Kanye West has announced the arrival of his very first opera, Nebuchadnezzar.
Sunday evening, West took to social media to upload a piece of artwork, designed by Nick Knight, attached to the new project. According to the graphic, Nebuchadnezzar will arrive on November 24th and is directed by Vanessa Beecroft. The opera's title is a direct reference to King Nebuchadnezzar, the Babylonian ruler.
Ahead of his Jesus Is King release, Kanye spoke with Zane Lowe about King Nebuchadnezzar, comparing his own life and career to the pitfalls of the monarch.
“[God] is saying, Let me take this Nebuchadnezzar-type character—Nebuchadnezzar was the king of Babylon, and he looked at his entire kingdom and said, I did this,” he said, per Pitchfork. “I stood on the top of the mountain talking about Yeezus, saying, ‘I’m a God’—I had a guy dressed as Jesus.”
He would add: “And now—I am unquestionably, undoubtedly, the greatest human artist of all time. It’s not even a question at this point," West said in the interview. "It’s just a fact. For the greatest artist in human existence to put a red hat on was God’s practical joke to all liberals. Like, ‘Nooo, not Kanye!'"