Ta-Nehisi Coates Will Speak At Glimmerglass Festival

The Glimmerglass Festival hosts best-selling author and journalist Ta-Nehisi Coates at the Alice Busch Opera Theater on Friday, August 2, at 4 p.m. in a discussion moderated by Teresa Miller, Senior Vice President for Strategic Initiatives and Chief Diversity Officer for the State University of New York system. A Q&A session follows the discussion.

Coates is currently a Distinguished Writer in Residence at New York University. His book Between the World and Me, detailing the relationship between a father and his son in American society based upon the idea of "race," won the 2015 National Book Award for Nonfiction among other accolades. Coates' writing received praise from Toni Morrison and others, with Morrison citing Coates as "the single best writer on the subject of race in the United States." Coates garnered a 2015 MacArthur Fellowship, more commonly known as a "Genius Grant," for his work. In addition to his four books, Coates was a national correspondent for The Atlantic and currently authors The Black Panther and Captain America comics for Marvel Comics. His latest novel, The Water Dancer, is set for release in September.

Coates' visit is part of the 2019 Glimmerglass season, which features new productions of Kern and Hammerstein II's Show Boat, Verdi's La traviata, Corigliano's The Ghosts of Versailles and the world premiere of Tesori and Thompson's Blue, which will be performed following Coates' talk at 7:30 p.m. The Festival is completed by additional concerts, lectures, cabarets and two additional operatic productions - the youth opera Noah's Flood and an adaptation of The Queen of Spades melding Pushkin's text with highlights from Tchaikovsky's score.

The Glimmerglass Festival welcomes two other writers for Literary Conversations this season, including National Book Award finalist Dana Spiotta on Monday, August 12, at 5 p.m.

For more information on the 2019 Glimmerglass Festival and performance dates and times, call the Box Office at (607) 547-2255 or visit www.glimmerglass.org.