Black History Month 2022 | Black Composers | Artist Biographies

February 2022

Celebrates Black Composers featuring

BLACK HISTORY MONTH

The Harlem Chamber Players & hosted by

Terrance McKnight Sponsored by ConEdison & the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs

WHO PERFORMED THE MUSIC? MEET THE MUSICIANS Ashley Horne, Violin

Claire Chan, Violin

Ashley Horne—violinist, Los Angeles native, and Juilliard School graduate—has performed professionally around the world and is known for his “bright tone and fine overall sense of style” (Dennis Rooney of Strad Magazine.)

He is principal violinist and soloist of The Harlem Chamber Players, founding member of the Harlem Chamber Players String Quartet, a member of the American Symphony, and recently appointed Music Director of the Antara Ensemble. He’s also known for championing works by Black composers, such as Noel DaCosta and Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson.

Claire Chan graduated Magna Cum Laude from Brown University with musical honors and a Bachelor of Science in Neuroscience. She continued her studies on the violin at The Juilliard School, where she completed both her master’s and doctoral degrees. She then taught at Juilliard as an assistant to both Professor Joseph Fuchs and the Juilliard String Quartet and later served on the faculty in Beijing at the Central Conservatory and the Capital Normal University. Currently, she teaches at Third Street Music School Settlement and at the Chamber Music Center of New York and performs at Phantom of the Opera on Broadway and with the Harlem Chamber Players Quartet.

Additional credits include being a featured soloist in Carnegie Hall’s Two Wings: The Music of Black America in Migration; appearing in Le Mozart Noir, the PBS documentary about the life of violinist and composer Chevalier de Saint-Georges; performing for Broadway shows including Carousel, Phantom of the Opera, and The Producers. His recordings of Perkinson’s Louisiana Blues Strut, Henry Cowell’s Fiddler’s Jig, and William Grant Still’s Mother and Child with the Manhattan Chamber Orchestra can be heard on WQXR.

As an avid chamber musician, she has collaborated with several award-winning groups such as the Essex Quartet, the Beijing Quartet and Chamber Players and the Kneisel Trio. She also performed as a member of New York City Opera and with such varied artists as Sam Smith, 50 Cent, Katy Perry, Hall and Oats, and Placido Domingo. She can be heard on labels of RCA Victor, Centaur, Convivium, Annsam, ESS.A.Y, and Death of Classical.

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WHO PERFORMED THE MUSIC? MEET THE MUSICIANS

William Frampton, Viola

Wayne Smith, Cello

William Frampton debuted in 2009 at Carnegie Hall and has since enjoyed a varied career of notable accomplishments, ncluding numerous performances with a string quartet led by Midori Goto and many appearances as principal viola with the American Symphony Orchestra; performances at festivals such as Bard Summerscape and IMS Prussia Cove; appearances as an orchestra player with the New York Philharmonic, the Metropolitan Opera, and the Philadelphia Orchestra; and orchestra credits for Broadway shows including Hamilton, Wicked, and The Lion King, and for films including The Greatest Showman and West Side Story.

He is co-founder and Artistic Director of Music at Bunker Hill, a chamber music series that brings five professional chamber music performances to Gloucester County, New Jersey every year.

The community built as a result of Music Bunker Hill has brought regular collaborations with schools, libraries, orchestras, and civic organizations, contributing to the cultural life of Southern New Jersey. Holding degrees from New England Conservatory and the Juilliard School, he currently teaches viola and chamber music at The College of New Jersey and Queens College, CUNY.

Cellist Wayne Smith gave his recital debut at the Kennedy Center in 1996 to critical acclaim. As soloist and chamber musician, he has performed throughout the United States, Italy, Germany, Romania, Hungary, Austria, Poland, and China. He is a member of the Wistaria String Quartet, the Portland Piano Trio, and 1200 Horsehairs, a contemporary cello quartet, and is a frequent performer at Bargemusic. He has also appeared with the New Jersey Chamber Music Society, the Manhattan Chamber Players and the National Chamber Orchestra.

Wayne enjoys an active teaching career, currently serving on the faculty of Amherst College. He completed his undergraduate studies at the Eastman School of Music and graduate studies at UMass Amherst. His principal teachers include Ardyth Alton, Steven Doane, and Astrid Schween.

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WHO PERFORMED THE MUSIC? MEET THE MUSICIANS

Anthony Morris, Double Bass

Mikael Darmanie, Piano

Anthony Morris was the principal auxiliary and toured internationally with The New York Philharmonic from 1999 to 2006 under the batons of Kurt Masur and Lorin Maazel. He plays with many orchestras in the tri-state area, which include the Harlem Chamber Players, Spectrum Symphony, and musical lectures with Musica de Camera to name a few. In addition, he’s played on shows such as Beauty and the Beast and Phantom of the Opera and has been subbing with the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra since 2008.

Since his debut as a conductor with the Carolina Chamber Symphony in 2008, Mikael Darmanie has performed throughout the U.S., conducting various piano concerti from the keyboard and symphonic works. As a soloist he’s performed throughout the Americas, Europe, and the Caribbean; he’s participated and won prizes in a number of regional and international competitions. As a composer, his works have been performed throughout the U.S. and he is a New York Foundation for the Arts Fellow.

Festival appearances have included High Peaks Festival, Pianofest in the Hamptons, Mozarteum, Mainly Mozart, and L’Acadèmie de Musique de Sion.

He is also the Professor of Classical Double Bass Performance at Brooklyn College, a teaching artist at Cicely Tyson School of Performing and Fine Arts in NJ, and the Head Teaching Artist at InterSchool Orchestras of New York. He holds a BMA from Manhattan School of Music and an MMA from the Juilliard School of Music.

He is currently P.H.D. student at SUNY Stony Brook under the guidance of Gilbert Kalish and teaches undergraduate piano and music history and theory.

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WHO PERFORMED THE MUSIC? MEET THE MUSICIANS

Lillian Copeland, Oboe

Christopher Bush, Clarinet

Lilian Copeland is a New York-based freelancer who plays with the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, American Ballet Theatre, and New Jersey Symphony Orchestra, among others.

She holds the positions of The Cynthia & Robert Hillas Principal Oboe Chair with the Princeton Symphony Orchestra and principal oboe with the Des Moines Metro Opera and the Northeastern Philharmonic Orchestra; she’s also recently served as guest principal with the Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music in Santa Cruz, CA.

Christopher Bush holds many notable positions, among them principal clarinet with the Brooklyn Chamber Orchestra, founding member of the contemporary ensemble Callithumpian Consort, and co-founder of Summerland Music Society, a chamber music series in upstate New York. He has been on the faculty at quite a few institutions, including the Boston Community Music Center, the Lincoln Public Schools,and New York University, where he currently teaches clarinet and chamber music and directs the NYU Composers Ensemble.

Lillian also maintains a private teaching studio and is on faculty at Mannes Prep and the Manhattan School of Music Pre-College Division.

As a soloist, he’s played with Metro Chamber Orchestra, New England Conservatory Symphony, Society of Musical Arts Orchestra, the New York University Symphony Orchestra, among many others. He’s also worked with such groups as the Boston Philharmonic, the New England Philharmonic, Quintet of the Americas, and the North Country Chamber Players; such composers as Walter Zimmermann, John Heiss, Tamar Diesendruck, and Malcolm Peyton; and such venues and events as London New Winds Festival, the Boston New Arts Initiative, the Asian Composers League (in Seoul), Harvard Group For New Music, and Carnegie Hall. His performances have been broadcast on both radio and television.

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WHO PERFORMED THE MUSIC? MEET THE MUSICIANS

Eric Davis, Double Bass

Amy Fraser, Bassoon

Grammy nominated hornist Eric Davis leads a diverse musical life. He is in demand as a soloist, chamber, orchestral and commercial musician. Eric has performed with orchestras including American Symphony Orchestra, the Philharmonic Orchestra of Queretaro (where he was Principal Horn), the New Jersey Symphony, the Princeton Symphony, and the Vermont Symphony.

The latter three he still plays. He’s also worked with artists including The Roots on the Tonight Show, Idina Menzel, Frank Sinatra Jr., and David Byrne. In a performance reviewed by the New York Times, they said “Mr. Davis plays with admirable poetry.”

As leader of small ensembles, Amy Fraser has enriched the lives of public school children through Music Outreach Educative Workshops, a program comprising the art of storytelling, lecture, and musical demonstration. A graduate of the Manhattan School of Music, a former teaching artist with the Bronx Arts Ensemble Arts in Education program, and a founding member of the West Harlem Winds (an ensemble that paved the way for the Harlem Chamber Players), she has many accomplishments to her name.

He has a Bachelor’s degree in Music from the Hartt School of Music, University of Hartford, a Masters of Music from Manhattan School of Music, and a Doctorate in Musical Arts from the esteemed Rutgers University. He’s now on faculty at Hofstra University in Hempstead, NY. He currently performs with the Bronx Arts Ensemble and the Sylvan Winds and on Broadway in the orchestra pits of shows including Les Miserables, Fiddler on the Roof, and Lion King.

Some of her orchestral credits include performances with The New Philharmonic of New Jersey, Soulful Symphony, Ensemble du Monde, Albany Symphony, New York Virtuosi, and Black Pearl Chamber Orchestra. She also travels to the Washington, DC area to perform with Janel Leppin’s avant garde ensemble, Volcanic Ash.

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LEARN EVEN MORE: ADDITIONAL READING AND RESOURCES

Gateways Music Festival Orchestra

Articles to Read: Black Musicians Who’ve Shaped Classical Music (Classical FM) Classical Music & the Color Line (Boston Review) 10 Black Women Composers to Discover (Bitch Media) Piano Music by Black Women Composers (University of Colorado Boulder) When Marian Anderson Defied the Nazis (The New Yorker) Queer Black Composer Julius Eastman (NPR) Singing Against the Grain: Playing Beethoven in the Black Lives Matter Era (The Point Magazine)

Organizations To Explore: Chineke! Orchestra & Tyler, the Creator for Virgil Abloh’s Louis Vuitton Show The Sphinx Organization The Dream Unfinished Castle of Our Skins The Gateways Music Festival

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Thank you!

Dorothy Maynor, Soprano and Founder, Harlem School of the Arts

The Black History Month Celebration Concert is made possible, in part,

by Con Edison and The New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council.

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