Mon 5/2 @ 7PM
The Kent State University School of Music is planning a program at Severance Music Center to on Monday May 2 called “Stories of Peace, Protest and Reflection,” marking the anniversary of the May 4, 1970 shootings at KSU that killed four students and injured nine other people.
And it’ll be quite a spectacular, with almost 300 students performing poetry, dance, theater and music in a variety of genres including classical, gospel, jazz and world music that looks at issues of social justice, civil rights and the lingering legacy of that tragic day.
“Today, we face many of the same challenges that led to May 4. I hope that through art, we can gather as a community to continue to learn and face them together,” says Kent McWilliams, director and professor of the School of Music.
KSU’s Wick Poetry Center has chose poems from its collection on the 50th anniversary two years ago, a memorial downsized by the pandemic with guest speakers reading the work, including faculty member Roseann Canfora, who was a witness to the shootings.
Other highlights include the world premiere of “I Have a Dream” for jazz ensemble and strings, written by sax player/composer/arranger Bobby Selvaggio who heads KSU’s jazz program; selections from Blind Injustice, a new opera based on the Innocence Project’s work to exonerate wrongfully convicted people, performed by Kent State Opera Theatre; and the finale of “Be the Change,” based on words attributed to Gandhi, featuring most of the performers back onstage together.
Other performers include the KSU Thai Ensemble with a Buddhist-inspired work; two pianists and eight dancers performing “Winnsboro Cotton Mill Blues;” the African Ensemble and Steel Band with Afrobeats dance team Asé Xpressions; the Kent State Gospel Choir; the Kent State Orchestra; KSU’s Percussion Ensemble, and guest clarinetist and former KSU student David Shifri with the Kent State University Orchestra performing Aaron Copland’s Clarinet Concerto. Get a complete listing of performers and what they’ll perform here.
There’ll be a reception in the main lobby after the concert. Tickets starts at $25; go here to buy them.