For Your GRAMMY® Consideration
Best Choral Performance
Best Contemporary Classical Composition
When the Caged Bird Sings
“Okoye has crafted more than an oratorio; she has provided a blueprint for how a society might sing its way toward a collective, empowered future… Ultimately, this release transcends the boundaries of a musical product to become a cultural event.”
— Alice Lange, Martin Cid Magazine
When the Caged Bird Sings is a large-scale choral-orchestral drama with music and libretto by award-winning composer Nkeiru Okoye. Structured as a musical ceremony, it draws on opera, gospel, spirituals, spoken word, and symphonic writing to explore faith, resilience, memory, and the sustaining power of community.
Across five interconnected parts, the work follows a journey from adversity toward transformation. Operatic arias, dramatic scenes, prayers, affirmations, and testimonies unfold within a rich choral-orchestral landscape, moving from intimate reflection to communal celebration. At its center is the story of Cerise Walker, whose struggles and triumphs become a larger meditation on hope, belonging, and liberation.
Commissioned by the University of Michigan School of Music, Theatre & Dance through its Michigan Orchestra Repertoire for Equity initiative, When the Caged Bird Sings received its world premiere at Hill Auditorium on February 10, 2024, in collaboration with University Musical Society.
Released on NAXOS American Classics, the recording features Angela Brown, Christie Dashiell, Issachah Savage, Jubilant Sykes, Rita Coburn, and Cyrus Chestnut, with EXIGENCE, the University of Michigan Choirs, and the University of Michigan Symphony Orchestra. Eugene Rogers serves as choirmaster, and Kenneth Kiesler conducts.
Praised by critics as "more than an oratorio" and "a singular and special achievement by any measure," When the Caged Bird Sings stands as a distinctive contribution to the contemporary choral-orchestral repertoire, uniting personal narrative, communal witness, and musical traditions rooted in the Black sacred experience.
“A singular and special achievement by any measure.”
— John Kelman, Textura
“It is rare to find a project so carefully considered as award-winning composer Nkeiru Okoye’s When the Caged Bird Sings.”
— Kaitlyn Chan, La Scena Musicale
“The large-scale choral work moves effortlessly between gospel music and spirituals, opera solos, cinematic orchestral interludes, minimalist passages, and spoken texts.”
— Rémy Franck, Pizzicato
“The musical idiom is accessible, varied, and consistently entertaining... One can imagine When the Caged Bird Sings finding a place in the repertoire of other colleges and universities who can muster forces strong enough to do it justice.”
— Altman, American Record Guide
“The distinctive musical experience that emerges serves as an emblem of the theme of transformation and how art can play a role in it.”
— Jane Harrison, AllMusic
