Discussion with Rhiannon

 I found the discussion with Rhiannon Giddens in class on Tuesday was super interesting, and I was really glad that she came to our class this week.  As someone who is not really familiar with opera, I thought it was very enlightening to hear from Rhiannon Giddens and her work on her new opera.  One thing that I thought connected with what we are learning in this course would be Rhiannon Giddens's response to the question that Alexa asked, which was about how Rhiannon is able to tell Omar's story without upsetting the audience.  Rhiannon Giddens responded to this question by saying that the audience should be upset, which I think is true.  The audience should be upset and should realized that slavery is wrong.  I definitely was not expecting her to answer this question in this way, but I am glad that she did because I think it was a super powerful statement.  I think that her answer to this question connects to what we are currently learning about in this class because in Equiano's narrative, we have been discussing how Equiano tries to appease his audience.  For example, we often discuss how Equiano's Christianity could be real or could be a performance just to appease the audience. 

Another thing that I thought was interesting from the panel discussion with Rhiannon was being able to listen to one of the songs that she played.  I have not listened to opera really, so it was interesting to hear some of her work.  I thought it was very beautiful, and I would love to check out more of Rhiannon Giddens's work.