Combining a mix of performance and conversation, Dr. Samantha Ege animates the soundworlds and stories of the women who inspire her research. Dr. Ege is a leading interpreter and scholar of the African-American composer Florence B. Price. Dr. Ege’s publications and performances shed an important light on composers from underrepresented backgrounds. In 2023, she won the Society for American Music’s Irving Lowens Article Award for Chicago, the ‘City We Love to Call Home!’: Intersectionality, Narrativity, and Locale in the Music of Florence Beatrice Price and Theodora Sturkow Ryder (American Music journal). Dr. Ege’s first book South Side Impresarios: How Race Women Transformed Chicago’s Classical Music Scene will be published with the University of Illinois Press in autumn 2024. 

Free tickets via the Box Office.

Grammy-nominated Berklee Indian Ensemble (BIE) is a world-renowned collective known for its global Indian sound that honors regional South Asian musical traditions while boldly experimenting with a cross
pollination of genres, cultures, and multidisciplinary art forms from around the world. A diverse 8-piece ensemble that was born at the Berklee College of Music, the brilliant musicians of BIE provide an evening of
expansive, integrated musical explorations.

Free tickets via the Box Office.

Five-time Grammy Award winner Angélique Kidjo is one of the greatest artists in international music today, a creative force with fifteen albums to her name. Kidjo’s creative power is palpable through the beauty and strength of her voice, her music and movement, visual aesthetic, linguistic prowess and enormous advocacy work that serves so many. Kidjo has cross-pollinated the West African traditions of her childhood in Benin with elements of American R&B, funk and jazz, as well as influences from Europe and Latin America. Yet her love for collaboration inspires musical fusions and partnering with gifted musicians from across the globe. Angelique also advocates on behalf of children as a UNICEF and OXFAM Ambassador. She created her own charitable foundation, Batonga, dedicated to support the education of young girls in Africa.

Tickets are required, but are available free of charge via the Watson Box Office (limit 2 per person).
“I believe music is a language beyond the colour of skin, country or culture. I want to inspire people to work to help educate, nourish and protect our children.”
Angélique Kidjo, Benin