STONO: An audio-ritual is an original composition exploring the 1739 Stono slave rebellion through the voices of its beyond-human participants. While typically depicted as a suppressed insurrection, this piece asks: Is there another story? To find answers, listeners are guided to commune with ancestors, water, mushrooms, guns, and the Kongolese Virgin Mary. Combining music, spoken text, and field recordings from the historic rebellion sites, STONO imagines a more expansive and surprising story about that fateful episode, a space in which revolution extends beyond racial politics, human temporality, and material space.
The backbone of STONO: An audio-ritual is a body of songs developed through ceremonial engagement with the beyond-human in rebellion sites and sung from their perspectives. These songs combine African diasporic roots forms (ring shout, bomba, rumba, batá), electronic and synthesized instruments, and field recordings of the more-than-human voices (raw audio, digitally processed, and transcribed onto other instruments).
STONO: An audio-ritual runs approximately 33 minutes. You are encouraged to listen with headphones.
Written & composed by T. Carlis Roberts
Additional lyrics for “Ibo” by Kristen Mitchell
Click to view the libretto
Performers:
T. Carlis Roberts - voice, synths, percussion, mandolin, guitar
Rafael Maya - drums, electronic percussion
Safiya Fredericks - voice
Kristen Mitchell - voice, hot water bottle
Presentation History
September 2022 — Slave Dwelling Project conference: The Stono Rebellion and the Atlantic World (Charleston, SC)
August 2022 — KGNU radio (Denver/Boulder, CO)
July 2022 — Destination Freedom podcast via the Broadway Podcast Network (online)
June 2022 — National Queer Arts Festival (online) — View program
Co-commissioned by No Credits Productions, LLC for Destination Freedom and Queer Cultural Center for the National Queer Arts Festival. A co-production of No Credits Productions, LLC and Queer Cultural Center.
