The Lyric Opera of Kansas City’s Langston Hughes: A Lyrical Life celebrates the life and legacy of one of America’s most influential literary voices. Born in 1901 in Joplin, Missouri, Hughes was an early innovator of jazz poetry and a leading figure of the Harlem Renaissance. This semi-staged musical program and literary experience honors Hughes’s extraordinary legacy and amplifies his singular voice and texts, illuminating the universal human experiences of joy, struggle, and aspiration.