Cincinnati Opera and the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music will be workshopping “Two Corners” and “Bulrusher” through their Opera Fusion: New Works Program. 

First up will be the workshop for “Two Corners,” an opera by B.E. Boykin and Jarrod Lee on Dec. 17, 2023. The work “explores the evolving friendship of a Black woman, Florine, and a white woman, Sarah, during the unrest of the Civil Rights movement. Told through a series of flashbacks, Florine and Sarah reflect on their different perspectives of race, friendship, and the status quo.”

The workshop is set for Cincinnati Music Hall’s Wilks Studio at 4 p.m.

Then on Jan. 24, 2024, audiences will hear a workshop of “Bulrusher,” also at Wilks Studio. The work, by Nathaniel Stookey and Eisa Davis, “is a coming-of-age story about an African American girl growing up in Northern California’s remote Anderson Valley in 1955. Found in a basket by the river, she is raised by the local schoolteacher and has never seen anyone who looks like her until a young Black woman from Alabama comes to town. Meeting someone like herself provokes her political, sexual, and identity awakening.”