The 100-voice World House Choir will present Sincerely Yours: Pauli Murray, a newly commissioned choral work honoring the life and legacy of Pauli Murray—poet, lawyer, Civil Rights activist, priest, and trailblazer for social justice. Commissioned by GALA Choruses, an international LGBTQ+ choral organization, this compelling ten movement dramatic cantata is scored for choir, two soloists/narrators, and an instrumental ensemble. It draws from Murray’s own words to illuminate her extraordinary and prophetic vision of equality and human dignity.
Performances are at the Foundry Theater [920 Corry St. in Yellow Springs] on November 7 at 7:00pm and on Sunday afternoon, November 9 at 2:00PM. There will be a performance in Cincinnati on Saturday, November 8 at the House of Joy [3220 Central Parkway] at 4PM.
Rev. Dr. Pauli Murray (1910–1985) was a woman of “firsts:” the first to refuse to give up her seat on a segregated Virginia bus in 1940, the first woman to earn a J.S.D. from Yale Law School, and the first Black woman ordained as an Episcopal priest. Going beyond personal milestones, Murray was also a co-founder of both the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) and the National Organization for Women (NOW). Her groundbreaking legal thinking informed Thurgood Marshall’s victory in the historic 1954 case Brown v. Board of Education and shaped Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s work to extend the Equal Protection Clause to women.
The music of each movement captures the styles of the decades of Pauli’s life: ragtime, blues, jazz, gospel, pop, Motown, and classical. Each movement is a musical and narrative chapter in her life. The composer Steve Milloy, now living in California, was well known in the tri-state area as artistic director of Cincinnati Men’s Chorus, and has composed and arranged for choruses across the country and internationally.
Following each concert there will be a panel consisting of the Steve Milloy [composer], Jane Ramsayer Miller [Dramturg], Rosita Steven-Holsey [niece of Pauli Murray], and Miriam McKenney [Episcopal Missioner for Beloved Community].
Other educational activities around the concerts include a Pauli Murray Symposium at Antioch College from 11:00am until 4:30pm on November 1, and a Pastries with Pauli Symposium at St. Andrews Episcopal Church in Cincinnati from 9:30am to 11:00am on November 8.
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