February 18th, 2024 - 3pm / Black History Month / Linking Legacies at Cultural Center of Cape Cod, South Yarmouth
When:
3rd Sunday, February 18th, 2024 / 3pm
Where:
Cultural Center of Cape Cod
307 Old Main St.
South Yarmouth, MA
Who:
Join Open Mic Classical sign-up musicians and featured guest ensemble Linking Legacies from Oberlin, Ohio (viola player Christopher Jenkins, pianist Dianna White-Gould, and lyric coloratura soprano Anastasia 'Ana' Rainbow) for our Open Mic Classical - Black History Month.
!!! Sign up to play is open to classical musicians of all levels and ages.!!! (email: openmicclassical@gmail.com or call 774.353.0244)
“Linking Legacies,” a group of Ohio-based performers, presents works by Black composers with ties to Ohio and the greater Cleveland area. Although Ohio’s legacy of educating Black composers is not well known, William Grant Still, Nathaniel Dett, Hale Smith, Dolores White, and Leslie Adams were all educated at Oberlin Conservatory and/or the Cleveland Institute of Music.
The performers who make up “Linking Legacies” similarly have regional ties. Pianist Dianna White-Gould is a graduate of Oberlin and daughter of composer Dolores White, viola player Christopher Jenkins is an Associate Dean at Oberlin and doctoral student at CIM, and soprano Anastasia Rainbow is daughter of an Oberlin alumni.
Join our program to learn more about these composers and hear several of their works that are not often performed.
Lyric Coloratura Soprano Anastasia “Ana” Rainbow is a graduate voice student at Longy School of Music of Bard College, studying under Jayne West. Ms. Rainbow is currently a recipient of the Castle of our Skins Fellowship. Ms. Rainbow is a graduate of Fisk University, where she majored in vocal performance. In 2015, Ms. Rainbow sang for President Barack Obama and Michelle Obama as a soloist with the Piney Woods School at the White House. In 2019, she was a semifinalist in the Tennessee National Association of Teachers of Singing competition, and in 2020 Ms. Rainbow was one of two students chosen to represent Fisk University in the CAAPA Masterclass Series with Denyce Graves. Most recently, in 2021, Ms. Rainbow took part in the Nashville Opera’s Big Blue Fellows program and participated in masterclasses with Laquita Mitchell, Adriana Zabala, and Talise Trevigne.
Ms. Rainbow will be singing Undine Smith Moore's Watch & Pray and Margaret Bonds' arrangement of The Whole World in His Hands.
Christopher Jenkins
Christopher Jenkins is the Associate Dean for Academic Support at Oberlin Conservatory. He is currently earning a DMA in viola performance from the Cleveland Institute of Music, and a Ph.D. in musicology from Case Western Reserve University, where his performance and research focuses on the music of African-American composers. The American Society for Aesthetics awarded him a curriculum diversification grant for his annotated bibliography on sources related to the aesthetics of African-American classical music, and the Irene H. Chayes “New Voices” award for his paper reimagining the practice of classical music through the lens of Black aesthetics. Mr. Jenkins was a 2003 laureate of the Sphinx Competition, and was Dean of the Sphinx Performance Academy for seven years prior to coming to Oberlin. He was also the Deputy Director of the Barenboim-Said Music Academy in Ramallah, Palestine. He has performed with the St. Louis Symphony and New York Philharmonic, the American Ballet Theater, and on Broadway in productions such as Spamalot, Shrek, and The Lion King. He previously earned a master's degree in international affairs from Columbia University, focusing on human rights. His international engagement has included performances and teaching in Palestine, Jordan, Lebanon, Pakistan, China, Colombia, and South Africa, and an engagement as a guest artist at the Afghan National Institute of Music in Kabul, Afghanistan. His teachers have included Lynne Ramsey, Michael Tree, Martha Katz, Karen Dreyfus, Karen Ritscher, Michelle LaCourse, and Carol Rodland. His alma maters include Harvard University, Columbia University, New England Conservatory, and the Manhattan School of Music.
Dianna White- Gould
Dianna White-Gould is an active soloist, accompanist and educator. She was born into a musical family. Her father was a cellist with The Cleveland Orchestra and her mother a composer and pianist. She began her early piano studies with her mother, then went on to high school where she was an active performing member of The Fortknightly Music Club and, as part of that group, a Gold Cup recipient for outstanding piano performances. She graduated from Oberlin College Conservatory. She later received a Master’s in Piano Performance from Cleveland State University. She attended L’Ecole de Fontainebleau in France as a student of Gaby Casadesus. She has also toured Germany performing as accompanist and soloist at The Odenwald Summer Music Festival.
Ms. White-Gould has appeared as the featured soloist with The Cleveland Philharmonic Orchestra, and twice as soloist with the Heights Civic Orchestra. Other performing appearances include solo and collaborative performances at Severance Hall, Oberlin College, Ursuline College, Cuyahoga Community College, The Music Settlement, Cleveland State University, Cleveland Public Library, Wooster College and The South Shore Cultural Center in Chicago. She has a strong interest in new music and music of African-American composers and has given world premieres by composers Dolores White, H. Leslie Adams, Hale Smith, and George Walker. She is on faculty at the Cleveland Music Settlement and the Dike School of the Arts, where she directs the Choir and Keyboard program.
In the Media:
The Cape Cod Chronicle:
The Enterprise:
WOMR:
MVY Radio: Cape Cod Current:
Admission: $25 general public / FREE for sign-up musicians, and kids
Donations for this event in addition to tickets at the door are accepted via electronic payment (cards), and check. Please check out our Donate page to choose the best option for you: https://www.openmicclassical.org/donate
"This program is supported in part by a grant from the Brewster, Harwich, Mid-Cape, Orleans, Provincetown, Sandwich, Truro Cultural Councils local agencies which are supported by the Mass Cultural Council, a state agency." https://massculturalcouncil.org/
Open Mic Classical is supported by Mass Cultural Council Cultural Investment Portfolio Projects Program FY24.
Open Mic Classical is sponsored by the Arts Foundation of Cape Cod.
