Juneteenth, Film Noir, Summertime Chamber Music and Opera, John Salmon, and Mean Mary

Juneteenth

On June 19th, 1865, slaves in Galveston, Texas—the last place in America where slavery existed—learned of their freedom for the first time.

Just one month earlier at what we know today as the St. Phillips Church in Old Salem, Union troops arrived to enforce President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation there. The Union chaplain read general order number 32: “….to remove the doubt in the minds of the people of North Carolina…that all persons held as slaves are now free”.

This year is the 150th anniversary of that monumental announcement. Juneteenth —the country's longest-running observance of the abolition of slavery—continues this month in Winston-Salem compliments of Triad Cultural Arts.  

The 11th Annual Juneteenth Africana Festival of the Triad will be held in Winston-Salem on Saturday, June 20th from 11-6 at 5th Street and MLK, Jr. Drive. There'll be African Dance, storytelling, exhibits, kids areas, food trucks, music and more.Juneteenth luncheon is Thursday, June 4th from noon to 1:30 in Gray Auditorium at Old Salem Visitor Center. The luncheon speaker will be Dr. Reginald F. Hildebrand, Associate Professor of African American Studies and History at UNC Chapel Hill and author of The Times Were Strange and Stirring: Methodist Preachers and the Crisis of Emancipation. The festival's featured literary guest will be Reverend Byron Williams, author of the bestselling 1963: The Year of Hope and Hostility. 

David Ford spoke with Old Salem Museums and Gardens Director of African American Programming Cheryl Harry.

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SECCA Presents Going Dark Film Nir Screening Series

The Southeastern Center For Contemporary Art, SECCA, is stepping into the shadows.

Their retreat from the light is in honor of film noir. Film noir is a genre known for bleak detective stories, fog, femme fatales, moral dilemmas, and criminal activity. The 1st annual Going Dark Film Noir Screening Series ignites the silver screen of SECCA on June 11th. Films showing include The Killing, The Asphalt Jungle, and Alfred Hitchcock's The Wrong Man.

The Going Dark Film Noir Screening Series starts in glorious black & white on Thursday, June 11th at 8pm. The series runs through July 16th.Eddie spoke with Alex Brown, SECCA Programs Coordinator. He curated the series, which begins with the 1944 Billy Wilder film Double Indemnity.

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Chamber Music on the Hill

Cellist and educator Grace Anderson is celebrating 10 years as Artistic Director of the Triad Chamber Music Society in Winston-Salem. Violinist and educator Sarah Johnson began Chamber Music on the Hill (CMOTH) more than 25 years ago on the campus of the then School of the Arts. The two have collaborated together with both organizations teaching young people the musical and non-musical lessons found through chamber music study, rehearsals, games and performance. This year CMOTH, a three week chamber music camp will be on the Wake Forest University campus.

Chamber Music on the Hill, the three week, rigorous and concentrated summer program that integrates the study of chamber music with solo performance is June 14th through July 3rd and applications for commuters are being accepted through June 10th.  Student, faculty and alumni concerts are free and open to the public.

John Salmon

The performance series Music for Great Space concluded last week with an unusual concert spanning genres, nations and generations. Chris Brubeck, the Grammy nominated composer, pianist, trombonist, bassist and son of the late great Dave Brubeck, performed in an intimate combo setting with a group of French jazz masters, and his longtime friend, UNC Greensboro piano professor John Salmon.

In addition to being an acclaimed classical soloist on four continents, John is also an exceptional jazz performer whose multifaceted career path began with a fan letter he wrote decades ago to Chris' father: Dave Brubeck.

In addition to John, the one-time concert featured some of the world's finest jazz musicians: Chris Brubeck, trombone, Guillaume Saint-James, saxophones, Jerome Seguin, bass, and Thierry Arpino, drums, and John Salmon on keyboards. It was courtesy of the Eastern Music Festival and Music for a Great Space present with music by Chris Brubeck, Dave Brubeck arrangements and more.

Mean Mary

Known around the world for her lightning-fast fingers on banjo, fiddle, and guitar, haunting vocals, and intricate story songs, Mary James or Mean Mary as she's known is the perfect fit for The Fiddle and Bow Society in Winston-Salem.  Her original music nods in the direction of folk-rock, bluegrass, and blues, but the skilled multi-instrumentalist has a truly unique musical voice that's all her own. We sample from Mean Mary's most recent album: Year of the Sparrow in today's show.

The Nashville-based artist and author has been entertaining audiences for as long as she can remember. In today's show, you can also hear Mean Mary singing Long Tall Texan for a television audience at the age of six.

On Friday night, June 5th at 8:00 PM she'll perform at the Muddy Creek Music Hall in Historic Bethania Mill, 5455 Bethania Rd, in W-S. 

American Singers Opera Project

The American Singers' Opera Project (ASOP) is underway on the campus of Wake Forest University, and opera fans as well as the opera curious can get a local taste of what's going on there on Friday, June 5th, at 7:00 pm at Arbor Acres Retirement Community during ASOP's first Aria Evening. There'll be a repeat performance on Saturday night the 6^th at Salemtowne. Then ASOP's production of Hansel and Gretel with chamber orchestra comes to the Brendle Recital Hall on the WFU campus. The concerts will be Thursday, June 11^th through the 13^th with evening concerts Thursday, Friday and Saturday at 7, and a 2:00 matinee on Saturday in Wake Forest's Ring Theatre. Tickets are just ten bucks and performances are free for all Wake Forest faculty, staff and students with I.D.

American Singers' Opera Project (ASOP) is one of the most affordable programs in the country called pay-to-sings. ASOP is unique in that it offers a full opera production each summer with chamber orchestra. Artistic Director, American soprano Barbara DeMaio Caprilli says it's also the only program that offers no upper age limit with singers from high school to college student level to professors of voice looking to learn a new role. Wake Forest University Associate Professor of Music, lyric tenor Richard Heard says that aspect of their summer program offers opportunities for both singers and ASOP instructors many of whom are leaders in their field.