Drawing on influences ranging from West African music to serialism, African American composer Nkeiru Okoye writes music rooted in American history and current events. Among her best-known works is the two-act opera Harriet Tubman: When I Crossed That Line to Freedom. Her work The Creation was premiered at Rutgers in 1999, with actor Danny Glover as narrator. Okoye gained attention for the orchestral work Voices Shouting Out (2002), which memorialized the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, and for The Journey of Phillis Wheatley (2005). Her song cycle, Songs of Harriet Tubman, was recorded in 2011 by soprano Louise Toppin. Later Okoye works of note include Black Bottom, which was premiered by the Detroit Symphony in 2020 at a concert marking the 100th anniversary of the city's Orchestra Hall.