Toni Lester: Mapping Ancestral Discoveries

An afternoon of poetry, art songs and discussion, entitled Mapping Ancestral Discoveries From The Eastern Shore to New York in Poetry and Song, as composer, poet, and scholar Toni Lester shares her journey of discovery about ancestors who migrated from DelMarVA to New York to form one of the oldest, continuous free Black communities in the North. This event will feature baritone Brandon Bell, soprano Adia Evans, and pianist/percussionist Bill Solomon.

Toni Lester is a composer, poet, playwright, cultural critic and scholar whose work often addresses themes of nature, spirituality and justice. Her work has been presented in venues ranging from Carnegie Recital Hall and the Sorbonne in Paris, to the National Black Theater in New York. With degrees from the New England Conservatory, Georgetown and Northeastern Universities, she received artistic guidance from Black Arts poet Sonia Sanchez, composers William Thomas McKinley and MacArthur Genius grant awardee George Russell, and Newark Jazz Elder and Blue Note recording artist Connie Lester. Lester is currently a Visiting Artist and Scholar at the School For Advanced Study at the University of London, England.

Brandon Bell is a baritone making waves in the North American operatic landscape. He made role debuts as Marcello in La bohème with the Borderland Arts Foundation and the Baker in Into the Woods with Union Avenue Opera this Sumer. As a recent Resident Artist with Pittsburgh Opera, Bell sang the roles of Fiorello in Il barbiere di Siviglia, Oreste in Iphigénie en Tauride, Pa Zegner in Proving Up, and Baron Douphol in La Traviata. He joined the Santa Fe Opera in 2023 as an Apprentice Singer, singing the Shepherd in Pelléas et Mélisande and Pastore II in Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo. Upcoming engagements include Moralès in Carmen with Virginia Opera, and a concert with Brooklyn Art Song Society.

Praised for her “big, beautifully projected voice with an attractive edge and sparkle” (Arts Knoxville), Adia Evans holds a Bachelor of Music from the University of Maryland, College Park, and a Masters in Music from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville as part of the Knoxville Opera Studio. She is a proud alumna of the Baltimore School for the Arts. Evans is the recipient of the 2024 Igor Gorin Memorial Award, the 2023 2nd Place Soprano Prize in the George Shirley Vocal Competition, and the 2022 William Matheus Sullivan Foundation Award. Later this season, she will perform with Borderland Arts Foundation as “Mimi” in La Bohème and with the National Orchestral Institute as the soprano soloist in Beethoven’s 9th Symphony under the baton of Marin Alsop.

Bill Solomon is a musician, writer, and educator from New York City specializing in percussion and piano. He is a member of Bent Duo with pianist David Friend focusing on developing works about queerness, collaboration and expanding performance vocabularies. His chapter “Queering Musical Chrononormativity: percussion works of the West Coast group” is included in collection Queer Ear: Remaking Music Theory published by Oxford University Press. As a performer, he has appeared at Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, BAM, Disney Hall, Lucerne Hall, Donaueschingen Festival, Bang on a Can Marathon, and other festivals. He is currently co-chair of music at the Dalton School.

This event is made possible with financial support from the Linehan Fund for Excellence in the Arts; the College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences; and the Dresher Center for the Humanities.