recorded Music of the African Diaspora (Albany Records, 2010: Center For Black Music Research; department of Columbia College in Chicago, IL).
Emmett Till: The Opera (2022)
The story of Emmett Till, a 14 year-old African-American boy whose brutal lynching in Mississippi in 1955 sparked the civil rights movement.
The New York concert premiere was held March 23 & 24, 2022
at John Jay College Gerald W Lynch Theater
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Is This America? The Fannie Lou Hamer Story (2024)
An opera in 2 acts about Fannie Lou Hamer, a daughter of share-croppers who became a leader in the Civil Rights movement during the turbulent 1960s.
Composed by Mary D. Watkins; Libretto by Mary D. Watkins & Cerise Lim Jacobs
World Premiere at White Snake Projects (Boston, MA – September 2024)
Note: Mary D. Watkins received funding to develop Is This America? from the Opera America Grants for Women Composers: Discovery Grants program, supported by the Virginia B. Toulmin Foundation.”
Note: An earlier version of this piece was produced under the title:
Dark River: The Fannie Lou Hamer Story (Music & Libretto by Mary D. Watkins)
Produced by Oakland Opera Theater (Oakland, CA -2009); Mount Holyoke Symphony Orchestra (South Hadley, MA 2014 & 2015); and Agnes Scott College and Community Orchestra (Atlanta, GA – 2016).
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Queen Clara (2005)
A look at the roller-coaster life of Clara Barton, a radical feminist with a passionate personal life who founded of the American Red Cross.
Workshopped by Goat Hall Opera Company and Z Space Studio in San Francisco, and by the Oakland Opera Company in Oakland, CA, and the Berkeley Arts Center in Berkeley, CA.