Carnegie Hall's The '60s: The Years that Changed America, a citywide festival from January 14-March 24, 2018, continues in February with an exciting array of events to be presented at Carnegie Hall and at more than 35 leading partner cultural institutions throughout New York City and beyond. This special exploration of the '60s invites audiences to explore this turbulent decade through the lens of arts and culture, including music's role as a meaningful vehicle to inspire social change.
Festival programming in February at
Carnegie Hall begins on February 5, 2018 at 8:00 p.m. with Sounds of Change in Stern Auditorium/Perelman Stage when the music and words that invigorated a nation, stirred uprisings, and effected change in the '60s will be celebrated. The evening will be hosted by
Phylicia Rashad, and the artist lineup features a stellar cast of performers whose music inspired and entertained joined by the next generation of performers with something to say, including
Anthony Hamilton, The Hamiltones,
Christian McBride, Naturally 7,
Otis Redding III, Vernon Reid, Cantor Azi Schwartz,
Valerie Simpson, and
Dionne Warwick. The artists will perform a rich variety of folk songs, R&B classics, and popular hits from the period, such as
Sam Cooke's "A Change Is Gonna Come," the protest anthem "We Shall Overcome,"
Jimi Hendrix's "Purple Haze," Santana's "Black Magic Woman,"
Otis Redding's "(Sittin' On) The Dock of the Bay,"
Dionne Warwick's "What the World Needs Now is Love," and Simon & Garfunkel's "Sounds of Silence," while poet and activist Sonia Sanchez recites some of her own seminal poetry from the period. Leading the performance will be composer and producer
Ray Chew, music director of Dancing with the Stars and other hit programs, who, with his wife Vivian Scott Chew, are the co-producers of this multimedia production that speaks to the power of music and of this remarkable decade that still resonates today.
"We are thrilled to invite the Carnegie audience on a journey through words, images and music from one of the most pivotal decades in American history," said music director
Ray Chew. "The '60s hold a special place in our hearts as the time that shaped our nation. It was a time of revolution, a time of resistance, a time of total evolution. Women stood up for their rights, and even though they may not have vocally expressed #MeToo as they now are, they did say #TimesUp. Our Mexican brothers and sisters in California fought to be recognized and equally compensated. The LGBTQ community took to the streets of Greenwich Village to scream proudly that they no longer were going to be ashamed of who God magnificently created them to be. The assassinations of our beloved John, Martin, and Bobby led us to question if we were ever going to make it to the mountain top. And all the while, the prolific music of the '60s could be heard across the air waves, telling us that if we stayed steady on our course, that we would all-hopefully-overcome one day."
On February 10, 2018 at 10:00 p.m, Icelandic pop experimentalists múmwill mesmerize audiences in Zankel Hall with their neo-psychedelic music that uses electronic effects, innovative sampling, delicate vocals, and traditional and unconventional instruments to create unique, otherworldly soundscapes in Zankel Hall.
A second festival concert in Stern Auditorium/Perelman Stage this month onFebruary 16, 2018 at 8:00 p.m. features
Philip Glass, holder of
Carnegie Hall's 2017-2018 Richard and Barbara Debs Composer's Chair, and thePhilip Glass Ensemble, returning to the Hall after more than a decade's absence for a performance of Glass's seldom-performed early masterpiece, Music with Changing Parts. The Ensemble will be joined by the San Francisco Girls Chorus, students from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, and additional artists.
From January 25-March 24, 2018, an exhibit in the Rose Museum at
Carnegie Hall that focuses on the role of
Carnegie Hall in the '60s and the 16 events that represent the social causes that sang out to be heard from the stage. At the laying of the cornerstone in 1890, Andrew Carnegie said that "all good causes may here find a platform." At no time during
Carnegie Hall's history were those words better represented than in the 1960s.
Also during the festival, Zankel Hall ticketholders will be able to enjoy the Harlem Postcardsphotography exhibition presented by The Studio Museum in Harlem which features prints by four artists whose work draws inspiration from the dynamic social and cultural climate of the '60s. Representing the intimate and dynamic perspectives of Harlem, the images reflect each artist's oeuvre with an idiosyncratic snapshot taken in, or representative of, this historic locale and decade.
Carnegie Hall has launched a special '60s Festival website carnegiehall.org/60s, which will feature a festival overview video, artist interviews, in-depth videos, exclusive footage, partner content, and more shed light on the importance of the 1960s and the decade's continuing influence on our world today.
The '60s festival is
Carnegie Hall's largest festival to date and features an extraordinary selection of more than 50 events from January 14-March 24, 2018 across the arts and culture spectrum, including music, dance, exhibitions, talks, films, and family programming as well as radio and digital offerings presented by more than 35 festival partner organizations.
Highlights of Festival Partner Event Programming in February:
Among the festival partner concert highlights are: Soundtrack '63 at the Apollo Theater, a musical retrospective-from 1963 to today-performed by an 18-piece orchestra and special guest artists that tells the untold and under-told stories of the Black experience in America (February 24).
Dance and theater highlights are:
Ronald K. Brown/EVIDENCE, A Dance Company, performing the duet "March" from Brown's work Lessons, inspired by the civil rights movement at
The Joyce Theater (February 6-11). Dance Theatre of Harlem celebrates its 49th anniversary with a program that features selections from choreographer
Louis Johnson's iconic Forces of Rhythm (February 11).
Film highlights include: In the Intense Now-a documentary essay directed by João Moreira Salles that explores three pivotal events of the 1960s: the May '68 uprisings in Paris, the Prague Spring and subsequent Soviet takeover of Czechoslovakia, and Mao's Cultural Revolution (January 31-February 13); and
Robert Drew's modern classic Primary(February 6), both at the Film Forum.
Talks include: "Black is Beautiful": Fashion and Consciousness at the Museum of the City of New York (February 6); The Summer of Law and Disorder: Harlem Riot of 1964, a panel discussion at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture (February 21).
Radio highlights include: a two-part series on Exploring Music with Bill McGlaughlinduring which McGlaughlin will be joined by the Director of
Carnegie Hall's Archives and Rose Museum Gino Francesconi to take listeners backstage for an intimate view of the hall, its history, and the legendary performers who have appeared there. From the world premiere of Dvorak'sNew World Symphony in 1893, to U.S. debuts by Jascha Heifetz,
Igor Stravinsky, and Béla Bartók, to appearances by artists and activists who challenged racial restrictions and the political status quo, including
Paul Robeson,
Mahalia Jackson,
Bob Dylan, Martin Luther King, Jr., the Beatles, and
Leontyne Price,
Carnegie Hall has long been a platform for social and artistic change that have challenged conventions (February 19-23 and February 26-March 2).
Exhibit highlights include: The Vietnam War: 1945-1975, a groundbreaking exhibit at The New-York Historical Society (through April 22); Narrative and Counter-Narrative: (Re)Defining the 1960s, a collaborative exhibition at New York University's Bobst Library, focused on the 1960s at Washington Square that explores how Downtown New York became a convergence point for the activism, social upheaval, and creativity fomented during the decade. The story unfolds through artifacts and documents from the library's renowned special collections (beginning January 3); You Say You Want a Revolution: Remembering the Sixties, which explores the counterculture of the 1960s and '70s at the Stephen A. Schwarzman Building of The New York Public Library (through September 1).
Family events include: The Kid Who Helped Leak the Pentagon Papers, a discussion with acclaimed children's author Steve Sheinkin and Robert Ellsberg who, at 13, helped his father leak the Pentagon Papers (February 3), at the New-York Historical Society.
The '60s: The Years that Changed America
Carnegie Hall's citywide '60s festival explores the turbulent spirit of this defining decade through the lens of arts and culture, including music's role as a meaningful vehicle to inspire social change. The '60s was a watershed decade in America's history-a period in which the country was torn apart by the struggle for social justice, the fight for civil rights, and war in which more than half a million Americans were fighting on the other side of the world. As a restive younger generation was finding its voice, the world witnessed a revolution in long-held values and social norms, from culture and fashion to politics and identity.
Half a century later, as many of the hard-won victories of the 1960s are being debated,
Carnegie Hall has turned for the first time to a figure outside the music world-Pulitzer Prize-winning author and historian Robert A. Caro, famed biographer of Robert Moses and Lyndon B. Johnson-for inspiration, presenting a festival examining this pivotal decade.
As part of its festival offerings,
Carnegie Hall presents a series of concerts and education projects that draw inspiration from the '60s, and explore the decade's nexus of music, protest, and change. Beyond the Hall, the festival includes an extraordinary array of events presented by more than 35 partner organizations across the city and beyond-including Apollo Theater, Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law, Dance Theatre of Harlem, Film Forum, The Museum of Modern Art, New-York Historical Society, The New York Public Library, The Paley Center for Media, and Smithsonian Folkways Recordings-that focus on a decisive moment in our country's history, a decade that changed America in ways that still reverberate today.
For the complete schedule of programming for The '60s: The Years that Changed America, January 14-March 24, 2018, visit
carnegiehall.org/60s.
