Composers Toshi Reagon & Daniel Bernard Roumain to Headline 'BLACK CREATIVITY' at The Greene Space

On Thursday, September 28 at 7pm, The Jerome L. Greene Performance Space at WNYC - in partnership with Apollo Theater - presents "Black Creativity," a special evening of conversation and performance with composers Toshi Reagon and Daniel Bernard Roumain.

Reagon and Roumain will join WQXR host and vocalist Helga Davis and Apollo Theater executive producer Kamilah Forbes for a discussion on the contributions of black artists to contemporary opera and the narratives they are driving in American culture.

The evening includes performances from new works, including Reagon's Octavia E. Butler's Parable of the Sower, an operatic adaption of the science fiction novel, and Roumain's We Shall Not Be Moved, an interdisciplinary opera co-commissioned and co-produced by Harlem's Apollo Theater, Opera Philadelphia and London's Hackney Empire, which will have its New York premiere on Friday, October 6 at The Apollo.

IF YOU GO:

Black Creativity: Toshi Reagon and Daniel Bernard Roumain

Thursday, September 28, 2017, at 7pm

At The Greene Space, 44 Charlton Street, New York, NY (corner of Varick Street)

Tickets are $20 per event, available at thegreenespace.org/events

The Greene Space is the street-level broadcast studio and performance venue of WNYC and WQXR that produces special live editions of WNYC programs and WQXR concerts and festivals, as well as original programming, including theater events, arts and culture conversation series, political debates and audio theater. It serves as a place for experimentation, cultural discovery and dialogue. For more information, visit www.thegreenespace.org.

The legendary Apollo Theater-the soul of American culture-plays a vital role in cultivating emerging talents and launching legends. Since its founding, the Apollo has served as a center of innovation and a creative catalyst for Harlem, the city of New York, and the world.

With music at its core, the Apollo's programming extends to dance, theater, performance art, spoken word initiatives, and more. This includes the October 2014 premiere and 2015 international tour of the dance celebration project James Brown: Get on the Good Foot, the annual Africa Now! Festival, and the recent New York premiere of the opera Charlie Parker's YARDBIRD. The Apollo is a presenting organization that also produces festivals, large-scale dance and music works organized around a set of core initiatives: Apollo Music Signature Programs-Amateur Night, Salon Series, Apollo Music Café; Legacy Series- work that celebrates and extends the Apollo's legacy through a contemporary lens; Global Festivals including the Women of the World (WOW) Festival and Breakin' Convention, international and U.S.-based artist presentations focused on a specific theme; and Special Projects, multidisciplinary work with partner organizations.

Since introducing the first Amateur Night contests in 1934, the Apollo Theater has served as a testing ground for new artists working across a variety of art forms, and has ushered in the emergence of many new musical genres-including jazz, swing, bebop, R&B, gospel, blues, soul, and hip hop. Among the countless legendary performers who launched their careers at the Apollo are D'Angelo, Lauryn Hill, Machine Gun Kelly, Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughan, Billie Holiday, James Brown, Michael Jackson, Gladys Knight, Luther Vandross, and Stevie Wonder; and the Apollo's forward-looking artistic vision continues to build on this legacy. For more information, visit apollotheater.org.