On March 15, 2021, Susan Kander released the album of her and librettist Roberta Gumbel’s chamber opera dwb (Driving While Black). In this insider interview we spoke with Mrs. Kander about writing a work that confronts the topic of systemic racism and the unique collaboration that makes the work so special.
How did the idea of dwb (driving while black) as an opera come about?
I will jump through fire to write for Roberta Gumbel. Our professional relationship and friendship goes back twenty-five years. When she joined the faculty at University of Kansas School of Music, she was joining two people I already knew from Cantata Profana Ensemble, Hannah Collins and Mike Compitello, aka New Morse Code. The sound world offered by voice, cello and percussion was mesmerizing to me right out of the gate – as was the prospect of writing for New Morse Code. I proposed that I write a piece for the three of them, and NMC said yes, thank goodness! Roberta and I talked, long distance, about several different possible subjects for a smallish song cycle, but none of them stuck. At the time, 2016-17, her son was getting his driver’s permit; the NAACP had recently issued a travelers’ warning for Black people driving in cars in the state of Missouri. As the mother of two boys, I was already sympathetic to her having a teenage driver, but the added anxiety of her son driving while Black – I couldn’t get it out of my mind. Over dinner while she was staying at my house for her annual NYC trip, we talked about it and it became clear that that should be the subject of the song cycle.
Naturally, I could not write the text as I often do. I approached a Black playwright friend who was interested but overwhelmed with commissions of her own. Since Roberta had so much to say about the subject, and so many family stories to relate, I went back to her and said, “You have to write the text.” So she did. Short bits started coming, scenes, speeches, and after a while it became apparent that this was going to be much more than a song cycle. Once we realized it was an opera everything started falling into place.
The instrumentation is a unique combo: in addition to the soprano, there is a cellist and percussionist each of whom play a variety of instruments (including their own bodies!), and have some speaking parts. What role do the instrumentalists take in the story? How do they add to or enhance the stage action?
I think the dramatic participation of the instrumentalists came to me partly because I know these two musicians are magical to watch – they would absolutely be part of the visual experience of any piece, but also because it’s just cool to wrap ensemble players into a vocal performance. I’ve done it before, in A Cycle of Songs, for soprano, clarinetist and pianist – which Roberta recorded and performed in 2008. I’d seen Hannah sing before, in a NMC piece, so I knew she was game, and they didn’t bat an eye at the speaking bits. It’s great to break up the timbre and texture of the human voice here and there - it wakes up our ears a bit and widens the dramatic lens terrifically. Last but not least, we’re telling a story of community, so it made sense to use the whole community before us to tell the story.
With just the performers on stage, how do you demonstrate or distinguish the two different points of view – the personal narrative Scenes and external Bulletins?
Basically, the narrative scenes have more fluid, often lyrical music, and the Bulletins tend to be more rhythm-defined, punchier.
You’ve composed a number of works with your own libretti, but this is the first time you’ve collaborated with someone else as librettist. What was the process like working with Roberta Gumbel to create dwb?
I have always written my own libretti because I started out in life as a playwright, theater is my formative background. The miracle of working with Roberta is that she’s a total theater animal, with deep, broad performing experience, and she brings that vital sensibility to creating text. She perceives the big picture – the arc of a piece – kind of instantly in big theatrical gestures. She understands character as something that must be defined and manifest by a human performer, principally (in opera) through the voice, and communicated with specificity to the audience. So each scene or vignette she sent me fired me with super specific ideas, feelings and sounds. And of course, being a singer, she organically knows what ‘sings’ as far as language goes, so that was a joy as well, no tussles over word choice.
dwb addresses the anxieties of being a black parent with a child who’s coming of driving age. How, as a white composer, do you approach telling this story unique to BIPOC families, and put yourself in their shoes as you’re composing?
There are several answers to that question. Answer one: I will never exactly, personally know the anxiety/terror I try to communicate in dwb. Answer two: I am a mother of two boys who grew up in New York; I do know very well what it’s like to worry about your children on a daily basis. Getting inside dwb meant adding more layers and more concrete danger to what is a fundamental, universal parental experience. Answer three: I experienced hard, sustained anti-Semitism growing up, a handy place to extrapolate from. Answer four: As a composer, my job is to use my imagination to get inside the words and characters Roberta created to the best of my ability. And to trust my collaborator to tell me when something doesn’t feel right.
What message do you hope listeners will take away from listening to the album?
Maybe “message” isn’t the right word. We wanted to make a piece that would give the audiences who generally frequent opera and chamber music an intimate experience of what it’s like to be that person: the Mother, the 12-year old boy, the young father, etc. The phrase that repeats and grows and bends throughout the opera is “You are not who they see.” Over and over, we are shown that the problem of driving while black – of (…) while black - isn’t a thing that only affects “them.” “Them” is always, always, an individual, and we hope that idea will be a takeaway from the opera.
Secondarily, we hope the opera will be produced in non-“classical” places and be made available to all kinds of audiences, all ages and styles. We hope companies and communities will use it to attract new audiences – Roberta and I have long experience in Opera Education; we’re always looking for ways to bring the unique magic of opera to new people. It’s cheap, short, portable, doesn’t need a big space, can be taken out of the concert hall or opera house and done mic’d if necessary (we’ve done it, it’s great); and people really want to talk about it when it’s over. We love that about dwb.
