Perle Noire – Meditations For Joséphine @ Her Majesty’s Theatre, Adelaide 3/3/2026
Perle Noire – Meditations for Joséphine is a 2026 Adelaide Festival production based on the life of Josephine Baker. American-born, Baker moved to Paris at the age of nineteen, where she became a dancer and singer, served as a spy for the French Resistance, and later emerged as a civil rights activist and the first Black international superstar. In 2016, Perle Noire (“Black Pearl”) was created by soprano Julia Bullock, director Peter Sellars, composer Tyshawn Sorey, and poet Claudia Rankine. The work reimagines Baker’s songs via at times radical, abstract rearrangements by (composer Tyshawn) Sorey, an American multi-instrumentalist and professor of contemporary music. These versions were performed by a three-piece wind section (flute, bassoon, saxophone) to Julia Bullock’s left, while on her right, violin, electric guitar, piano and percussion by Tyshawn Sorey. These versions encompass opera, jazz, and classical improvisation to explore themes of exploitation, racial identity, and the deeply private emotions behind her public persona, offering a twenty-first-century perspective on her legacy.
Baker’s oeuvre consisted largely of French dance hall music, which maintained a light and playful tone even when the subject matter of her songs was intense and serious. This contrast creates a distinctly operatic dynamic and offers a fresh way to experience opera as a form.
The performance begins with Julia Bullock reciting the poetry of Claudia Rankine, who was invited by director Peter Sellars to contribute the text. This dangerous and beautiful prose is recited between the songs, heightening the emotional and thematic resonance of the work. The first two songs are Bye Bye Blackbird (Baker’s most famous song) and Sous le ciel d’Afrique (“Under African Skies”), which set the scene as examples of Sorey’s significant deconstruction and refashioning of Baker’s canon. Sorey has stated that he identified strongly with Baker as a figure within the civil rights movement and sought to recompose the lyrical and emotional content so that it would align more closely with that dimension of her identity. (He also performed a solo piano concert at the same venue earlier in the week, which I regret not having been able to attend.)
In the middle of the program, the three songs C’est ça le vrai bonheur (“This Is Real Happiness”), Madiana, and Doudou largely retain their original style and melody, and emerge as particularly beautiful and joyous moments.
Si j’étais blanche (“If I Were White”) was one of the evening’s standout performances. Julia Bullock committed herself fully to the piece, delivering a haunting meditation on race and simultaneously asserting the rejection and the desire of her African heritage by others
The penultimate song, Terre sèche (“Dry Earth”), was another highlight, both artistically and musically. The band was exceptionally professional and cohesive. Toward the end of the piece, Julia Bullock symbolically “died,” lying within a perfect rectangle of light representing a coffin. The band members stood around her, gathering to play in tribute to Josephine Baker (embodied by Bullock), until she rose to conclude the performance with the traditional and poignant song My Father, How Long.
Overall, Perle Noire – Meditations for Joséphine was a compelling and artistically ambitious production, and a significant inclusion in the 2026 Adelaide Festival program.
Adelaide Festival Review By Richard De Pizzol