Marian Anderson and the Desegregation of the American Concert Stage

Date: 

Wednesday, September 28, 2016, 4:00pm to 5:30pm

Location: 

Knafel Center, 10 Garden Street, Cambridge, MA (Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study)

Please register online and join us by visiting www.radcliffe.harvard.edu/event/2016-carol-j-oja-fellow-presentation.

Hailed as one of the greatest singers of the 20th century, Marian Anderson used her talent and celebrity to advance civil rights. Her 1939 concert at the Lincoln Memorial defied a ban excluding African American performers from Constitution Hall in Washington, DC, and her 1955 debut at the Metropolitan Opera ended the Met’s exclusion of African American singers in starring roles. This lecture—which includes audio and video of Anderson in performance—repositions those landmarks as part of the little-discussed history of institutional segregation in the classical music business.

Lecture by Carol J. Oja, 2016–2017 Frieda L. Miller Fellow at the Radcliffe Institute and the William Powell Mason Professor of Music at Harvard University.

The event is free and open to the public. We encourage you to share this invitation with people you know who may be interested in attending this event.

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The Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University is dedicated to creating and sharing transformative ideas across the arts, humanities, sciences, and social sciences. Learn more about the people and programs of the Radcliffe Institute at www.radcliffe.harvard.edu.