While researching family history for his semibiographical opera Monte and Pinky, Richmond-based poet and songwriter Richard Rose came face to face with the fact of his ancestors’ involvement in the local slave trade. As a social and environmental activist, Rose became determined to explore and come to terms with the many consequences of the injustices in which his family took part.

A story in verse, Coming Around is the companion piece to Monte and Pinky, following the life and

descendants of a slave named Simon Abouette and of the Ouillechaud family, who purchase him to work on their sugar plantation in the early 1800s. Interspersed with heartbreaking lyric pieces based on historical anecdotes from across the South, Coming Around is the culmination of one man’s effort to heal the hurts of the past through humility, understanding, and acceptance.