APPROACHING ALI is a new one-act chamber opera with music by D. J. Sparr and a libretto by Mark Campbell and Davis Miller, based on Mr. Miller's memoir, The Tao of Muhammad Ali. The story is about a boy in North Carolina in the early 1960s who is galvanized to overcome some traumatic childhood events when he sees Muhammad Ali on television. More than twenty years later, as a writer on the brink of middle age, he now seeks to rekindle that spirit by visiting his boyhood hero in person at his mother's home in Louisville.

APPROACHING ALI is a family-friendly work chat is performed by a cast of six, features an ensemble of only 10 players, and employs very simple production elements to help convey its story.