MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:
I've been reporting all this week from Minneapolis, where George Floyd's life ended under a police officer's knee five years ago.
A MARTÍNEZ, HOST:
The outpouring of grief and protest over Floyd's murder inspired a choral work that premiered in 2022. It's called "A Knee On The Neck."
(SOUNDBITE OF OPERA, "A KNEE ON THE NECK")
UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL ARTIST #1: (Singing) Have you ever seen a knee on a neck?
UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL ARTIST #2: (Singing) Have you ever seen a knee on a neck?
MARTÍNEZ: Here's what composer Adolphus Hailstork told us back then.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED NPR BROADCAST)
ADOLPHUS HAILSTORK: We're talking about the taking of a life and then taking of many lives, and the general cultural attitudes we have.
(SOUNDBITE OF OPERA, "A KNEE ON THE NECK")
UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL ARTISTS: (Singing) Oh, death is the virus going round.
UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL ARTIST #3: (Singing) Death is taking me.
UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL ARTIST #1: (Singing) Death is...
MARTÍNEZ: The words were written by poet Herbert Martin days after Floyd was killed. Martin grew up in Alabama in the aftermath of the Great Depression, years before the peak of the civil rights movement.
M MARTIN: And when we spoke with him again this week, he recalled the talk his mother gave him to avoid run-ins with police.
HERBERT MARTIN: You must always mind your manners - say, yes, sir, no, sir. She wanted to find me whole and not to have to rush me off to the hospital.
MARTÍNEZ: The advice is also heard in the requiem cantata.
(SOUNDBITE OF OPERA, "A KNEE ON THE NECK")
UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL ARTIST #1: (Singing) Swallow your pride if any is in you
UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL ARTISTS: (Singing) Swallow your pride if any is in you.
M MARTIN: Martin says he hasn't seen much positive change over the five years since Floyd's murder. And that, he says, is a concern.
H MARTIN: I think it's going to get worse and worse.
MARTÍNEZ: And, he adds, it's important to recall trauma to overcome it.
H MARTIN: People tend to be very, very angry instantaneously, and then they forget why. And so one has to remind them of what brought us to that point of agitation and then what brings us even beyond that, to doing something about it.
MARTÍNEZ: Hailstork injects hope into a composition that began with a solitary death.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED NPR BROADCAST)
HAILSTORK: A moment of universal outreach to hope that there will be a greater sense of peace and respect among all the people of America.
(SOUNDBITE OF OPERA, "A KNEE ON THE NECK")
UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL ARTIST #3: (Singing) We shall overcome.
UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL ARTISTS: (Singing) Determined, bold and... Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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