Black history month 2024: celebrating artists

Liz Player, a clarinetist and the executive and artistic director of the chamber, will conduct this year’s concert. Player fell in love with classical music in middle school. She founded the

organization because she wants to share the art form with everyone. “What we often refer to as ‘classical music’ is European-derived and has historically excluded many people of color. ...

This music is for everyone,” she says. “It is empowering for Black people to know there are many classically trained musicians of color and that there were in fact many Black composers and

musicians who contribute to this art form.” Ashley Jackson, a harpist, will participate in the Harlem Chamber Players’ 16th Annual Black History Month Celebration on Feb. 15. courtesy of

Ashley Jackson Harpist Ashley Jackson, one of the featured artists in this year’s program, focuses on the connections. “All kinds of music can make us feel joy or sadness, and when we begin

to see the connections between different styles of music, perhaps that allows us to be more empathetic, to see the common humanity in all of us,” she says. To Player’s point, the Mill City

String Quartet, which is dedicated to “cultivating transformative concerts that promote underrepresented composers and celebrate the classical musical genre,” will perform the works of

three contemporary classical composer/musicians. The Minneapolis-based group will perform select works from Jessie Montgomery, Shelley Washington and Daniel Bernard Roumain in a free concert

in Minnetonka, Minnesota, on Feb. 10. COMMUNITY-FOCUSED EVENTS Throughout the month, cultural organizations, libraries, houses of worship and universities often organize and present an

array of programming. Check the websites of your local newspaper, college or other organizations for activities. The University of Colorado Denver presents the immersive exhibit “Time and

Spaces” and a companion documentary, _Uncommon Genius_, about the life of jazz trumpeter Eddie Henderson. Henderson, an Air Force veteran and medical doctor, trained as a professional figure

skater in the 1950s, when African Americans were unwelcome in the sport. The exhibit, which opens with a free reception featuring a brief performance and remarks by Henderson, runs Feb.

1–April 21. Farther west, in Los Angeles, a female dance troupe will bring African music, dance, drumming and song to a workshop Feb. 6 at Art + Practice as part of an exhibit, “Bahia

Reverb: Artists and Place.” Curated by Bia Gayotto in partnership with the California African American Museum (CAAM), the exhibit runs through March 2. The experiential workshop will feature

a performance and public instruction of a dance, observed each February in Brazilian and Salvadoran cultures, honoring the Dia de Iemanjá (Day of Yemanjá) for the queen of the sea and the

beloved orixás (spirits) established in the Afro-Brazilian tradition of Candomblé.