GEOFF BENNETT: Imagine a world 400 years in the future where a young woman is forced into exile after discovering she carries a rare gene linked to extraordinary power and immortality.

That is the premise of a new opera opening in Cincinnati next month.

PBS stations CET and ThinkTV take us behind the scenes for a look at the project and the new direction it's taking opera for our arts and culture series, Canvas.

MORRIS ROBINSON, Artistic Adviser, Cincinnati Opera: Well, the Black Opera Project was birthed out of necessity.

I was here in Cincinnati Opera starring as Porgy in "Porgy and Bess."

I have always loved what "Porgy and Bess" has done for our community.

And this is not an attack on it, but it's also just to notice that traditionally it has been an opportunity for African Americans to get on operatic stages at a time where we weren't allowed to sing the traditional opera canon.

We were afforded the opportunity to see "Porgy and Bess."

But as proud as I was to do that, with all the greats that have gone before me that I honor and treasure, it bothered me that that was the only thing that was considered a Black opera.

It wasn't even composed by a Black person.

But it's what we had.

And we had a meeting to discuss how we all felt about being on this stage and being in its production.

And I raised a question.

And it was basically, when are we going to have something in the operatic world that has the same impact on the opera world that "Black Panther" had on the movie industry?

And that's the idea that kind of started the ball rolling on the Black Opera Project.

We're going to do three operas in three consecutive seasons composed by, directed by, libretto written by all African American artists.

The stage designs will be by African American artists.

Costuming will be designed by African American artists.

First one out of the gate is entitled "Lalovavi," which stands for love in the language of Tut.

KEVIN DAY, Composer, "Lalovavi": This opera is really, it's an epic journey, and I don't use that word lightly, because it is.

We're going on a journey, postapocalyptic world.

TIFARA BROWN, Librettist, "Lalovavi" is an Afrofuturist opera set 400 years in the future in a city that was formerly known as Atlanta, but now it's called Atlas.

So this opera is centered on a central character.

Her name is Persephone.

She is the daughter of the leader of Atlas, a man known as Titan.

And in Atlas, there is a caste system.

And power and wealth is divvied out based on one factor.

It's a genetic code known as the Syndica gene.

And the more Syndica you have, the higher in Atlas' society you are.

Titan has been on a mission to find this one variation of the Syndica gene known as the Tree of Life gene.

And he plans on extracting this gene to make himself immortal.

It turns out that Persephone is the only one in the world that has this variation of Syndica.

So -- and she has to run for her life.

Most of the opera is in English, but we -- there are sections and songs, especially when we talk about the rebel nation, which is called Nunewaks.

Tut is their language.

Tut is a living language.

It's indigenous to Black American slaves in the Deep South.

So this language was a secret language, and it was a code used to teach enslaved people how to speak English and how to read and write English, at a time where that was illegal.

To our knowledge, there has never been a media production in history that incorporates the Tut language.

In our story, there is a resistance movement that is pushing up against the Atlas regime.

And this is exactly how Tut was used to push against enslavement.

KEVIN DAY: When I think of Afrofuturism, a lot of my research and work has been mostly on the jazz side of things.

Having all the crazy eccentric costumes and music that was also very eccentric and more based in technology and free improv, I thought that's where we were going with this concept.

But as I began to get the libretto and begin to see what's going to be happening, this -- from the page, it read like a movie.

And so that's what kind of shifted my approach to keeping the elements of Afrofuturism in terms of, like, the costumes, in terms of the place, in terms of the themes of liberation and freedom and all of that.

But the sound world of this opera was shifted into one that is meant to feel like a movie.

MORRIS ROBINSON: We can't keep trying to feed the younger generation the older menu.

KEVIN DAY: I think it's a chance, as we're pushing the boundaries of the medium, as we're writing these new works, to bring people who would not necessarily go to an opera concert normally to feel welcomed to come into this place, again, for like three hours to hear something they have never heard before.