In some ways, the year 2023 was a year of revanchism and regression in classical music. Just a few years earlier, many voices –...

A Conspirare Premiere and a Gratuitous Youthful Photo Langston Hughes’s poem Joy was first published in the collection The Weary Blues...

A Commencement Letter from Langston Hughes, Shared with Margaret Bonds We are in an age of marches, of collective protests against...

The Song of Hope sounds at Ithaca College under the baton of Michael Stern [This post is occasioned by the world première of Florence B....

On Tuesday, February 15, 2022, at 7:30 p.m. CT, the internationally heralded GRAMMY-winning chorus Conspirare, conducted by...

Lady Jess and Ric’key Pageot Record the Recently Published Andante con espressione for Violin and Piano The Summer of 1926 was important...

And a Most August Album and Edition, on the Bicentennial of Pauline Viardot-García Few musical dynasties compare to the one that included...

A Seasonal Blessing in Word and Song from the Pen of W.E.B. Du Bois (1913) W.E.B. Du Bois (1868-1963) was a male womanist as well as an...

Performances by Greg Watkins and Members of the CAAPA Chorale, November 14, 2021; and Anton Nel and Members of Conspirare, February 15,...

An Important New Album from Composer Lori Laitman “Settles the Question” I’m not a reviewer – I’m just a musicologist who’s deeply,...

A Teacher Bids a Fond Farewell (for now) to His Fine Students and an Adventurous Course [Background: Yesterday was the last regular class...

Langston Hughes’s relationship with the Christian church was . . . complicated. Except that it wasn’t. While he acknowledged that the...

A Song Lyric by Margaret Bonds Margaret Bonds traveled nearly constantly in her adult life. Even though she maintained a single address...

MARGARET BONDS, EDNA ST. VINCENT MILLAY, AND LANGSTON HUGHES* * (WITH A CAMEO BY DEBUSSY AND PIERRE LOUŸS) The long, close, and...

Florence B. Price’s “Night” (Text by Bessie Mayle) The poetry, music, and other artworks of the Harlem Renaissance and Chicago Black...

A new and consciously LIVE music video of Margaret Bonds's "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening" offers a fresh look at her musical world.

The newly recovered gospel song "When the Dove Enters In" by Margaret Bonds & Langston Hughes delivers a symbolic message for our own time.

A new series of videos featuring music of Florence Price and Margaret Bonds shows music's ability to bring comfort and beauty amidst trauma.

41 readers ages 5-81 voice their support for #BlackLivesMatter in a collaborative reading of a Civil Rights manifesto by W.E.B. Du Bois.

Margaret Bonds's little-known settings of Robert Frost's well-known "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening" teach important lessons.