In timely counterpoint to the Netflix sensation Bridgerton, Chicago Opera Theater unveils Errollyn Wallen’s Quamino’s Map, set to Deborah Breevort’s libretto. Loosely inspired by the novel Incomparable World by S. I. Martin, the new work tells of the former slave Juba Freeman, who escaped his masters to fight alongside the British in the Revolutionary War. Now free, he is forging a new life in London, an outsider finding his way in the society of the established Black British gentry. And who, you ask, is Wallen? Born in Belize, she is the first Black female composer to have been featured at the BBC Proms and the first to receive a commission from the Royal Opera Covent Garden. She divides her time between London and a lighthouse in the Scottish Highlands, overlooking the lonely Orkney Islands. Where has she been all our lives? —Matthew Gurewitsch