Attend virtually any orchestral concert in the country, and you’re likely to see a similar picture onstage: a sea of white performers, with very little racial diversity. The perception that classical music is predominantly a Caucasian pursuit has endured for several centuries, but that idea doesn’t reflect the current reality, as demonstrated by the Gateways Music Festival.
Michael Morgan
Posted inMusic
Opening the gates
Classical music boasts some stellar African-American names: composers Scott Joplin, William Grant Still, and George Walker; singers Leontyne Price, Shirley Verrett, and William Warfield; and pianist André Watts, not to mention the many black musicians in our symphony orchestras. For 22 years, Gateways Music Festival’s aim has always been the same: to “increase the visibility […]
