CURATORIAL NOTE: LENAPEHOKING
As we enter the 400th anniversary of the founding of New Amsterdam, Lenapehoking invites us to challenge the received story of this land—not as one that began with colonial “discovery,” but as one that continues from time immemorial through the voices and visions of the Lenape people and other Indigenous nations. In a city that often masks its foundational violence with myth, particularly the fable of Manhattan’s purchase, this evening of music and storytelling challenges us to confront that erasure and listen differently.
At the heart of this evening is the belief that storytelling and music are not only forms of cultural expression but acts reclamation. Through the richly layered compositions of Brent Michael Davids—“Touching Leaves Woman,” “The Last of James Fenimore Cooper,” and the world premiere of “Ode to Joe”—we are drawn into an immersive sound world shaped by Lenape traditions and futurities. Davids, a citizen of the Stockbridge-Munsee Band of the Mohican Nation, brings a lifetime of work reconfiguring new music with Native American instruments, tonalities, notation, and cosmologies. His compositions summon spirits, histories, and possibilities often excluded from dominant cultural narratives about classical music. It has been a privilege to work with him and with Lenape Center to conceive and present this evening.
Held in the historic Veterans Room — a space that embodies complex tensions between different American stories—Lenapehoking draws on the room’s richly layered design and natural materials to amplify
the acoustic and symbolic resonance of Indigenous storytelling. One of the few surviving interiors by Louis Comfort Tiffany and a fine example of the American Aesthetic Movement, the room’s intricate woodwork and mosaic surfaces create a warm, reverberant space uniquely suited to the immersive power of Brent Michael Davids’ compositions. But its placement within an armory built on Lenape homeland layers additional complexity. Rather than ignoring these contradictions, Lenapehoking deliberately engages with them, transforming this ornate Victorian interior into a site where Indigenous voices can resonate through the very architectural elements that have historically excluded them.
This event is part of Making Space at the Armory, our signature series of public programming that brings artists, scholars, and cultural workers together to probe the pressing questions of our time through embodied, interdisciplinary engagement. This year has been pursuing the question: “What time is it on the clock of the world?” For Indigenous creatives, that question is not metaphorical but material. Time is not linear, but layered. The past is not gone, but alive in the land, in the language, and in the music. As New York City reckons with its history, we hope this evening can model cultural stewardship through partnership with the Lenape Center. We are honored to hold space with them this evening.
— Tavia Nyong’o, Curator of Public Programming and Scholar-inResidence at Park Avenue Armory
MAKING SPACE AT THE ARMORY
LENAPEHOKING: AN EVENING WITH BRENT MICHAEL DAVIDS
friday, may 30, 2025 at 8pm veterans room program
The Last of James Fenimore Cooper for string quartet and narrator
Ode to Joe for SATB chorus and Native American flute world premiere
Touching Leaves Woman for voices and birdroars
Desert Invocation for quartz flute
This program runs approximately 1 hour and 15 minutes with no intermission.
SEASON SPONSORS
Presented in collaboration with The Lenape Center
Making Space at the Armory is made possible with support from the Rockefeller Brothers Fund (RBF).
Citi and Bloomberg Philanthropies are Park Avenue Armory’s 2025 Season Sponsors. Leadership support for the Armory’s artistic programming has been generously provided by the Anita K. Hersh Philanthropic Fund, Charina Endowment Fund, Donald A. Pels Charitable Trust, the Pinkerton Foundation, the Starr Foundation, and the Thompson Family Foundation.
Major support was also provided by the Emily Davie and Joseph S. Kornfeld Foundation, the Fan Fox and Leslie R. Samuels Foundation, The Harold and Mimi Steinberg Charitable Trust, the Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation, the Howard Gilman Foundation, the Marc Haas Foundation, The Shubert Foundation, the SHS Foundation, and Wescustogo Foundation. Additional support has been provided by the Armory’s Artistic Council. Public support is provided by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Kathy Hochul and the New York State Legislature as well as the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council under the leadership of Speaker Adrienne Adams.
Cover image: score by Brent Michael Davids, courtesy of the composer.
NOTES FROM THE COMPOSER
Thank you for attending this evening of chamber and choral music. The program has been crafted to honor the true Indigenous roots of this island, the ancestral home of the three federally recognized Lenape nations: the Delaware Tribe of Indians in Oklahoma; the Delaware Nation also in Oklahoma; and the Stockbridge Munsee Community in Wisconsin, of which I am an enrolled citizen. On the 400th anniversary of the “purchase” of Manahatta, I hope these pieces inspire you to investigate this myth and to connect with the longstanding cultural roots of this land.
THE LAST OF JAMES FENIMORE COOPER FOR STRING QUARTET AND NARRATOR
The Last of James Fenimore Cooper is a humorously narrated story with string quartet spoofing James Fenimore Cooper’s Last of the Mohicans book. Cooper’s story took place during the French and British war of 1757 (The Seven Years War). Two Mohicans, Uncas and his father Chingachgook, befriend Hawkeye and some English colonists including Cora and Alice Munro, the daughters of a British Colonel.
In the original story, an Iroquois guide named Magua (meaning “Bear” in Algonkian) kills the younger Mohican, leaving the old man to be the final member of the Mohican people. Being a legitimate writer, anyone might assume that Cooper would get the rightful facts—but he did not. With his mainstream acceptance and downright gullible popularity, Cooper’s dead Mohicans have overshadowed the real Mohicans—who remain quite alive!
For this musical spoof, in opposition to the mythology, Cooper’s original fairy tale is reworked to combine a much older cannibal giant story (in this case of a snow monster) to comic effect. The work was commissioned for the Miró Quartet by the Caramoor International Music Festival, and dedicated to the surviving Mohicans, the Stockbridge-Munsee Community, and to our perseverance, longevity, humor and unique way of life.
ODE TO JOE WORLD PREMIERE FOR SATB CHORUS AND NATIVE AMERICAN FLUTE
Ode to Joe is a new work for SATB chorus and Native American flute, commissioned by the West Virginia University at Parkersburg for the WVU-Parkersburg College Chorale. The work is dedicated to a lone Wappinger man named “Joe” Two Trees, to a young schoolboy (in 1924) named Ted Kazimiroff, and later to his son (and author) Ted Kazimiroff, Jr. along with the author’s book The Last Algonquin
The Last Algonquin is the story of “Joe” Two Trees of the Wappinger people, and Joe’s passing of his traditional knowledge to a young boy scout (later recalled by his son) in the still wild Pelham Bay Park, now the largest public park in New York City. Two Trees was part of the wampum-making tribe from Snakapins along the Bronx River. Two Trees was named by his mother Small Doe for a tiny island with two trees growing on it, now appropriately called Two Trees Island.
Including Joe’s own grandfather, the encroached-upon Wappingers dispersed from their traditional land, heading north to join the Stockbridge Mohicans living in upper New York state. Only a boy when they left, Joe had no idea where his people had gone. After searching but failing to find them, Two Trees spent his final days back in what is now the wilds of Pelham Bay Park, his birthplace.
Ode to Joe is designed as a calming journey of memory and admiration for the Wappinger people using an “ode” written as the lyrics for this musical work. Along with the sonorous wood flute, the music includes the celebratory “lulu” vocalizations of indigenous people, but in a more hushed and lyrical way rather than the characteristic high-pitched, punctuated call.
I dream wild to Snakapins1, pointed flint, Clean sand, cracked walnuts toast a fiery pit.
Chipped wampum shells flick basil mountain-mint, Piping rounds smoke banks where two trees sit.
Breaking seasons waving watery eyes, Musty Manetto Stones2 rush, clap and spit
Against dear bones only sand will surmise.
What would turtle shells say if cups could talk?
Hidden clay coil jars medicine supplies.
Unknown bygones mark a tomahawk dawk.
Combing softly for one Small Doe3 imprint, Elusively buried with her Niskwamak4 .
Time worn might discourage me but it didn’t. Round old Two Trees Island gives me a hint.
TOUCHING LEAVES WOMAN FOR VOICES AND BIRDROARS
A hand-notated manuscript, inked on vellum, this new musical work honors Nora Thompson Dean (1907-1984), a Lenape teacher and herbalist who dedicated her life to preserving Lenape culture. Nora was a beloved cultural treasure for the Lenape. Commissioned by Network for New Music, the musical notes are inked into the shape of various trees (picture notation) throughout the four seasons. The birdroars are devices created by the composer that chirp like birds when spinning through the air.
The sung and spoken lyric consists entirely of her name “Weènchipahkihëlèxkwe” in Unami. “Weènchipahkihëlèxkwe” is pronounced “WEN-jee-paH-kee-LEKH-kway” (CAPS indicate a stressed syllable, where “H” is a stressed breathy aspiration sound). Translated, her name was “Touching Leaves Woman,” or as Nora herself suggested, “Leaves-that-touch-each-other-from-time-totime.” The name was given to Nora by her mother Sarah Wilson Thompson, and Nora’s name remains a beautiful expression of her life.
DESERT INVOCATION FOR QUARTZ FLUTE
Desert Invocation for solo quartz crystal flute was written in 2001 for Arizona’s 20th Annual Governor’s Arts Awards, commissioned by the Arizona Commission on the Arts.
This work grew from my connection with Arizona State University, where I completed my postgraduate work in music theory and composition as well as the anthropological study of Native American ritual and performance. There I worked with the ASU chemistry lab to develop my signature quartz flutes. I premiered this piece that year at the Arizona Governor’s Arts Awards ceremony in Phoenix as that year’s top winner of the Arts Award.
Desert Invocation is scored in my characteristic “picture notation,” taking the form of a bending Saguaro cactus against the backdrop of Arizona’s red rock deserts, green cacti, and mountain ranges.
LENAPEHOKING: AN ANTHEM FOR LENAPE CENTER
MUSIC VIDEO, ON VIEW IN THE LIBRARY
Lenapehoking is a video affirmation of empowerment for all Lenape people returning to Lenapehoking (Lenape land). The Lenape people ARE Manahatta. We are the place and the place is us. Lenape stomp dances use turtle shell rattles on the dancer’s legs, and the stomping creates the rattle sound heard in the song. “Manahatta” (Manhattan) is the Munsee word for “the place where we get the wood to make the bows.”
Historically, the Lenape were driven away in a diaspora into Oklahoma, Wisconsin, and Canada. Many Indigenous languages were traditionally spoken in New York: Munsee, Unami, Lenape, Mahican, Wappinger, and others. Heard in present-day New York are countless other languages. Manhattan as indigenous land remains an open secret rendered invisible by society, and that awareness applies to the distant past, this immediate moment, and what lies ahead, all rolled into one understanding.
Home is home. There are many ways to hint at what that is, a residence, locale, habitat, maybe homeland. How ever we think of it, it’s a feeling of belonging, of a place we know, and where we are known. It’s a place of family. That’s the feeling for “Lenapehoking” and one I was hoping to convey in the new song, written as an anthem for Lenape Center. Lenapehoking is right where I am.
Performers on this video include: Curtis Zunigha, Brent Michael Davids (lead vocals); Cochise Anderson, Hadrien Coumans (vocals); Joe Myers (guitars); John-Carlos Perea (bass); Alex Alexander (drums); Brent Michael Davids (Native American flute); Delbert Anderson (flugelhorn); Mixashawn Rozie (tenor saxophone); Brent Michael Davids (bass trombone); Dawn Avery (cello); Ann Millikan (Hammond B3); Brent Michael Davids (hand drum and turtle rattles). Production by Doodlebug Music Studio, engineering by Brent Michael Davids, videography by Kendrick Whiteman, Jr., and animation by Xeneca LeClair. Inspired by Joe Baker, Hadrien Coumans, and Curtis Zunigha.
1Snakapins (snack-a-pins): Place of origin for Two Trees’ Turtle Clan
2Manetto Stones: A rock formation called “The Devil’s Stepping Stones”
3Small Doe: Two Trees’ mother
4Niskwamak (nis-kwam-ak): Two Trees, also “Joe” Two Trees
A NOTE FROM THE LENAPE CENTER: HONORING THE UNIQUE TALENT OF BRENT MICHAEL DAVIDS
Lenape Center is deeply honored to recognize Brent Michael Davids— an internationally celebrated composer, musician, educator, and cultural visionary—whose artistry and leadership have profoundly shaped the landscape of contemporary music and Indigenous cultural expression.
Brent Michael Davids (Mohican/Munsee-Lenape), a citizen of the Stockbridge-Munsee Community and Lenape Center’s Director of Language and Music in Manhattan, stands as one of the most influential Indigenous composers of our time. For nearly five decades, Davids has dedicated his career to centering Native voices in concert music, a field where Indigenous perspectives have long been underrepresented. Through his innovative compositions, he bridges ancestral traditions with forward-looking creativity, crafting music that resonates with both deep-rooted heritage and bold experimentation.
Davids’s musical language is distinguished by his masterful blending of Indigenous instruments—including his signature quartz crystal flutes—and his use of graphic notation, where the written score itself becomes a visual work of art. His works range from solo flute and choral pieces to orchestral scores and operas, and he is renowned for his ability to evoke landscape, story, and spirit through sound. Notably, his compositions often serve as acts of remembrance and resilience, honoring figures such as Lenape teacher Nora Thompson Dean while also envisioning Lenape futures through the power of music and narrative.
Internationally, Davids’s music has been performed at some of the world’s most prestigious venues, including Carnegie Hall, Disney Concert Hall, Lincoln Center, Tanglewood, and the Kennedy Center. His works have premiered across the globe, from Austria and Japan to Russia and South Korea, reflecting the universal resonance of his artistic vision. He has received numerous awards and honors, including the National Endowment for the Arts’ recognition as one of America’s most celebrated choral composers, and the Indian Summer Music Festival’s Lifetime Achievement Award.
Beyond his own compositions, Davids is a tireless advocate for Indigenous music education. He founded the Native American Composer Apprentice Project (NACAP) and the Composer Apprentice National Outreach Endeavor (CANOE), empowering hundreds of Indigenous youth to compose and perform their own music. Through these initiatives, he has fostered new generations of Native composers, ensuring that Indigenous musical traditions continue to thrive and evolve.
As a performer, educator, and consultant, Davids is in high demand, sharing his expertise with film, television, schools, festivals, and workshops. His recent major work, “Requiem for America: Singing for the Invisible People,” confronts the history of genocide against
Indigenous peoples in the United States, giving voice to stories too often left unheard.
Brent Michael Davids’s artistry is a living testament to the enduring presence, creativity, and resilience of the Lenape and other Indigenous nations. His music does not simply echo the past—it brings Lenape presence into the heart of contemporary culture, inviting audiences to listen, reflect, and imagine new possibilities for justice, healing, and belonging.
As we gather to celebrate his work, the Lenape Center expresses our deepest gratitude for Brent Michael Davids’s unwavering commitment to Indigenous cultural sovereignty, his visionary contributions to the world of music, and his role as a bridge between generations, traditions, and communities. We are honored to walk alongside him in Lenapehoking, our homeland, and to share his extraordinary gifts with the world.
— Joe Baker, Co-Founder and Executive Director of the Lenape Center, and Hadrien Coumans, Co-Founder and Deputy Director of the Lenape Center
ABOUT THE LENAPE CENTER
LENAPEHOKING, HOMELAND OF THE LENAPE
Lenape Center is a nonprofit organization fiscally sponsored by the New York Foundation for the Arts. Our work is the creation, production and development of exhibitions, public art, symposia, performances, music, theater, courses, lectures and publications. Our seed rematriation project will enter its sixth season.
DIASPORA
Lenape Center proudly acknowledges the Lenape today are members/ citizens of these three US Federally recognized nations: Delaware Tribe of Indians in Oklahoma, Delaware Nation in Oklahoma, and the Stockbridge-Munsee Community in Wisconsin.
ABOUT THE ARTISTS
BRENT MICHAEL DAVIDS
Brent Michael Davids (Mohican/Munsee-Lenape) is a professional composer, and a music warrior for native equity and parity, especially in concert music where there is little indigenous influence. Davids places Native voices front and center. He originated and co-founded the award-winning Native American Composer Apprentice Project (NACAP), championing indigenous youth to compose their own written music. He uses indigenous instruments, including handmade quartz flutes, and pens performable notations that are themselves visual works of art. Davids is co-director of the Lenape Center in Manhattan, and is enrolled in the Stockbridge Munsee Community. His composer career spans nearly five decades, with countless awards and commissions from America’s most celebrated organizations and ensembles.
International ensembles have premiered his works globally in Austria, Bermuda, Canada, England, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Portugal, Russia, Scotland, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, and throughout the United States, including Carnegie Hall, Disney Concert Hall, Tanglewood Music Center’s Koussevitzky Shed and Ozawa Hall, Rothko Chapel, The Joyce Theater, Lincoln Center, Lincoln Center Out-Of-Doors, and The Kennedy Center. Davids is in high demand as an Educator and Consultant for Films, Television, Schools, Festivals, Seminars and Workshops. In 2006, the National Endowment for the Arts named Davids among the nation’s most celebrated choral composers in its project “American Masterpieces: Three Centuries of Artistic Genius.” And In 2015, the prestigious Indian Summer Music Festival awarded Davids its “Lifetime Achievement Award.”
Davids’ most recent project is “Requiem for America: Singing for the Invisible People.” This major work tackles the genocidal founding of America, giving voice to America’s Indigenous People. “Requiem” exposes a specific genocide in each state, juxtaposing genocidal texts from America’s founding against historical letters from American Indians themselves. In addition to the Western singers and orchestra, each performance will feature Indigenous singers recruited from local tribal communities. Once completed, it is hoped that “Requiem” will tour every state in the country.
KATARINA STRING QUARTET
The Katarina String Quartet is the current Graduate Resident String Quartet at The Juilliard School, and regularly performs in New York as recipients of Juilliard’s Gluck Fellowship. The tightlyknit ensemble has worked closely with André Roy, as well as with the Juilliard, Alban Berg, Dover, and Pacifica quartets, and are recent ProQuartet and Drimnin String Quartet Academy prize winners at the 2025 Wigmore Hall String Quartet Competition. Previously, they were Gold Medal and BIPOC prizewinners of the 2024 St. Paul Chamber Music Competition. Scholars believe the eponymous Katarina Guarneri worked on Giuseppe Guarneri del Gesu’s violins; inspired by Katarina, the KSQ celebrates the people behind the canonized figureheads of classical music who contribute to the art we enjoy.
COURTNEY CAREY
Baritone Courtney Carey’s performance highlights include: Morales in Bizet’s Carmen (Komische Kammer Oper München); Lantello in the world premiere of Noam Sivan’s Fruits of Folia; principal roles in opera classics including Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro and Così fan tutte, Floyd’s Susannah, Gounod’s Romeo et Juliette, and Rossini’s L’elisir d’amore; appearances at the Cleveland Art Song Festival; and concert performances of Brahms’ German Requiem, Bach’s Cantata 147, Vaughan Williams’ Mass in G, and Ricky Ian Gordon’s Intimate Apparel. He has worked with prominent conductors including Joseph Colaneri, David Effron, David Gilbert, Joshua Green, Matthias Kuntzch, Jay Meetze, and Ted Taylor, among others. Carey has worked as a teaching artist, conductor, and music educator across a variety of institutions in New York. He founded Courtney Stars of Tomorrow and the CSOT Concert Chorale in 2014, which present and promote high caliber and early career classical music artists. BA Music, Morehouse College; MM Choral Conducting, Eastman; Diploma in Voice, Mannes.
JEANETTE BLAKENEY
From Bizet to Broadway, Jeanette Blakeney is hailed as a true mezzo soprano and a gifted singing actress with extraordinary depth, range, color, beauty, and grace. Blakeney has garnered worldwide applause and has been widely praised by numerous critics for her electrifying performances on stage, while wowing audiences with her sassy and unapologetic style. She has joined the talented ranks of some of the most prestigious opera houses, theaters, and concert halls across the globe. Blakeney’s repertoire displays her artistic versatility in a variety of dramatic, comedic, and sultry, operatic and musical theater roles. Equally at home on the concert and recital stage, Blakeney has brought regal bearing and impassioned interpretation to oratorios, choral pieces, anthems, sacred songs, and spirituals.
HAI TING CHINN
Mezzo-soprano Hai-Ting Chinn’s eclectic career spans music from medieval to new, and theatrical styles from performance-practice to wildly experimental. She was featured in The Wooster Group’s La Didone, Philip Glass/Robert Wilson’s Einstein on the Beach, and several monodramas written for her, along with standard operatic, oratorio, and concert repertoire. Hai-Ting is the creator of Science Fair: An Opera With Experiments; Astronautica: Voices of Women in Space, based on the words of women astronauts (with Trio Triumphatrix); and Meltdown, in which a glaciologist loses her cool; a collaboration with glaciologist Åsa Rennermalm.
PERRI DICHRISTINA
Praised for her “rich, surprisingly dark” sound (Parterre Box) and “precise coloratura” (Cleveland Classical), mezzo-soprano Perri DiChristina is a versatile artist based in New Jersey. This season, DiChristina looks forward to joining Teatro Nuovo as a Resident Artist, performing the alto solo in Mozart’s Requiem with the Fort Greene Orchestra, and performing with The Fourth Wall Ensemble at Carnegie Hall. DiChristina is the co-founder of Thrilled to Announce, an esoteric opera podcast, meme factory, and collective. She is also a writer, and has published articles on topics ranging from operatic boredom to performer envy in VAN Music Magazine.
PAUL GREENE-DENNIS
Paul Greene-Dennis hails from Brentwood, New York. He is a versatile musician, mainly an opera singer, who also lends his bass to other styles and genres of music, including jazz. He has performed opera and oratorio with various organizations in the New York area including the Oratorio Society of New York, the Long Island Choral Society, and the Queens College Opera Studio. Greene-Dennis also does voice-overs for various projects to which he has lent his voice and artistry.
KALEB ALEXANDER HOPKINS
New York native Kaleb Alexander Hopkins is a singer of various backgrounds (Opera, Jazz, NeoSoul, Gospel). Born with a speech impediment, music was the vehicle that gifted him the power of speech. Hopkins sings, arranges, teaches, and produces for artists across genres under the name Klassiq K-Man. Performance credits include: Wynton Marsalis’s All Rise (Jazz at Lincoln Center, Chatauqua Instiitution); Marsalis’s The Abyssinian Mass (JALC); pit orchestra, Alvin Ailey’s Revelations; and tourings with the Collegiate Chorale and Chorale le Chateau. His artist development company—The Klassic Brand, LLC—supports artists in finding their artistic identities. Education: Frank Sinatra School of the Arts; Aaron Copland School of Music, Queens College; Jazz, LIU Brooklyn.
ISABEL CRESPO PARDO
isabel crespo pardo is a latinx vocalist, improviser-composer, and interdisciplinary artist. Their work actively entangles music, visual art, text, and performance, always evolving to reflect the intra/interpersonal spaces they inhabit. Their compositions often reimagine Latin American folksong through improvisational practice. This can be heard in their poemsong trio, sinonó and their recent electroacoustic work under the moniker iiisa. They maintain myriad collaborations and have had the pleasure of performing works by Matthew Barney, Brent Michael Davids, Sandra Mujinga, and Raven Chacón. crespo’s work has been presented by Roulette Intermedium, Big Ears Festival, and MATA Festival.
DEVONY SMITH
Mezzo-soprano Devony Smith is a dynamic artist equally at home in opera, concert music, and contemporary repertoire. Across the US and Europe, she has performed roles such as Cherubino, Hansel, Cenerentola, Rosina, and Dido. A champion of new music, she has premiered works by Grammy-winning composer Jennifer Higdon, Eve Beglarian, and Luna Pearl Woolf. Smith’s debut solo album, featuring studio premieres and commissions from celebrated composers, will be released in the summer of 2025. She has been a recitalist with Caramoor Center for Music and Arts, Carnegie Hall Citywide, Ravinia Steans Music Institute, and SongFest, where she received a Sorel Fellowship.
LONNIE REED
Lonnie Reed, a Beaumont, Texas native based in Brooklyn, New York, is a vocalist and educator passionate about the intersection of music, community, and education. Since 2021, he has taught in Bedford-Stuyvesant, blending service with teaching music and math. A choral enthusiast, Reed performs across New York City and has sung with EXIGENCE and The Concert Chorale of Harlem. Recent highlights include a collaboration with the Philharmonic Orchestra of Jamaica. He envisions founding a school of the arts focused on ensemble music, serving Black and Latinx communities. Through both teaching and performance, Reed builds bridges with his voice and vision.
CHRISTOPHER TEFFT
As a singer, bass baritone Christopher Tefft has toured to Egypt, Saudi Arabia, China, Mexico, and all across the US and Europe. Tefft frequently sings as a soloist and section leader with Canterbury Choral Society. He recently appeared with the Bard Festival Chorale at Carnegie Hall. As a member of the New York Philharmonic Chorus, he has performed at Lincoln Center, on PBS, and on tour. Other performances include with the Metropolitan Opera, Bard Music Festival, National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene, Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival, Berkshire Bach Society, and Ember. Tefft studied the arts at Millikin University in Illinois and Interlochen Arts Academy in Michigan.
TROY D. WALLACE
Bass baritone Troy D. Wallace has lent his voice to numerous churches and choruses throughout the Tri-State area and theaters throughout the country. Notable Choral Credits: Baritone Soloist, Fauré Requiem (Qara Vocal Ensemble); Bass Soloist, Handel’s Messiah (Brooklyn Contemp. Chorus); Bass 2 (Mineola Choral Society). Selected Theatre Credits: Smudge in Forever Plaid (Greenbrier Valley Theatre); Julius X in Julius X: A re-imagining of Julius Caesar by William Shakespeare (Folger Theatre); Husky Miller in Carmen Jones (Ensemble Theatre of Santa Barbara). He is a proud member of Actors Equity Association. He thanks his family, friends, and fiancé Ashley for their constant support.
EDWARD WASHINGTON II
Edward Washington II is an acclaimed American lyric tenor renowned for his crisp coloratura and compelling tone. He has performed with major companies such as The Metropolitan Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago, and New York City Opera, as well as concert stages including Carnegie Hall. His repertoire ranges from Gilbert and Sullivan to classic operas like Puccini’s La Bohème and Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte and new works by American composers. A dedicated concert soloist, Washington has appeared with symphonies nationwide and is a Grammy-winning artist. He studied at Stetson University and Morgan State University and is a proud member of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia.
SHANELLE VALERIE WOODS
Shanelle Valerie Woods recently debuted with Seattle Opera and the Charleston Symphony Orchestra, with additional appearances at BARE Opera and National Sawdust. She has performed leading roles such as Carmen (Carmen), Tituba (The Crucible), Jenny (Threepenny Opera), and Alma Stinney in the southeastern premiere of Stinney: An American Execution. Other credits include Annie in Spoleto Festival USA’s Porgy and Bess and the world premiere of Stomping Grounds at The Glimmerglass Festival. A former voice instructor at Charleston Southern, Claflin, and New York Universities, Woods now serves as Director of Education and Vocal Studies for the Young People’s Chorus of New York City.
PRODUCTION ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Music and lyrics (c) Brent Michael Davids
Translations by Jim Rementer
Sidney Rubinowicz Stage Manager
Courtney’s Stars of Tomorrow, CSOT Concert Chorale
Ethan Philbrick
Gelsey Bell
Special thanks to Hadrien Coumans of the Lenape Center
ABOUT PUBLIC PROGRAMMING AT THE ARMORY
Park Avenue Armory’s Public Programming series brings diverse artists and cultural thought-leaders together for discussion and performance around the important issues of our time viewed through an artistic lens. Launched in 2017, the series encompasses a variety of programs including large-scale community events; multi-day symposia; intimate salons featuring performances, panels, and discussions; Artist Talks in relation to the Armory’s Drill Hall programming; and other creative interventions, curated by professor and scholar Tavia Nyong’o.
Highlights from the Public Programming series include: Carrie Mae Weems’ 2017 event The Shape of Things and 2021 convening and concert series Land of Broken Dreams, whose participants included Elizabeth Alexander, Theaster Gates, Elizabeth Diller, Nona Hendryx, Somi, and Spike Lee, among others; a daylong Lenape Pow Wow and Standing Ground Symposium held in the Wade Thompson Drill Hall, the first congregation of Lenape Elders on Manhattan Island since the 1700s; “A New Vision for Justice in America” conversation series in collaboration with Common Justice, exploring new coalitions, insights, and ways of understanding question of justice and injustice in relation moderated by FLEXN Evolution creators Reggie (Regg Roc) Gray and director Peter Sellars; Culture in a Changing America Symposia exploring the role of art, creativity, and imagination in the social and political issues in American society today; the 2019 Black Artists Retreat hosted by Theaster Gates, which included public talks and performances, private sessions for the 300 attending artists, and a roller skating rink; 100 Years | 100 Women, a multiorganization commissioning project that invited 100 women artists and cultural creators to respond to women’s suffrage; a Queer Hip Hop Cypher, delving into the queer origins and aesthetics of hip hop with Astraea award-winning duo Krudxs Cubensi and author and scholar Dr. Shante Paradigm Smalls; the Archer Aymes Retrospective, exploring the legacy of emancipation through an immersive art installation curated by Carl Hancock Rux and featuring a concert performance by mezzo soprano Alicia Hall Moran and pianist Aaron Diehl, presented as one component of a three-part series commemorating Juneteenth in collaboration with Harlem Stage and Lincoln Center as part of the Festival of New York; legendary artist Nao Bustamante’s BLOOM, a crossdisciplinary investigation centered around the design of the vaginal speculum and its use in the exploitative and patriarchal history of the pelvic examination; Art at Water’s Edge, a symposium inspired by the work of director and scholar May Joseph on artistic invention in the face of climate change, including participants such as Whitney Biennale curator Adrienne Edwards, artist Kiyan Williams, Little Island landscape architect Signe Nielsen, eco-systems artist Michael Wang, and others; Symposium: Sound & Color – The Future of Race in Design, an interdisciplinary forum exploring how race matters in creative design for live performance hosted by lighting designer Jane Cox, playwright Branden Jacobs-Jenkins, set designer Mimi Lien, and sound designer and composer Mikaal Sulaiman and featuring collaborations with Design Action and Oregon Shakespeare Festival; Juke Joint, a two-day event spotlighting the history of the juke joint in Black American social history and its legacy in music and culture, including performances by Pamela
Sneed and Stew; Hapo Na Zamani, a 1960s-style happening curated by Carl Hancock Rux with music direction by Vernon Reid, and presented in collaboration with Harlem Stage; Hidden Conversations, a celebration of Dr. Barbara Ann Teer with National Black Theatre; and Corpus Delicti, a convening of artists, activists, and intellectuals imagines and enacts transgender art and music as a vehicle for dialogue across differences presented in collaboration with the NYC Trans Oral History Project
Notable Public Programming salons include: the Literature Salon hosted by Branden Jacobs-Jenkins, whose participants included Lynn Nottage, Suzan Lori-Parks, and Jeremy O. Harris; a Spoken Word Salon co-hosted with the Nuyorican Poets Cafe; a Film Salon featuring the works of immersive artist and film director Lynette Wallworth; “Museum as Sanctuary” led by installation artist and Artist-in-Residence Tania Bruguera, curated by Sonia Guiñansaca and CultureStrike, and featuring undocu-artists Julio Salgado and Emulsify; a Dance Salon presented in partnership with Dance Theater of Harlem, including New York City Ballet’s Wendy Whelan and choreographer Francesca Harper, among others; Captcha: Dancing, Data, Liberation, a salon exploring Black visual complexity and spirit, led by visionary artist Rashaad Newsome and featuring Saidiya V. Hartman, Kiyan Williams, Dazié Rustin Grego-Sykes, Ms.Boogie, Puma Camillê, and others; and Seasons of Dance, a contemporary dance salon featuring conversations with “mother of contemporary African dance” Germaine Acogny, Tanztheater Wuppertal dancer Malou Airaudo, and dancers from The Rite of Spring / common ground[s] at the Armory.
Artist Talks have featured esteemed artists, scholars, and thought leaders, such as: actor Bobby Cannavale; architects Jacques Herzog, Pierre de Meuron, and Elizabeth Diller; artist and composer Heiner Goebbels; choreographers Reggie (Regg Roc) Gray, Bill T. Jones, and Anne Teresa de Keersmaeker; composers Philip Miller, Thuthuka Sibisi, Tyshawn Sorey, Samy Moussa, and Alexandra Gardner; composer and director Michel van der Aa; composer, vocalist, and scholar Gelsey Bell; conductors Amandine Beyer and Matthias Pintscher; designer Peter Nigrini; directors Claus Guth, Robert Icke, Richard Jones, Sam Mendez, Satoshi Miyagi, Ariane Mnouchkine, Ben Powers, Peter Sellars, Simon Stone, Ian Strasfogel, Ivo van Hove, and Alexander Zeldin; Juilliard president Damian Woetzel and Juilliard Provost and Dean Ara Guzelimian; musicians Helmut Deutsch, Nona Hendryx, Miah Persson, and Davóne Tines; New Yorker editor David Remnick; James Nicola, Artistic Director of New York Theater Workshop; performance artists Marina Abramović and Helga Davis; RoseLee Goldberg, Founding Director and Chief Curator of Performa; playwrights Branden Jacobs-Jenkins, Tony Kushner, Lynn Nottage, and Anne Washburn; Dr. Augustus Casely Hayford, Director of the Smithsonian, National Museum of African Art; visual artists Nick Cave, William Kentridge, Julie Mehretu, Julian Rosefeldt, Hito Steyerl, and Ai Wei Wei; and writers and scholars Anne Bogart, Robert M. Dowling, Emily Greenwood, and Carol Martin
ABOUT PARK AVENUE ARMORY
Part palace, part industrial shed, Park Avenue Armory supports unconventional works in the performing and visual arts that cannot be fully realized in a traditional proscenium theater, concert hall, or white wall gallery. With its soaring 55,000-square-foot Wade Thompson Drill Hall—reminiscent of 19th-century European train stations—and an array of exuberant period rooms, the Armory provides a platform for artists to push the boundaries of their practice, collaborate across disciplines, and create new work in dialogue with the historic building. Across its grand and intimate spaces, the Armory enables a diverse range of artists to create, students to explore, and audiences to experience epic, adventurous, relevant work that cannot be done elsewhere in New York.
The Armory both commissions and presents performances and installations in the grand Drill Hall and offers more intimate programming through its acclaimed Recital Series, which showcases musical talent from across the globe within the salon setting of the Board of Officers Room; its Artists Studio series curated by Jason Moran in the restored Veterans Room; Making Space at the Armory, a public programming series that brings together a discipline-spanning group of artists and cultural thought-leaders around
BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Chairman Emeritus
Elihu Rose, PhD
Co-Chairs
J.T. Riegel
the important issues of our time; and the Malkin Lecture Series that features presentations by scholars and writers on topics related to Park Avenue Armory and its history. In addition, the Armory also has a year-round Artists-in-Residence program, providing space and support for artists to create new work and expand their practices.
The Armory’s creativity-based arts education programs provide access to the arts to thousands of students from underserved New York City public schools, engaging them with the institutions artistic programming and outside-the-box creative processes. Through its education initiatives, the Armory provides access to all Drill Hall performances, workshops taught by Master Teaching Artists, and in-depth residencies that support the schools’ curriculum. Youth Corps, the Armory’s year-round paid internship program, begins in high school and continues into the critical post-high school years, providing interns with mentored employment, job training, and skill development, as well as a network of peers and mentors to support their individual college and career goals.
The Armory is undergoing a multi-phase renovation and restoration of its historic building led by architects Herzog & de Meuron, with Platt Byard Dovell White as Executive Architects.
Edward G. Klein, Brigadier General NYNG (Ret.)
Avant-Garde Chair Adrienne Katz
Directors Emeriti
Harrison M. Bains
Angela E. Thompson*
Dabie
Wade F.B. Thompson* Founding Chairman, 2000-2009
Pierre Audi*
Anita K. Hersh Artistic Director
*In memoriam
