Fisk University 91st annual Spring Arts Festival 2020

Fisk University’s

91st Annual Summer

2020

Artist: Kadeer Wellington, freshman

THEME

e ARTS: A MIRROR OF SOCIETY

The Fisk University Department of Art is delighted to participate in the University’s Annual Spring Arts Festival which celebrates the arts and the humanities.

In 2020, as in previous years, Artist: ???????? we continue our tradition of showcasing the creative efforts of our students, and of those who have taught and trained them. Student artists are selected from the Painting, Ceramic, Sculpture, and Photography Studios where they are given opportunities to present their creative work during classes and receive constructive criticism.

The department, founded by Aaron Douglas, known as “the father of black

Artist: Christina Jacob, sophomore

American art,” was the department chairman for 22 years and chairman Emeritus from 1966 until his death in 1979. An illustrious list of faculty and alumni have followed and left a remarkable impression. For over seventy-five years, the department has continued to produce exceptional graduates dedicated to the study of the arts and visual culture. Fisk’s museum collections have consistently been an integral teaching resource for students, artists, and scholars as well as the national and global community.

CONTENTS CONTENTS 1 PRESIDENT'S GREETING 2 THE SPRING ARTS FESTIVAL HISTORICAL OVERVIEW 3 LITERARY ARTS 4 SOCIAL JUSTICE 7 VISUAL ARTS 8 THEATRE 17 MUSIC 20 FILM 23 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 24

Artist: Christina Jacob, sophomore

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PRESIDENT’S GREETING

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HISTORICAL OVERVIEW

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he Annual Spring Arts Festival is an established tradition at Fisk University. In 1929, the first Festival was held under the auspices of the Fisk Music School with Ray Francis Brown as director.

Invitations were sent to Nashville patrons of music and to friends of Fisk all over the country requesting their presence at the three-day celebration known then as “The Festival of Negro Music and Fine Arts.”

This cultural event opened with a concert of Jubilee Music, which featured the Fisk Jubilee Singers®, under the direction of Mrs. James A. Myers, and the Men’s Glee Club and Mozart Society (Choir) both directed by John W. Work.

The second day featured a program of folk songs, dances and gymnastics by the Department of Physical Education for Women, a talk by James Weldon Johnson, a student recital, an art exhibit and a fashion show with the theme “Sugar and Spice – Fisk Fashions for 1929.” Festivities for the third day began with regular Sunday morning church service. The afternoon activities consisted of a concert of sixteenth century church music, music by Russian composers, Bach, and others.

The festival closed with a tea in the parlor of Jubilee Hall honoring Maggie Porter Cole, one of the original Fisk Jubilee Singers®, Mabel Lewis Imes, a former Jubilee Singer and Mary Fisk Park, daughter of Clinton B. Fisk. The Board of Trustees, who met during the Festival, was present at the tea.

As a result of the success of the first Festival, it was decided that the event should become an annual affair. Over the years, guest participants have included such luminaries as Countee Cullen and Robert Hayden who shared their poetry, Arthur Spingarn, Martin Luther King, Jr., Pearl Buck, Ralph Ellison, Langston Hughes, Margaret Walker, Carl Rowan, Ossie Davis, Harry Belafonte, Sidney Poitier and J. Mason Brewer who have been among the convocation and seminar speakers, musicians who have ranged from Roland Hayes, Philippa Duke Schuyler and the Nashville Symphony Orchestra to Miriam Mekeba, Quincy Jones and Cannonball Adderly, and dancers representing the Pearl Primus, Jose Limon and Jean Leon Destine Dance Troupes.

In conjunction with the seminars, concerts, film showings and play productions, there have been several noteworthy art exhibits. Items from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, paintings by Aaron Douglas and other members of the Fisk faculty, portraits by Carl Van Vechten and works

by Elizabeth Catlett have been displayed at the Library, Livingston Hall and in later years, the Carl Van Vechten Art Gallery.

There were several historic events connected with the University, which occurred during the Festivals. In 1930, there was the laying of the cornerstone for the Erastus Milo Cravath Library.

In 1959, there was the dedication of the Adam K. Spence Student Union Building, the W.E.B. DuBois Hall and Park-Johnson Hall. Events such as the crowning of the Festival King and Queen, the Beaux Art Ball and dance recitals were some of the most popular activities for Fisk students. Several awards have been presented to individuals for their outstanding achievements. In1932, Roland Hayes received the Doctor of Music degree and Marian Anderson, Dorothy Maynor, Pauli Marshall and Undine Smith Moore are among those who have received the Humanitarian Award.

No account of the history of the Annual Spring Arts Festival would be complete without mentioning our own talented “in house” artists.

The Fisk Jubilee Singers® and the University Choir have been integral parts of the Festival since its inception. The Stagecrafters, founded in 1926, joined the festivities in the early thirties and Orchesis made its first appearance in 1954. The Modern Black Mass Choir and the Jazz Ensemble became part of the Festival in 1972.

During recent years, the Festival has attracted well-known participants like Shirley Chisholm, Nikki Giovanni, Hubert Laws, and the Boy’s Choir of Harlem. From all indications, it is evident that Fisk University stands in the forefront as a medium for cultural expression while she continues to subscribe to her legacy of excellence in the arts.

— Beth M. Howse ‘65 (1943–2012) Special Collections Librarian

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LITERARY ARTS

A collaborative exhibit between Fisk University and Martin Luther King, Jr. Academic Magnet High School (MLK ). Faculty member: Katharine A. Burnett I Student researcher: Alexandria Green

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he North Nashville neighborhood has historically been the epicenter for the African American community in Nashville.

However, in recent years North Nashville has undergone drastic changes due to gentrification and the rapid growth of the city as a whole.

As a result, many long-time residents feel the culture is being erased or lost.

COLLECTIONS UTILIZED

Fisk University campus, aerial view, 1946, Jefferson Street Photo Project, Fisk Special Collections

Otey’s Discount Supermarket, 1953, Jefferson Street Photo Project, Fisk Special Collections

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Franklin Library Special Collections at Fisk University • The Jefferson Street Photo Project (1857-1982) • Jefferson Street is the primary corridor in North Nashville.

• The photographs document the history of the area for over a century.

Pearl High School Archives Located at MLK • Pearl HS is crucial to understanding the history of Nashville, North Nashville, and black history in the area.

• The archives contain official photos related to the school and photos of notable alumni, such as Perry Wallace, the first black athlete to play for the SEC.

They then chose a set of photographs from the two archival collections and conducted research on the subjects.

Project Overview– Part Two: Visual Art Exhibit 1966 Pearl basketball team, TSSAA champions Pearl HS archives

Project Members • Dr. Katharine A. Burnett, Fisk University (coordinator) • Ms. DeLisa Harris, Fisk University (librarian) • Mr. Melvin Black, Pearl High School (archivist) • John Davies, Fisk University (student researcher, archival portion) • Alexandria Green, Fisk University (student researcher, exhibit portion) • Mr. Randall Norton’s African American History course, MLK (student researchers) • Prof. Alicia Henry’s Arts and Ideas course, Fisk University (student researchers) • Dr. Angela McShepard-Ray, MLK (principal and project consultant) • Dr. Vann R. Newkirk, Fisk University (administrator)

Project Overview– Part One: Archival Research and Preservation In Fall 2019, students from an African American History course at MLK participated in a series of archival preservation sessions at Fisk University.

In Fall 2020, an Art class at Fisk curated a public art exhibit that featured the chosen photographs and creative art pieces based on the individual photos.

The creative pieces were created by a Fisk University Art class in Fall 2019. The result was a public exhibit, “Becoming North Nashville,” that was part historical, part creative.

Format of the Exhibit

• Gallery style hanging of colored photographs with art works on one end • Gallery style hangings of monochromatic photographs on the other end • Information texts and QR codes for corresponding pictures

Audience

• Local community members • Students and faculty at both institutions • Alumni of both institutions • Members of the Nashville community at-large

Research Questions (Archival) Pedagogical: • To expose students (high school and university-level) to local history

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• To introduce students to innovative research practices (primary and secondary sources, hands-on archival research, interdisciplinary approaches, preservation/ conservation) • To encourage creative processes and expression through new pedagogical methods Community-based: • To highlight the archival collections, both of which are under-utilized and unfamiliar to the community at-large • To bring more scholarly attention to these holdings and open them to those in the surrounding community whose histories are represented • To highlight the history of a vibrant community in flux and change the narrative of North Nashville by placing the focus on the individuals and institutions who live in and define the community

And of course, thank you to the Council of Independent Colleges for the “Humanities Research for the Public Good” grant that sponsored this project.

F https://womenofrosenwald.omeka.net/

Successes (Archival)

• Continuity: Students developing research practices (archival, qualitative, observational) and making connections between the history of the neighborhood and the present day • Conservation: Students learning preservation processes • Community: Students developing a personal connection to the space and the archives

Acknowledgements A huge thank-you to all of the project members, in particular the MLK team members: • Mr. Melvin Black, whose expertise with the Pearl HS archives was invaluable • Mr. Randall Norton, for coordinating the project and exhibit with his MLK students • Dr. Angela McShepard-Ray for advising and coordinating throughout the project MANY thanks to the Fisk University Art students and the MLK History students for contributing their time and talents.

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The “Women of Rosenwald” Exhibit at Fisk University

“Women of Rosenwald: Curating Social Justice through the Arts, 1928-1948,” utilizes materials from the Special Collections housed at Fisk University’s John Hope and Aurelia E. Franklin Library to narrate the stories of eleven female African American writers, artists, performers, and scholars who received a Rosenwald fellowship between 1928 and 1948.

The exhibit traces the ways in which these women broke professional barriers and gave back to their communities in the fields of music, fashion, literature, sculpture, painting, and dance. While not all of the artists of focus reached international celebrity or achieved long-term financial success after their fellowship period, the Rosenwald Fund provided each the vital opportunity to grow their talents, shape their respective fields, and touch their communities.

To complete this project, Professor Bostow collaborated with Fisk librarians and recruited and trained six undergraduate students to participate in metadata input, exhibit curation, document analysis, and writing (biographies and explanatory text).

SOCIAL JUSTICE

O

F https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QOPGpE-sXh0

n November 18, 2019, a Fisk alumnus named Justin Jones, boldly stood on the steps of historic Jubilee Hall at Fisk University, and announced his candidacy to challenge longtime incumbent Jim Cooper for Tennessee’s 5th congressional district seat to the U.S. House of Representatives. Though Mr. Jones was just a recent college graduate at the time, he was a hardened veteran of protests, civil disobedience, and the fight for equality.

Flanked all around him at this same event, were current students at Fisk University. But one should not be fooled by their young ages and baby faces. For many of these students and supporters of Mr. Jones’s congressional candidacy, were hardened veterans of the Black Lives Matter movement. Underneath their youthful and hopeful countenances, were battle scars and weary bones from hard fought political wins and losses on the battlefield for justice, equality, and a world free from racism.

In the wake of George Floyd’s murder, many colleges and universities across the country have sought ways to address their own unique legacies of systemic racism and discrimination. To those who suffer from these evil pathologies, their recent actions to confront and reform is most welcomed. But Fisk University is different. For Fisk has a long legacy of producing the men and women who lead these key movements for social justice. The social and academic environment at Fisk University creates young people ready and eager to weather the rigors necessary to achieve social justice in this world.

Unlike most other colleges and universities, Fisk openly embraces the protest culture. Social protesting and boldly standing for what is right, even in the face of extreme adversity, is part of our very fabric. At key moment’s in our nation’s history, Fisk University was there participating and leading protest movements.

From the Free South Africa Movement, the movement to decolonize, the Civil Rights movement, the protests

against Vietnam, the Black Power movement, the Women’s suffrage movement, and many more, Fisk University was right in the middle of them all.

Unfortunately, when America strays from the path of justice and truth, there is always a flock of individuals, corporations, and even universities that all seek to profit from these illicit and unrighteous acts. This is what separates most other colleges and universities from an institution such as Fisk. Fisk proudly chooses the other path. The unappealing and rugged, but infinitely more rewarding path. Instead of basking in the sea of blood money, Fisk chooses to make America a more just and democratic society, so that everyone may live in peace and security. Fisk chooses to put America’s feet to the fire and demand change. It chooses to force America to live up to its own ideals and standards.

This should be the ultimate mission of universities and institutions of higher learning in any society. This university has always observed events taking place around us and asked what we must do in the face of such challenges. The teaching, learning, and research that occurs both inside and outside of the classroom at Fisk University, helps to equip each member of our community with the tools necessary to meet these challenges. One of the greatest assets of any institution of higher learning is its intellectual capital. The joy of Fisk University has been in translating its intellectual capital to help balance the scales of justice.

This is why it comes as no surprise when we witness Justin Jones, our Black Lives Matter student activists, and a host of other student activists emerge from the great halls of Fisk University. They hail from a rich heritage of global freedom struggles fighters and a long line of warriors unafraid to speak truth to power about social justice and inequality.

—by Dr. A. Hannibal Leach, Interim Assistant Dean, School of Humanities and Behavioral Social Sciences, Fisk University

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VISUAL ARTS Student Exhibition 80s + 10 Black Then: Cultural Edition Culture plays an important role in everyone’s life, but the culture of the 90s from clothing, television, music, and movies is like no other. The 80s + 10 Black Then: Cultural Edition exhibit is a love letter to the 90s. This student led exhibition explores creativity centered around popular culture from this decade.

Student Curators: Alexandria Green Perrin Kennedy

Kylie McKay Keziah Oliver

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Robbyn Portis Khairi Ross

Jazmen Tanksley Reece Williams

Artist: Moses Betts, senior

Artist: Moses Betts, senior

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Artist: Meaghan Hall, senior

Artist: Takaylon Walker, junior

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Artist: Christina Jacob, junior

Artist: Skylar Barnes, junior

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Social Justice Artist: Jazzmine Brooks, senior

Artist: Jalisa Mauldin, senior

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Retrospective: Fisk Art (Excerpt from Fisk University Catalog, 1971–1972)

DAVID DRISKELL (photo: David Hills)

A

TERRY ADKINS (photo: Luca Nostri)

t Fisk University, courses of study in art serve

several purposes. A major program is offered, which may lead to graduate study in studio, art history, museology and fine arts consulting, teaching on the secondary or elementary levels or a professional career in the visual arts. A major sequence can be pursued in painting, ceramics, graphic arts, art history and museum science, public school art and the photo-graphic arts.

Non-majors are encouraged to enroll in both history and studio courses.

The department of art is housed in four separate buildings: The Carl Van Vechten Gallery, the photo laboratory, the new library and Ballentine Hall. The new library houses the Alfred Stieglitz collection of art consisting of representative works by Paul Cezanne, Charles Demuth, Arthur Dove, George Grosz, Marsden Hartley, John Marin, Alfred Maurer, Eli Nadelman, Georgia O’Keefe, Jules Pascin, Pablo Picasso, Auguste Renoir, Diego Rivera, Gino Severini, Charles Sheeler, Paul Signac, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Abraham Walkowitz and others. A fine sampling of African sculpture, selections from the first such exhibition to be held in this country, is included in the collection which was the generous gift of Georgia O’Keeffe, the widow of Alfred Stieglitz.

The Van Vechten Gallery houses the offices of the department of art, the university art gallery and also a prize collection of the photography of Alfred Stieglitz and Carl Van Vechten. A library of 3,000 volumes of art and artists is maintained in the Carl Van Vechten Gallery which also houses important works by Milton Avery,

AARON DOUGLAS

(photo: Robert Abbott Sengstacke/Getty Images)

Richmond Barthe, Romare Bearden, Louis Eilshemius, Jacob Lawrence, Henry O. Tanner, Walter Williams, Kenneth Noland, and Charles White, to mention only a few. The permanent collection is expanded through acquisitions, gifts and the selection of one work from students enrolled in courses in art.

The department of art maintains an academic relationship with the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. During the summer session, a limited number of students may pursue a credit course of study in museum science under the supervision of a member of the professional staff.

Ballentine Hall provides facilities for the students, the offices and studios and the art faculty and studio workshops in art education, ceramics, graphic arts, painting, drawing and sculpture. A reading room and art seminar is maintained where students can study color slides, filmstrips and reproductions of works of art. This room also houses technique manuals and art periodicals.

A study storage and exhibition workshop is maintained where students may participate in the preparation of exhibitions and study at first hand original paintings, prints and crafts. Ballentine also houses classrooms for courses of study in museum science and fine arts consulting. The ceramic studio, apart from its regular equipment of potters wheels, electric kilns and a glaze laboratory, houses the Alpine gas kiln which is capable of reaching porcelain temperatures.

The photography laboratory houses three dark rooms for photography and cinematography with four classroom workshops on the ground floor.

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TERRY ADKINS

Our Sons and Daughters Ever on the Altar

he Frist Art Museum and Fisk University Galleries present Terry Adkins: Our Sons and Daughters Ever on the Altar, concurrent presentations of sculptures, prints, installations, and video by the multidisciplinary and multimedia artist and musician, on view in the Frist’s Gordon Contemporary Artists Project Gallery and the Carl Van Vechten Gallery at Fisk from February 20, 2020 through January 10, 2021. Presented forty-five years after Adkins’s graduation from Fisk, the exhibition pays special attention to the influence that his time in Nashville had on the late internationally acclaimed artist.

“This is the first exhibition of its kind of Terry Adkins’s work in Middle Tennessee, and we are excited to partner with the Frist Art Museum to co-present it,” says Director and Curator of Fisk University Galleries Jamaal Sheats.

“A Fisk University alum, Adkins was a member of the jazz orchestra and a disc jockey for WFSK Jazzy 88 radio station. However, the Fisk Art Department was his home. He studied under the then chairman of the art department and director of galleries, historian, and artist David Driskell. Adkins has credited Aaron Douglas, who founded the art department 75 years ago, as igniting his interest in art. Today, I see Adkins’s work and career as a beacon for the arts tradition at Fisk.”

Fisk and the Frist will collaborate with the soon-to-open National Museum of African American Music to produce a multidisciplinary performance, featuring local talent inspired by Terry Adkins and his performance collective, the Lone Wolf Recital Corps.

Terry Adkins (1953–2014) was principally interested in the intersection of visual art, music, and African American history. First trained as a musician on guitar, saxophone, and other woodwinds, he approached his visual art practice from the perspective of a composer, often arranging series of works to create what he called “recitals,” many of which feature modified musical instruments or other salvaged materials. “One of his primary aims was to forge a link between music and art, reversing each discipline in order to make sculpture more ethereal and music more concrete,” says Frist Art

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Museum Curator Katie Delmez.

Throughout his career, Adkins also questioned the processes by which historical figures’ pasts become or do not become a part of the historical canon. “He mined African and African American histories for marginalized narratives and organized series of works devoted to either under-recognized figures or highlighted underrepresented aspects of well-known figures’ lives,” says Delmez. The works in Our Sons and Daughters

F https://www.fisk.edu/galleries/

F https://fristartmuseum.org/calendar/detail/terry-adkins Ever on the Altar pay tribute to the legacies of several influential and enigmatic figures, such as Jimi Hendrix, Bessie Smith, Dr. George Washington Carver, and Dr. W.E.B. Du Bois.

On view at the Frist Art Museum The “recital” Principalities is dedicated to Jimi Hendrix and his service as a paratrooper in the 101st Airborne Division of the U.S. Army at nearby Fort Campbell, Kentucky. A centerpiece of the series, Cloud, is a work comprising a white parachute hung above a rack of kimonos. Referencing the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings, it underscores the tragic history of war.

Flumen Orationis, a video pairing Hendrix’s 1970 antiwar protest song “Machine Gun” with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s 1967 speech “Why I Am Opposed to the War in Vietnam,” will also be featured.

Another “recital” on view at the Frist titled Belted Bronze will be devoted to legendary blues singer Bessie Smith,

who was born in Chattanooga. Though successful during her lifetime, Adkins felt her accomplishments lacked sufficient public acknowledgment after her untimely death at the age of forty-three. The installation features multiple components meant to channel Smith’s opulence, strength, and majesty. Columbia, a large record-shaped sculpture, refers to both the label Smith was signed to in 1923 and the type of record (Columbia 78s) on which her music was recorded and played.

On view at Fisk University Galleries The presentation at the Carl Van Vechten Gallery will relay the significant impact that Fisk had on Adkins. His father was a graduate of the university, and his uncle was a former president. “As a student, Adkins studied with Stephanie Pogue and had seminars with Robert Blackburn and Fred Bond before graduating with a (continued next page)

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TERRY ADKINS (continued)

Bachelor of Science degree in art with a concentration in printmaking,” says Sheats. “The presentation at Fisk explores Adkins’s works on paper, the medium in which he revisits and shifts the perspective of the lives and works of iconic figures in American history.” Adkins demonstrates this ability through bodies of works derived from scientist and inventor George Washington Carver and sociologist, historian, and civil rights leader W.E.B. Du Bois, in works the Progressive Nature Studies and The Philadelphia Negro Reconsidered, respectively.

Another highlight at Fisk will be Darkwater Record, which features a porcelain bust of Mao Zedong sitting on five recorders playing excerpts of W.E.B. Du Bois’s “Socialism and the American Negro” speech. Du Bois is an 1888 graduate of Fisk University and met Chairman Mao in China in 1959.

Adkins continued to be inspired by people and artwork he was exposed to at Fisk throughout his career, including explorer Matthew Henson, whose portrait

by Winold Reiss still hangs in the John Hope and Aurelia E. Franklin Library on campus. Also on view at Fisk will be prints of x-rayed memory jugs—African American funerary objects often created by Southern sharecroppers as headstones. They were made of clay and included objects from the person’s life. Adkins collected over 120 of these and worked with colleagues in the medical school of the University of Pennsylvania (where Adkins taught for many years) to make these photographs by x-raying them.

Adkins often claimed that the foundation of his career began in Nashville, where his interest for the visual arts was nourished at Fisk. There he studied under artists Martin Puryear, Stephanie Pogue, Carlton Moss, and Earl Hooks, and he was mentored by Aaron Douglas, an influential artist during the Harlem Renaissance. Born into a segregated America, Adkins felt a call to take up the torch that Douglas and others passed on to him, and he strove to create art that reflected the tenor of the times and served as instruments of change.

Organized by Fisk University Galleries and the Frist Art Museum. All artwork © 2019 The Estate of Terry Adkins / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Images © The Estate of Terry Adkins / Lévy Gorvy. Text courtesy of the Frist Art Museum.

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THEATRE

STAGECRAFTERS Fisk University’s Acting Ensemble

T

he Fisk University Stagecrafters was

Little Theatre since 1935. Today, the group provides

organized in April of 1926, with English 142

opportunities for intensive study of plays and their

(a class in Pageantry) as a nucleus. The director

production. Membership is open to all students,

was Miss L. E. Cashin, Professor in Comparative

who may participate as actors, designers, lighting

Literature. Its purpose was the “fastening of art

technicians, make-up artists, or in the construction

for art’s sake, the discovery and development of

of scenery or costumes. Major productions and

new talent, and the establishment of a little theatre

student directed laboratory performances are held

on the Fisk campus.” The initial performance was

each year.

Sophocles’ Antigone, which was presented in May, 1926.

From this rather auspicious beginning 94

years ago, Stagecrafters has evolved into the main University theatre group. They have occupied the

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THE FISK UNIVERSITY STAGECRAFTERS present A PLAY ABOUT RACE, RAGE, AND SURVIVAL Conceived, Written and Directed by SEKOU WRITES Best described as a choreopoem, BROWN BOY MAD, incorporates elements of film, song, poetry and even the perspectives of the actors in an attempt to describe some of the author’s real-life interactions with race and micro-aggressions in “post-racial” America. staged reading: A form of theatre where actors read from the script of a developing play.

Used to gauge the effectiveness of the dialogue, pacing, flow, and other dramatic elements that the playwright or director may wish to change.

Audience feedback is invaluable.

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choreopoem: A multifaceted dramatic expression that combines poetry, dance, music, and song. The term was first coined in 1975

by American writer Ntozake Shange in a description of her work, For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide / When the Rainbow Is Enuf.

CREDITS CAST & CREW

SPECIAL THANKS

Jeffrey Casey Chelseai Cunningham Eliana Grant Kiare Green Meaghan Hall Camryn Johnson Kyron McDonald McKenna Mimms Keenya Phillips-Riley Carol Ruiz Sean Webb Sadara Welch

Professor Persephone Felder-Fentress, Sharon Kay (WFSK), Cass Teague, Rosetta Perry Miller, J. Sheats, Tony Lewis, Korby Marks, Antonio Q. Meeks, Joy Doss, Hadley Park Library, Lola A. Brown-Norris, Jamaal Sheats, Courtney Deckard, Pastor Kelly Miller Smith Jr., Joe Ella Darby, First Baptist Church Capital Hill

BLESSED (SONG)

INSTAGRAM

Lyrics

by Sekou Writes Melody & arrangement

by Gina Calloway Performed

by Chelseai Cunningham Musical accompaniment

by Konson Patton

@brownboymad @sekouwrites @fiskstagecrafters @fiskuniversity #brownboymad Photo of Sekou Writes

by Keith Major Photos of cast by Sadara Welch

F https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=khRiMNN6bKc

SEKOU WRITES was one of three writerperformers in No Good Nigg@ Bluez, a spoken word theater production which was featured in the 2003 New York International Fringe Festival. After that journey ended, Sekou wrote a derivative script for a one-man-show entitled DEAR WHITE MAN, but he never produced it and the project was shelved.

In November of 2019, after seeing the return of For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide/When the Rainbow Is Enuf at The Public Theater, Sekou unearthed the script for DEAR WHITE MAN, rewrote it, renamed it BROWN BOY MAD, and introduced it to Blackboard Plays, a NYC nonprofit which connects playwrights with actors who can breathe life into their work.

Encouraged, Sekou rewrote the script again and brought it with him to Nashville.

In January of 2020, after Sekou gave a lecture about converting racial rage into creative energy at Fisk University, Professor Persephone Felder-Fentress granted him permission to become an artist-in-residence at Fisk to develop his play with the help of the Fisk University Stagecrafters. The result was a staged reading of BROWN BOY MAD in Fisk University’s Little Theater on Wednesday, Feb. 26, 2020, 9:00 pm­ —the same month and day that Trayvon Martin was killed in 2012.

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MUSIC F https://www.curb.com/store/albums/8401/

FISK JUBILEE SINGERS Fisk University opened in Nashville in 1866 as the first American university to offer a liberal arts education to “young men and women irrespective of color.” Five years later the school was in dire financial straits.

George L. White, then Fisk treasurer and music professor, created a choral ensemble of students and took the group on tour to earn money for the University.

The ensemble, initially consisting of eleven students, left campus on October 6, 1871. Only nine students completed the first tour. To commemorate this historic day, Jubilee Day is celebrated annually on October 6.

The first concerts were in small towns. Surprise, curiosity and some hostility were the early audience responses to these young black singers who did not perform in the traditional “minstrel fashion.”

One early concert in Cincinnati, Ohio, brought in $50, which was promptly donated to victims of the notorious 1871 fire in Chicago. When they reached Columbus, the next city on the tour, the students were physically and emotionally drained. Mr. White, in a gesture of hope and encouragement, named them “The Jubilee Singers,” a Biblical reference to the Jewish year of Jubilee in the Book of Leviticus, Chapter 25.

Continued perseverance and beautiful voices began to change attitudes among the predominantly white audiences. Eventually skepticism was replaced by standing ovations and critical praise in reviews. Gradually they earned enough money to cover not only expenses, but to send back to Fisk.

In 1872 they sang at the World Peace Festival in Boston and at the end of the year President Ulysses

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S. Grant invited them to perform at the White House.

Funds raised from this tour were used in purchasing the current land on which Fisk University is located.

In 1873 the group, now eleven members, toured Europe for the first time. Funds raised during this tour were used to construct the school’s first permanent building, Jubilee Hall. Today, Jubilee Hall, designated a National Historic Landmark by the US Department of Interior in 1975, is one of the oldest structures on campus. The beautiful Victorian Gothic building houses a floor-to-ceiling portrait of the Fisk Jubilee Singers®, commissioned by Queen Victoria during the 1873 tour as a gift from England to Fisk.

The ensemble returned to England in May 2015 and performed in Birmingham. In recent years, the Fisk Jubilee Singers® have performed in Italy, Spain, Ghana and Germany. As they travel, they continue to sing the Negro spirituals, thus preserving this important genre of music and the rich legacy.

The two-time GRAMMY Nominated Fisk Jubilee Singers® have won a Dove Award and have been inducted into the Gospel Music Hall of Fame as well as the Music City Walk of Fame. In 2008, the Fisk Jubilee Singers® were awarded the National Medal of Arts by former President George W. Bush at the White House. Other awards of the ensemble include the Governor’s Award, the Recording Academy Honors, and the Heritage Award of the Nashville Music Awards. The Fisk Jubilee Singers® were among the 2015 GRAMMY Hall of Fame inductees and are the 2017 recipients of the SYNERGY AWARD presented by the Nashville Ballet.

VIRTUAL SPRING ARTS FESTIVAL SONGS AND SPIRITUALS OF AMERICAN COMPOSERS AND AMERICAN POETS

F https://youtu.be/N4fRXbgz0m4

A Voice Studio Student Recital primarily emphasizing the works of American and African American Composers and American and African American Poets; as well as Spiritual arrangements by African American Composers.

Creole Girl from Nightsongs H. Leslie Adams Poet: Leslie Morgan Collins Kennedi Hall, mezzo soprano, senior

Night Florence Price (1887–1953) Poet: Louis C. Wright DeJuan Jackson, lyric baritone, junior For you, there is no song from Five Malay Songs H. Leslie Adams (b. 1932) Poet: Edna St. Vincent Millay Cortney Towns, lyric soprano, senior

Watch and Pray arr. Undine Smith Moore (1904–1989) Anastasia Rainbow, coloratura soprano, senior Hold On arr. Paul T. Kwami (b. 1952) Jada Marshall

Minstrel Man, Dream Variations, and I, Too from Three Dream Portraits Margaret Bonds (1913–1972) Poet: Langston Hughes Jada Marshall, mezzo soprano, graduate 2020

Guide My Feet arr. Jacqueline Hairston (b. 1933) Shawna Lewis, lyric soprano, sophomore

Song to the Dark Virgin Florence Price Poet: Langston Hughes Tory Westbrook, lyric baritone, junior

Ride on King Jesus arr. Hall Johnson (1888–1970) Jada Spight, lyric soprano, junior

Kid in the Park from Genius Child Ricky Ian Gordon (b. 1956) Poet: Langston Hughes Dartisha Mosley, lyric soprano, graduate 2020

Ms. Gwendolyn Brown would like to thank these pianists for their collaboration with the students: Kyle Hankins, Dave Ragland, Allison Williams, Maeve Brophy, Dr. Anthony Williams

PERFORMERS

Jada Spright

Shawna Lewis

Anastasia Rainbow

Jada Marshall

Cortney Towns

Dartisha Mosley

Tory Westbrook

Kennedi Hall

DeJuan Jackson

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VIRTUAL SPRING ARTS FESTIVAL SONGS AND SPIRITUALS OF AFRICAN AMERICAN COMPOSERS AND ARRANGERS

F https://youtu.be/qx8fQNkmXas GWENDOLYN BROWN, contralto KYLE HANKINS, piano

This Little Light of Mine arr. John W. Work, III (1871–1925)

Oh, Glory arr. Shawn Okpeholo (b. 1981)

Prayer from Nightsongs H. Leslie Adams (b. 1932) Poet: Langston Hughes

No Ways Tired arr. Jaqueline Hairston (b. 1933)

Sense You Went Away from Nightsongs H. Leslie Adams Poet: James Weldon Johnson Calvary arr. Dave Ragland (b. 1979)

Gwendolyn Brown

Contralto Gwendolyn Brown’s more than 25-year international career includes performances in opera, symphonic music, classical art song, and spirituals, as well as the contemporary and the avant-garde. She has received critical acclaim in these works and has performed in many large opera houses (Lyric Opera of Chicago, Washington National Opera, Seattle Opera, New Orleans

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Lord, I’ll Go arr. Jacqueline Hairston Recorded in the Fisk Memorial Chapel May 2020 Videographer: Rick Malkin

Opera, to name a few), and symphony houses in the United States including Boston Symphony, LA Philharmonic at the Hollywood Bowl and Tanglewood. Her international career includes performances in Germany, Spain, Amsterdam, and Australia.

Originally from Memphis, Tennessee, Gwendolyn obtained her Bachelor of Arts in Music at Fisk University where she was a member of the Fisk Jubilee Singers® (and still is at heart), and pursued the Masters of Music degree in Vocal Performance at the University of Memphis (Memphis, TN). She completed her Master’s of Music degree at the American Music Conservatory (Hammond, IN). Her young artist development included The Patrick G. and Shirley W. Ryan Opera Center of the Lyric Opera of Chicago and The Des Moines Metro Opera Young Artist Program. Ms. Brown currently lives in Nashville, Tennessee where she is the Assistant Professor of Music in Voice and Opera Workshop at her alma mater, Fisk University.

FILM

ROBERT POOLE

F https://vimeo.com/53382911

R

obert L. Poole is a

Nashville native known for crafting high concept films populated by authentic characters.

While studying communications (theatre) at (Fisk University), he had the opportunity to ignite his love of filmmaking, using his fellow students as subjects. Shortly after graduating, Robert made short documentaries as a way to shine a light on his surrounding community. His first narrative short film, “The Earl Thompson Movement” was screened and reviewed favorably at the 2006 Nashville Film Festival. During that same year, he honed his directing skills with the production of James Weldon Johnson’s “God’s Trombones,” that featured the acting debut of former NFL star, Eddie George.

Poole went on to earn his MFA in Film Production from Columbia University. His thesis film “Brother’s Keeper” was showcased as part

F https://youtu.be/s7SfibWlXTg of Issa Rae’s #ShortFilmSundays and televised nationally on the Aspire Network. Continuing to lean on his exceptional writing skills and unique vision, he directed “The Exchange” starring Michael Beach (Third Watch), Mekia Cox (Once Upon a Time), and Aml Ameen (Yardie), which went on to be screened at festivals around the country.

Currently, Robert is in the pre-production phase of a few significant projects including a feature film, “The Big League,” that received a script development grant from Tribeca Film Institute. He also brings clarity to many mainstream music artists by bringing their vision and sound to life through visually impactful music videos.

Robert thrives in his passion as he develops narrative film and television projects through his own company, Isaiah 40 Films, and commercial projects through RPC Media. He resides with his wife in Los Angeles, California.

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS SPRING ARTS FESTIVAL COMMITTEE

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Persephone Felder-Fentress Convener

Kevin Rome, Sr., Ph.D. President Vann Newkirk, Ph.D. Vice President, Academic Provost Division of Humanities, Behavioral and Social Sciences

Gwendolyn Brown Courtney Deckard James Dennis Katara Grissom Alicia Henry Adrienne Latham

Jessie Carney Smith, Ph.D. Dean, Fisk University Library and Camille Cosby Distinguished Chair in Humanities Reavis L. Mitchell, Jr., D. A. Professor, History Dean, School of Humanities and Behavioral Social Sciences

David Miller Brandon Owens, Sr. Nathanial Perry Jamaal Sheats Yvette Spicer

FISK SPRING ARTS FESTIVAL 2020 SPONSORS

Katherine Burnett, Ph.D. Professor, English Coordinator, Women’s and Gender Studies A. Hannibal Leach, Ph.D. Interim Assistant Dean, School of Humanities and Behavioral Social Sciences DeLisa Harris Reference Librarian, Special Collections

General Alumni Association of Fisk University, Inc.

Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Incorporated Kappa Lambda Omega Chapter

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Nancy Apple The Designing Apple Studio Program design and layout

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SUPPORT THE ARTS AT FISK https://connect.fisk.edu/donate

Artist: Jazzmine Brooks, senior

Artist: Jalisa Mauldin, senior

Artist: Takaylon Walker, junior