Langston Hughes News

The United States Artists (USA) announced today that dancer/ choreographer Dianne McIntyre is one of fifty recipients of their 2020 USA Fellow award. Each of the fifty recipients will receive a $50,000 cash award of unrestricted funds.

'... About 26 years ago, I was in New York playing a gig at Nel's on 14thStreet. Late night, the 5 Train would stop running and you would have to catch a shuttle from 180thStreet, which ran really infrequently, so I decided to catch the 4 Train uptown to Gun Hill Road and walked down to the corner of Bainbridge and Gun Hill to catch the BX 28 (which used to be the BX 15). So here it was, about 3:00 in the morning and I'm standing across the street from Montefiore Hospital, watching a Black squirrel dart in and out of the sparse shrubs next to the building, when suddenly, an old man popped out from behind the parking garage, just behind the bus shelter where I was standing. The man was about 5'5', wearing slacks, a collared shirt, fall coat and a Totes hat. In his left hand, he carried two shopping bags stuffed with collard greens. There was something in the way he walked... a rather slew-footed stride, that told me he was from the islands.'

'What happens to a dream deferred? Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun?'

What would you do if you could peek in on the memories of your ancestors? That's the question posed in the World Premiere play by Darren Canady, a?oeReparationsa??, currently offered from Sound Theatre Company. In a play filled with thought provoking ideas and stirring performances, they metaphorically examine the history in our blood.

AURAL COMPASS PROJECTS - On Friday, February 7th, 2020 at 7:30pm, Aural Compass Projects presents Lift Every Voice, a celebration of African-American composers of the last century. Featured cycles on the program are John Carter's Cantata, a five-part work of sophisticated arrangements of spirituals; Jacqueline Hairston's On Consciousness Streams, a song cycle with text by Ms. Hairston, a translation of text by Ludwig van Beethoven, and an excerpt from Dr. Howard Thurman's Meditations of the Heart; Margaret Bonds' Three Dream Portraits, which uses poems by Langston Hughes; and H. Leslie Adams' Nightsongs, using the words of five African-American poets. Soprano Meroë Khalia Adeeb, mezzo-soprano Tesia Kwarteng, and tenor Elliott Paige all make their ACP debuts, joined by Artistic Director and pianist Michael Lewis.

With a mix of exhilarating premieres, new productions, and retuning favorites, the renowned Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater (AAADT) marks its annual Kennedy Center engagement with seven performances on the Opera House stage from February 4a?"9. Led by Artistic Director Robert Battle, the company has had a long-standing impact on the world of modern dance and a unique role in celebrating the African American cultural experience. The company's performances include premieres from esteemed choreographer Donald Byrd and Ailey dancer and first-ever resident choreographer Jamar Roberts that shine a spotlight on social issues. The engagement will see three D.C. debuts; two new productions; and two company premieres, along with Alvin Ailey's American masterpiece Revelations, which will be performed as the finale for all seven programs.

Langston Hughes, one of America's most beloved poets, will be celebrated in song at Feinstein's/54 Below on Sunday, February 2nd, at 9:30 pm.

Falcon Theatre's third production of its 30th anniversary season is Pearl Cleage's Blues for an Alabama Sky. The play is a brutally honest and candid examination of an array of issues--including race, gender, sexuality, and cultural intolerance--in the historical context of the Harlem Renaissance and the early years of the Great Depression. The production, directed by Torie Wiggins, opens January 24, 2020.

Memphis Symphony Orchestra will present its Magic of Memphis Holiday Spectacular on Saturday Dec. 21 and Sunday Dec. 22. Presented in partnership with the Hattiloo Theatre, this year's production 'Black Nativity' features Memphis' best musical and theatrical performers.

The Carnegie Hall Citywide free concert series continues this winter with dynamic performances by mezzo-soprano Kayleigh Decker and pianist Madeline Slettedahl at St. Michael's Church in Upper Manhattan; Carnegie Hall's own Ensemble Connect at Bartow-Pell Mansion Museum in the Bronx; jazz vibraphonist Stefon Harris and his band Blackout at the Schomburg Center in Harlem; and Brooklyn-based group Pistolera at Flushing Town Hall in Queens. The series, now in its 44th year, brings renowned artists and rising stars to all five boroughs of New York City.

The Auditorium Theatre announces programming for Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater's March 4-8, 2020 performances in Chicago, featuring Midwest premieres and Ailey classics. The company gives the Midwest premiere to three works: Ode, created by Ailey dancer and the company's first-ever Resident Choreographer Jamar Roberts; Greenwood, Donald Byrd's ensemble work inspired by the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre; and Ounce of Faith, Darrell Grand Moultrie's ode to teachers and mentors. The engagement also includes Chicago premieres of BUSK, Aszure Barton's 2009 work premiered by the Ailey company in 2019, and The Call by Ronald K. Brown, a joyous mix of modern and West African dance. The company brings new productions of Ailey Artistic Director Emerita Judith Jamison's Divining and Lar Lubovitch's Fandango, along with audience favorites In/Side and Ella by Ailey Artistic Director Robert Battle. Keeping with Chicago tradition, every performance ends with company founder Alvin Ailey's masterpiece Revelations.

Houston's theater company and non profit The Sankofa Collective is taking its spin on the classic piece written by Langston Hughes - Black Nativity. The greatest gift given to earth will be shared this Christmas season, December 20th - 22nd at the MATCH - Midtown Arts & Theater Center Houston (Matchbox #3).

Susan R. Williamson, Director of the Palm Beach Poetry Festival (PBPF), today announced the five winners of Fellowships and Scholarships to the 16h annual Festival, scheduled for January 20-25 at Old School Square in Delray Beach. The three Poetry Festival Fellowships cover full tuition and lodging for the recipients.

Coming off a historic fourth win for Outstanding Theatre of The Year from the Gregory Awards, Sound Theatre Company announces their most compelling and relevant season to date. Producing Artistic Director, Teresa Thuman and Associate Artistic Director, Jay O'Leary, deliver a season of three hard-hitting works which seek to dissect power structures, ownership and envisions the path to a more just future. RETURN THE POWER will feature two world premiere productions and a classic satirical take-down of greed and corruption. Sound's 2020 season boasts inclusive casting, community building and Radical Hospitality ticket pricing starting at $5.

Black Nativity by Langston Hughes will run December 5-15 with a special Community Night preview performance on Thursday, December 5 at the Marcus Center's Wilson Theater at Vogel Hall. 

Choreographer Beth Soll will present her Beth Soll & Company, an ensemble of dancers and musicians in Dances of Passion and Peace, A Concert of New Dance, Music, Poetry, and Translation, an evening of all premieres, set to new music by composers Thomas Addison, Nuria Divi, Wendy Griffiths, Josh Rosen, and Stan Strickland, and poetry, both sung and spoken, of Robert Frost, Lin Haire-Sargeant, Langston Hughes, Rumi, and Walt Whitman.  Poems will be recited in English, French, Catalan, German, French, and American Sign Language.  Performances November 22 & 23 at 8 PM at University Settlement, 184 Eldridge Street.

One of the most renowned musicals of the holiday season, BLACK NATIVITY, returns to Black Theatre Troupe. December 6-22, 2019. This annual, legendary holiday event by Harlem Renaissance poet Langston Hughes, returns again to the BTT stage. Black Nativity is a joyous company of singers, actors, dancers and musicians, delivering a powerful message of joy, hope, victory and liberation. This song-play touches a special chord in the hearts of all at a very special time of the year.

THE NEW YORKER NEW YORK FESTIVAL OF SONG presents a new show that sheds light on Harlem's gay underground: Tain't Nobody's Business If I Do: Songs from Gay Harlem

The Umbrella Stage Company has baptized their newly renovated blackbox with an appropriately bleak production of August Wilson's Fences. The play is the third installment in Wilson's American Century Cycle, for which he wrote 10 plays about the Black American experience, one play per decade in the twentieth century. Fences is arguably the most successful and most frequently produced, having secured the 1987 Tony Award for Best Play along with the Pulitzer Prize for Drama and inspiring a 2016 movie adaptation which was nominated for an Academy Award for best adapted screenplay, among others. We follow the story of Troy Maxson, a city sanitation worker whose aspirations for anything beyond driving a dump truck have abandoned him, and his family. The play relays a narrative which explores the intricacies of familial relationships in the quotidian as well as within a crucible of infidelities, deceit, and betrayal.