Sound Off: Music for Bail Opens Its 2023-2024 Season at People's Forum

The program features music by notable Black, Brown, and Asian historical and living composers performed by violinists Aurora Mendez and Celina Farmer, violist Jay Julio, and cellist Angelique Montes. Featured speaker Tatiana Hill will offer a history of her work with the NYC Office of the Community Liaison in the wake of Judge Shira Scheindlin’s 2013 ruling that “stop-and-frisk” policies are unconstitutional, and the path forward ten years later. General admission tickets are $15. Proceeds from these concerts directly support musicians and speakers. Free tickets are available at request to remove financial barriers to attendance.

REVIEWS: Two Shows On the Edge of Now: Palaver Strings + American Composers Orchestra

Brooklyn new music institution National Sawdust played host to Wednesday’s March 15 show titled joy. The name was apt; from the moment Palaver Strings and double bass soloist Kebra Seyoun-Charles began filing on stage in their appropriately diverse and festive attire, the packed audience received them with a roar of applause.

Chineke! Orchestra To Make Highly Anticipated Inaugural Tour to North Americ

Chineke!, Europe’s first majority-Black and ethnically diverse orchestra, led by conductor Andrew Grams, will make its inaugural North American tour this month performing in six cities across Canada and the U.S.

Interlochen, NY Phil to perform "MUKTI: A Movement of Liberation” at Lincoln Center

Featuring music by living Black composers, the concert program will be led by Interlochen Orchestra director Dr. Leslie Dunner, recipient of the Leonard Bernstein American Conductors Award and the NAACP's James Weldon Johnson and Distinguished Achievement Awards.

Sound Off, Planetary Music Project, PROTESTRA & VOCAL-NY Collab For Concert of Chamber and Orchestral Works at Robert Moss Theater

In collaboration with Groupmuse’s Planetary Music Movement and PROTESTRA, Sound Off: Music for Bail presents a hybrid program of chamber and orchestral music by leading contemporary and historical Black American composers alongside "Yet Unheard" a cantata dedicated to the life and memory of Sandra Bland by Rome Prize-winning composer Dr. Courtney Bryan at Playwrights Horizons Downtown.

Review: Curtis Stewart & EXO at DiMenna Center

Yet through intelligent curation and a bit of ingenious staging, a clear but multifaceted thematic line emerged: combining performances and reimagining pieces by Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson,Julia Perry, and Stewart himself with call-and-response, group singing, and even a mid-concert dialogue, pulling from community and scholarly knowledge offered by Stewart, Blachly, and guest lecturer Dr. Fredara Hadley, also of the Juilliard School.

2023 Grammy Nominations Announced

This year BIPOC classical composers' works have been Grammy nominated in several award categories and BIPOC classical musicians perform on a number of Grammy nominated recordings in the Classical Music category, as well as the Americana category.

This week on TRILLOQUY: Opus 157

Inspired by the viscerally provocative poem, "Here, Bullet" by Brian Turner, the art song of the same name by composer Kurt Erickson is, among many things, a plea for western classical arts spaces to directly address gun violence.

When Gun Violence Erupts Again, Will The Concert Hall Be Spared? Not Unless We Act Now

While this story may seem inappropriate, exaggerated, and even far-fetched for many classical concert goers, the reality of gun violence is becoming more widespread and normalized across American society. As of mid-July, 2022, over 300 mass shootings had been reported in the United States, with associated deaths stacking up to over 60. Orchestral and opera venues have long been considered “safe spaces” where issues of systemic racism, patriarchal norms, and class division (among others) have been pushed to the proverbial nosebleeds, but as the issue of gun violence continues to grow, so should the attention that arts institutions are paying this issue.

BMOP, Odyssey Opera to Perform and Record Davis’ “X: The Life and Times of Malcolm X”

The opera, written by Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Anthony Davis, debuted in 1986. This new performance will be staged just a short distance from the house in the Roxbury neighborhood where Malcolm X (1925-1965), born Malcolm Little, lived during his formative adolescence.

Season 2 Episode 1 of CONVERSATIONS Out Now: Nnenna Ogwo on A Musician's Responsibility

Each episode of Represent Classical's “Conversations” series features in depth interviews with industry leaders, notable musicians, movers, shakers, and innovators.

Featured in this episode: Nnenna Ogwo – pianist and Founder and Artistic Director of JuneteenthLP

Opera Programming: When is Representation At Odds With Cultural Sensitivity?

Do you remember the first time you went to go see a live production of an opera? Maybe it was during a school field trip, or for a date that you wanted to impress. I’ve met people whose first experience in an opera house was born out of a pure curiosity that led to the purchase of a ticket.

Everyone has a different story about their introduction to this art form, but what isn’t engaged as much is the residual emotional impact of said introduction. For me, the introduction came by way of performing on the stage, but I wasn’t able to measure the emotional impact opera had on me until I engaged opera as an audience member.

New Report Says U.S. Orchestras Are Programming More Works by Composers of Color and Women

The new “2022 Orchestra Repertoire Report” says that over the last several years there’s been an increase in how often American orchestras perform works by composers of color, women composers, and living composers. The report also examined programming trends dating back from 2015 to the current season.

The study was produced by SUNY Fredonia’s Institute for Composer Diversity, in partnership with the League of American Orchestras, with support from the Sphinx Organization’s Venture Fund. Data for the study was gathered from season announcements and the websites of medium and larger budget orchestras.

Silkroad Ensemble to Tour "Phoenix Rising" with Rhiannon Giddens This Summer

A musical rebirth and celebration, Phoenix Rising takes a cross-section of Silkroad’s award-winning compositions and arrangements and re-imagines them for today. With this in mind, members of the Silkroad Ensemble and Giddens collaborated on new works that coalesce Giddens unique worldview with the Ensemble’s collective experience during the pandemic.

Phoenix Rising will unveil three new commissions by Silkroad artists Sandeep Das, Maeve Gilchrist, and Kaoru Watanabe. The program also includes new arrangements by Rhiannon Giddens, Colin Jacobsen, Edward Pérez, and Mazz Swift.

Giddens and 13 Silkroad artists will visit venues in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, and Virginia.

4th Annual Women Composers Fest to Feature Grammy Winning Headliners

The Women Composers Festival will highlight performances by dozens of women composers on May 27 at The Church of the Epiphany in Washington and May 28 at AMP by Strathmore in North Bethesda, Md.

The two-day event is hosted by Boulanger Initiative, a nonprofit whose mission is to promote music composed by women through performance, education, research, consulting and commissions. Boulanger Initiative advocates for women and all gender marginalized composers.

AMVA and PAO Arts Present Concert Celebrating AAPI Composers and Performers

Asian Musical Voices of America and PAO Arts Center present “Our Objects and Possibilities”, a concert celebrating AAPI composers and performers on Friday, May 6, 7:30 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. at the PAO Arts Center at 99 Albany Street in Boston, MA.

Works by Ken Ueno, Iman Habibi, JungYoon Wie, and Michael Thomas Foumai will be featured.

Performers include violinists Lucia Lin, Jae Lee, and Hyeyung Sol Yoon, violist Sarah Darling, cellist Leo Eguchi, and harpist Charles Overton.