“America at 250: The Journey to Freedom” is the topic of a three-day festival being presented by the Rochester Oratorio Society.
All events are free and open to the public.
The festival opens at 6:15 p.m. June 24 with “Two Pivotal Figures in Freedom,” a panel discussion led by Brighton Town Historian Mary Jo Lanphear at the Brighton Public Library, 2300 Elmwood Ave. The discussion will focus on abolitionists Austin Steward and William Clough Bloss. Steward, an escaped slave, was the first African-American to establish a business in Rochester and wrote “Twenty-Two Years a Slave, and Forty Years a Freeman.” He assisted escaped slaves and helped formerly enslaved people establish themselves economically. Bloss helped his friend Frederick Douglass to move escaped slaves to freedom along the Underground Railroad and sheltered many at his house on East Avenue. He is buried in Brighton.
“Harlem Renaissance Revisited,” a vocal recital featuring X’Zaya Ivy with Kevin Nitsch, will begin at 7 p.m. June 25 at the Rochester Academy of Medicine, 1441 East Ave. Ivy is a soprano who teaches in the Rochester City School District, and Nitsch is a member of the piano faculty at Nazareth University, a vocal coach at SUNY Geneseo and music director at the Baptist Temple in Brighton.
“America at 250: The Journey to Freedom” will celebrate American choral traditions at 4 p.m. June 28 at Christ Clarion Church, 415 Thornell Road, Pittsford. The Festival Community Chorus will sing such classics as Wilhousky’s “Battle Hymn of the Republic.” Resonanz, which the Rochester Oratorio Society website describes as its “Choir for Hire,” will perform Brent Michael Davids’ “We Are On Native Land” and a new work by Daryl Smith using School of the Arts student Bronwyn Capps’ poem “Freedom,” which won the Writers & Books Teen Poetry Contest this year.
Volunteers are being sought for the Festival Community Chorus, which begins rehearsals June 22. Sign up at https://rossings.org/volunteer-your-voice-for-an-unforgettable-choral-event/.
Arts Connexions is the society’s concert series that explores the intersections of classical music with diverse traditions.
This article originally appeared on Rochester Democrat and Chronicle: Rochester festival explores America at 250 and the fight for freedom
Reporting by Laura Nichols, Rochester Democrat and Chronicle / Rochester Democrat and Chronicle
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By Laura Nichols, Rochester Democrat and Chronicle | USA TODAY Network
