15.
This program covers Songs for the African Violet, a song cycle by Jasmine Barnes that addresses the experiences of Black women. Song of America Fellow Emma Beachy explores the ways that race and gender are represented in American song and has the chance to speak with the composer as well as soprano Leah Hawkins.
This program covers Songs for the African Violet, a song cycle by Jasmine Barnes that addresses the experiences of Black women. Song of America Fellow Emma Beachy explores the ways that race and gender are represented in American song and has the chance to speak with the composer as well as soprano Leah Hawkins.
Host, Audio Editing & Scriptwriter: Emma Beachy
Production Support: Christie Finn
Guests: Jasmine Barnes & Leah Hawkins
Recording:
Live performance
Leah Hawkins, soprano
Nicholas Fox, piano
Dylan Rieck, cello
This program was created in 2023-2024 and released in September 2024 as part of the Song of America Fellowship Program, a project of the Classic Song Research Initiative between the Hampsong Foundation and the University of Michigan, School of Music, Theatre, and Dance.
Song listings with composer / poet, performers, CD label, and CD number:
In this program, Song of America Fellow Emma Beachy explores Margaret Bonds’s song cycle Three Dream Portraits, which sets the poetry of Langston Hughes. With the help of performers and scholars Thomas Hampson and Louise Toppin, Emma considers who is meant to hear and sing American song.
This program turns to the ugliness of racism in American life with Shawn E. Okpebholo’s Two Black Churches, a song cycle that addresses two acts of white supremacist violence that happened fifty years apart. In this episode, Song of America Fellow Emma Beachy considers the role of grief, tragedy, and injustice in American identity. This program contains potentially upsetting and triggering references to racialized violence and white supremacy.
