The great Haitian revolutionary hero Mackandal ignited a popular uprising in the 1740s, only to be brutally killed as an example to his fellow travelers. It would be nearly four decades before the Haitian Revolution would gain momentum again. There’s a tiny taste of the same drama in the making of the opera that bears the name Mackandal, with a libretto by Carl Hancock Rux. Originally commissioned for a debut at the Arsht (then Carnival) Center, the piece was a casualty of the center’s fiscal crisis that lead to a change in management and programming philosophy (as well as a change in name). Yet there were stirrings afoot in Little Haiti this morning suggesting that Mackandal will rise again.

While overseeing the completion of a large orange and white sculpture of a boat in his studio tucked inside the Little Haiti Cultural Center, renowned visual artist Edouard Duval Carrie conspired with Harlem Stage director of programming Brad Learmouth and saxophonist/composer Yosvany Terry Cabrera, the visitors’ suitcases piled in a corner. If all goes well with the morning’s conversation, he will sign his contract to compose the score for this Caribbean opera today. Cabrera flew into Miami from his home in New York for a gig with pianist Gonzalo Rubalcaba this weekend and decided to take the opportunity to meet with Duval Carrie, who has been commissioned to design the opera’s sets. Classically trained in his native Cuba, Cabrera also has considerable experience with Afro-Caribbean music, both from his family’s roots in Cuba, Haiti, and Jamaica and from extensive study with a master of the Dahomey tradition from Benin that he conducted for his work Ye-De-Gbe: The Afro-Caribbean Legacy.