Original image by There Stands the Glass.
Knowing they’d be amused by my response, two cousins asked me what I’d been listening to when we chatted during a family gathering on Sunday, November 20. I told them that in addition to watching a new production of Richard Strauss’ “Der Rosenkavalier” (gorgeous!), I’d spent the first part of the day taking in new music by GloRilla (wild!) and Run the Jewels (vital!).
The cousins laughed at the idea of their graying relative enjoying hip-hop and opera on a frigid Sunday. I don’t find it odd. A concert presented by the Harriman-Jewell Series at the Folly Theater that evening displayed similar stylistic breadth. An audience of about 200 heard a splendid mix of Black gospel, opera, European art songs and contemporary classical music.
A 78% discount on two seats in the third row convinced me to attend the recital billed as “Our Song, Our Story: The New Generation of Black Voices.” What a bargain! I’ll remember the concert overseen by Damien Sneed for years. The perplexingly unpolished presentation belied the emotional impact of the staggering talent displayed by seven musicians.
Rather than expounding on Raven McMillon’s heartrending treatment of “Balm in Gilead,” Sneed’s reading of Hale Smith’s startling “Evocation” or the Griot String Quartet’s interpretation of Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson’s “Calvary” or assessing the success of the concert’s premise, I’ll simply note that sitting twenty feet from the category-defying Raehann Bryce-Davis was a privilege.