Jessye Norman
Founding Artistic Director (1945-2019)

Jessye Norman, one of the world’s most celebrated performing artists, was acclaimed for her performances in a wide range of leading roles with the world’s premier opera companies, in solo recitals and in concerts of her cherished classical repertoire with preeminent orchestras all over the globe, as well as her most recent artistic expansion with her jazz ensemble. Her collaborations with artists of other disciplines was a hallmark and included groundbreaking projects with fellow icons in the field: Bill T. Jones, Steve McQueen, Garth Fagan, Laura Karpman, and Robert Wilson among many others. She was the recipient of a number of awards and accolades including more than forty honorary doctorate degrees from colleges, universities and conservatories around the world, five Grammy awards including the ‘lifetime achievement award’, the National Medal of the Arts and was a Kennedy Center Honors recipient. Miss Norman was also awarded the highest honor of the NAACP, The Spingarn Medal. Her community service included trustee board memberships at Carnegie Hall, The New York Public Library, The New York Botanical Gardens and The Dance Theatre of Harlem. The Jessye Norman School of the Arts in her hometown of Augusta, Georgia is now in its sixteenth academic year.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/30/obituaries/jessye-norman-dead.html

Adina Williams
Executive Producer and Dramaturg

Founding member of Woke Up Famous, LLC and President of AdinaWorks Productions, Adina Williams advises and partners with arts and culture sector organizations such as Bethel Woods Center for the Arts, Site of the 1969 Woodstock Festival and National Sawdust as well as artists across disciplines. She has collaborated with TONY Award-nominated choreographers Karole Armitage and Camille A. Brown, Pulitzer Prize laureate Wynton Marsalis, Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Darryl “DMC” McDaniels of multiplatinum hip-hop group Run-DMC, and with the late opera legend Jessye Norman. Williams endeavors to create programming that is unique, mission-specific and relevant. An Artist Scholar at Manhattan School of Music, advisor for the PBS American Masters series, “UNLADYLIKE2020,” Williams serves on the Composers Concordance board. She also proudly participated as a founding member and panelist for former New York State Senator Jesse Hamilton’s “Roundtable on Diversity and Inclusion in Cultural Institutions.” Williams’s recent posts have included Senior Manager of Public Programs at the American Museum of Natural History, where she was responsible for designing an overarching strategic vision for a diverse and interconnected series of programs which encompassed various mediums of expression. As Director of Jazz and Standards at Boosey & Hawkes, Inc., Williams personally signed Blue Note Records, Paquito D’Rivera, Andrew Hill and Wynton Marsalis to its renowned family of composers and catalogues and re-signed the late jazz icon Chick Corea. Adina Williams holds Master’s degrees in Arts Administration and Elementary Education from Teachers College, Columbia University and a Bachelor of Arts, Magna Cum Laude, in Music (violin) from Baldwin-Wallace University.

Harolyn Blackwell
Co-Artistic Director

Lyric coloratura soprano Harolyn Blackwell is recognized for her expressive and exuberant performances, with a career that has spanned opera, concert and recital stages around the world. Following college, the Washington, D.C., native began her career on Broadway in Leonard Bernstein’s “West Side Story”. Shortly afterwards, she was selected as a finalist for the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, and her career path changed from the musical theatre to opera. Since then, she has performed with many of the major national and international opera companies, and at festivals around the world, including Lyric Opera of Chicago, Glyndebourne Festival, Teatro Colon de Buenos Aires, Seattle Opera, Opera de Nice, Miami Opera, Canadian Opera Company, Aix-en-Provence Festival, Opera Orchestra of New York and New York’s Mostly Mozart Festival. She has appeared in several productions at the Metropolitan Opera, including “Un Ballo in Maschera,” “Le Nozze di Figaro,” “Manon,” “Die Fledermaus,” “Werther” and “La Fille du Régiment”. Ms. Blackwell starred as Cunegonde in the Broadway revival of “Candide”. An accomplished recitalist, she has performed in several acclaimed concert series, including London’s Wigmore Hall, Carnegie Hall’s Weill Recital Hall, The Morgan Library, The Library of Congress, The San Francisco Performances Series at the Herbst Hall, The Kennedy Center's Fortas Chamber Series, The Vocal Arts Society of Washington and The Ambassador Foundation Performing Arts Series in Los Angeles. She has also appeared in a number of nationally televised concerts such as The Grammy Awards, The Kennedy Center Honors, The Memorial Day and Fourth of July Concerts on PBS, Christmas in Washington and The PBS Live From The White House to name a few. Ms. Blackwell is the recipient of numerous awards and honors, one of which provided her with the opportunity to study in Italy with Renata Tebaldi and Carlo Bergonzi. She is a member of the voice faculty at Manhattan School of Music, NYU Steinhardt and Barnard/Columbia University. Previously, she was a member of the voice faculty at The Peabody Conservatory of Music at The Johns Hopkins University.