(Credit: LA Opera)

Los Angeles Opera is set to preset “We Hold These Truths” starting on March 4, 2022.

The short, which is part of the company’s Digital Shorts Series, features music by composer Tamar-kali and features musical settings to poetic works by such Black poets as Langston Hughes, Claude McKay, and Laurence Dunbar. The short film stars tenor Ashley Faatoalia, baritone Cedric Barry, violinist Curtis Stewart, speaker Samuel Getachew and Selah Gospel Choir with conductor Anthony Parnther leading a 34-piece ensemble of members of the LA Opera Orchestra.

The film was directed by Dream Hampton, who previously worked on “Surviving R. Kelly.”

“This piece is written at a moment in the 21st century where a segment of our nation bristles at the thought of progress and there continues to be a debate about how far we have come and whether or not change is being pushed upon the populace too hastily,” said Tamar-kali in an official statement. “The first wave of the Civil Rights Movement in America dates back to the late 1800s. The thought that, more than a century later, ‘these truths’ are still unattainable for a portion of our population seems unconscionable.”

The work is available to stream on the LA Opera’s On Now digital platform.