The African Art Music Conversation Series brings composers, performers, and scholars together to dialogue with one another, sharing their experiences and knowledge based on selected repertoires. This year’s edition, the second in the series, focuses on “African pianism,” a concept developed by the Nigerian composer and ethnomusicologist Professor Akin Euba to theorize how the piano could be Africanized by African composers. Participants in this year’s conversation will reflect on the significance of the concept, for example, in terms of the aesthetic modes it demonstrates, the interface of ethnography and the compositional process, and the history of music in post-colonial Africa and its global resonances.

Guest Speaker:

• Kofi Agawu, Distinguished Professor, CUNY Graduate Center

Piano recitalist:

• Kamilla Arku, New York University

Featured composers:

• Akin Euba, Joshua Uzoigwe
• Fred Onovwerosuoke
• Nkeiru Okoye
• Nahla Mattar
• Kamilla Arku

Moderator and Director, African Art Music Conversation Series

• Bode Omojola, Hammond Douglass Five College Professor of Music

This event is free and open to the public.