Words like Freedom: Gweneth Ann Rand and Allyson Devenish Always, Already There

Tickets for this performance can be purchased here.

Join us for a compendium of Black Art Song focused on the female voice, devised by leading soprano Gweneth Ann Rand and pianist Allyson Devenish.

This sequence includes Shawn Okpebholo’s settings of Langston Hughes, exploring themes of racial injustice, hope and humanity, and Jamaican composer Mikhail Johnson’s Praise to the Jamaican Mother of Art, which presents the First Mother as an enslaved African, whose art came out of unspeakable circumstances, unsigned, unknown, and expands this to comment on the exploitation of artists today.

Storytelling is a major element of Afrodiasporic heritage. As Allyson Devenish writes: ‘The title of the festival – Always, Already There – is the perfect jumping off point for our offering. We have been here, forever. We have always been telling stories, reflecting on our history, heritage, culture and being'.

Tickets for this performance can be purchased here.