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When Francesca Zambello, director of The Glimmerglass Festival, commissioned an opera about race in America, the country was reeling from a spate of police shootings of young African-American men in Missouri, Ohio, Oklahoma, and South Carolina. By the time the commissioned work Blue premiered at The Glimmerglass Festival in 2019, police killings of unarmed African-American men and women had soared to nearly 135.

While Blue holds up an often times uncomfortable mirror to racism in America, it is much more than a “protest opera” or an opera about police violence. In the words of director and librettist Tazewell Thompson, an internationally acclaimed director for opera and theatre, “I wrote [Blue] from an obsessive need and responsibility to tell an intimate story behind the numbing numbers of boys and men who are killed.”

And that is exactly the powerful appeal of Blue, which recently premiered at the Lyric Opera. Through Thompson’s intense and profound libretto and the soaring score composed by Tony-Award winner Jeanine Tesori, Blue draws us in beyond the names and the headlines to the unimaginable suffering of the families who have been torn apart by these tragic and senseless deaths.

Blue is a powerful, passionate, and yes, painful depiction of a family and community coming together in crisis and faith. Hailed by critics as a “new American classic,” it was named the Best New Opera of 2019 by the Music Critics Association of North America. Tesori, who won recent Tony Awards for the music to Kimberly Akimbo and Fun House, brought her considerable talent and success as a Broadway composer to create a score that is both contemporaneous and timeless. Thompson drew on a canon of African-American literary greats, including James Baldwin, Ta-Nehisi Coates, and Claude Brown, to write a libretto that is passionate and unapologetic.

The story centers on a Black middle-class couple living in Harlem, whose lives are shattered when their teenage son is shot and killed by a white police officer. Compounding the tragedy is the fact that the Father himself is a so-called “Black in Blue” – a member of the very same police force.

The two-act opera opens with the Mother performed by Lyric favorite Zoie Reams, who has gathered her girlfriends to share her wonderful news of her pregnancy. As her girlfriends, a charismatic trio led by Ariana Wehr in her Lyric debut and Lyric veterans Adia Evans and Krysty Swann, titter and exclaim over the Mother’s husband (“Damn girl,” they sing), the mood shifts suddenly as they learn her child is a boy. Oh no, no, no, they lament, reminding Mother that she is breaking the cardinal rule – “You shall not bring a black baby boy into the world.” Through a poignantly performed plea, Mother prevails upon her girlfriends to bless her child, whom she vows to bring into this world with love and hope.

The scene segues to Father, expertly performed by bassist Kenneth Kellogg in a role written specifically for him, as he reveals the news of his pending fatherhood with his three fellow police buddies (Terrence Chin-Loy, Jonathan Pierce Rhodes, and Christopher Humbert, Jr.) at the local watering hole, who can barely tear their eyes from watching the football game. Yet, they share in Father’s joy, peppering him with lighthearted advice and warnings about being a dad.

The first act concludes sixteen years later, when the Son, performed magnificently by tenor Travon D. Walker, and the Father engage in a bitter argument. The father confronts his son, who has been frequently at odds with the law for his involvement with non-violent political protests. “Look at yourself,” the Father intones. “Pull up your pants. Take off that hoodie.” The son pushes back, derisively accusing the Father of being “a cop,” “A clown in a blue suit,” upholding an oppressive system. Act 1 concludes with the Father, despite his son’s bitter words, offering an emotion-filled pledge to love and hold his son always.

As the second act opens, we discover that the Son has been shot and killed by a white police officer at a protest. The heartbroken Father meets with the Reverend, powerfully performed by Lyric veteran baritone Norman Garrett, who attempts to console him and encourages him to forgive. But the Father, in an ironic twist, adopts much of his son’s attitude and words, angrily lashing out at the Reverend. “I’m not here for redemption,” the Father says, “I’m here to confess” the revenge he plans to exact against the white officer. Yet, the Reverend continues to console the Father, and in a groundswell of pain, the two perform the beautiful heartrending duet “Lay my burden down.”

Meanwhile, the grief-stricken mother is attended once again by her girlfriends, to support her as she buries her son. In a particularly heartbreaking moment, Mother falls to her knees and begs God to return her son to her. “I don’t care if he’s blind; if he has no hands or feet. Just that he is alive,” she laments. But then, she bitterly remembers that “We are not God’s favorites.”

At the funeral, Father and Mother together wrestle with their grief. But with the prayers and support of the congregation, as the theme of “lay my burden down” is reprised, the two find consolation in their faith and community. The opera concludes with a flashback to the Son’s last night at the dinner table with his father and mother, pledging that this will be his last protest and promising that “nothing will happen. Nothing.”

Blue is an important, relevant opera, touching on themes and issues in a way that is not confrontational but heartfelt and profound. You may feel uncomfortable, but you will not walk away from this performance untouched and hoping for a better world.

Blue is in a limited engagement at the Lyric, with performances on Nov. 20, 22, 26 and December 1. For ticket information, visit Lyricopera.org.