This event is presented as part of Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man
At 70: A Harlem Celebration.
In this special collaboration, Harlem Stage, National Jazz Museum in Harlem, and Maysles Documentary Center present dramatized readings of Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man, as part of a yearlong celebration of the 70th anniversary of the publication of Ellison’s seminal novel, and an unprecedented partnership among six Harlem arts organizations, also including The Studio Museum in Harlem, The Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, and the Ralph Ellison Memorial Committee. The evening will highlight selected excerpts from the work, read by award-winning actors, including Stephanie Berry, Ty Jones, and Carl Hancock Rux. Throughout the program, a curated selection of recordings from Ralph Ellison’s personal record collection will be played. This will surround and set the tone to honor and revisit this quintessential work of American literature.
Thank you for joining us!
Carl Hancock Rux
Stephanie Berry
Ty Jones
Creative Direction: Pat Cruz & Carl Hancock Rux
Musical Selections: Pat Cruz & Ryan Maloney
Project Management: Maurice Ivy
This program is supported, in part, by Penguin Random House and public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council.
Courtesy of and copyright: The Gordon Parks Foundation.
Photograph by Gordon Parks.
The music we curate in our homes offers a very personal look into who we are as humans – what brings us joy, nostalgia and peace. There is no way of knowing exactly what records in Ralph Ellison’s personal collection were actually on frequent rotation in his home, but we do see that the blues, classic jazz of the 1930s to the 1950s and the “hits” of European classical composers, with special attention to opera, represent the majority of the collection.
When Ornette Coleman began performing and recording in the late 1950s, his music confused many listeners. He was breaking free from the harmonic and rhythmic structures that most jazz and popular music was built upon. The song Lonely Woman from the 1959 album The Shape of Jazz to Come became Coleman’s best-known composition. The album is somewhat of an anomaly in Ellisons collection as there are only a few “free jazz” albums present.
Solitude from the 1962 album Money Jungle connects three very unique voices in jazz: Duke Ellington, Charles Mingus and Max Roach. The result presented Ellington on piano in a style we had never before heard from him – edgy, reaching and connecting with the more Avant-garde Mingus and Roach in a way that still sounds fresh and new today.
Louis Armstrong’s 1929 version of Fats Waller’s (What Did I Do to Be So) Black and Blue plays a significant role in Ellison’s Invisible Man. Although this record is not in the collection donated to the National Jazz Museum in Harlem, we know that it was a meaningful piece to Ellison. Next to Duke Ellington and J.S. Bach, Armstrong recordings are the most represented in Ellison’s collection.
Nearly 50% of Ralph Ellison’s record collection consists of European classical music. Recognizable names like Bach, Beethoven, Brahms and Mahler are well represented alongside slightly lesser-known composers including Britten, Mussorgsky and Respighi. Opera was of particular interest to the Ellisons. This selection, Omnia sol temperat from Carl Orff’s Carmina Burana, holds a somber and introspective tone.
Duke Ellington is the artist most represented in the Ellison record collection. Ellington’s 1962 album Black, Brown and Beige paired the composer’s big band with gospel singer Mahalia Jackson in a quasi-secular setting, something Jackson had never done before. Come Sunday would become the most recognizable song on the album and is now performed around the world as a standard in the jazz canon.
ASSOCIATE ARTISTIC DIRECTOR, CURATOR-IN-RESIDENCE
Carl Hancock Rux is an American poet, playwright, novelist, essayist, recording artist, actor, theater director, radio journalist, as well as a frequent collaborator in the fields of film, modern dance, and contemporary art. He is a co-Artistic Director of Mabou Mines, and Associate Artistic Director/Curator-in-Residence at Harlem Stage. www.carlhancockrux.com
Stephanie Berry just appeared in The Bandaged Place at the Roundabout Theatre. She is a 2022 nominee for a Drama Desk, the Lucille Lortel, and Outer Critics Circle Awards for her role in On Sugarland at New York Theatre Workshop. She recurs on the TV series, Fantasy Island. She appeared in the world premieres of The Garden at La Jolla Playhouse, Frankenstein at Classic Stage Company and Suga In Our Wounds at Manhattan Theatre Club for which she was nominated for a Lucille Lotrel and Outer Critics Award for Best Featured Actress. (She was a featured actress in I Dream A Dream that Dreams Back at Me for Juneteenth at Lincoln Center.) She is the recipient of the New Professional Theatre’s Award for Activism, Advocacy and Outstanding contributions the arts community and The League of Professional Theatre Women’s Lee Reynolds Award for her work using theater for social, cultural, or political change.
She was also seen in GLORIA: A LIFE at Daryl Roth Theatre and was nominated for a Helen Hayes Award for Best Lead Actress for her role in Gem of the Ocean at the Round House Theater. She appears in the movies Before You Know it, O.G., Delivery Man, Invasion, No Reservations, and Finding Forrester. Television credits include Luke Cage, The Last OG, Bull, Blue Bloods, all the Law-and-Order shows. She is the recipient of an OBIE Award for “best performance, THE SHANEEQUA CHRONICLES. She is a recipient of the TCG/Fox Foundation Resident Actor Fellowship as a “Distinguished Artist.”
NAACP Award Winner, Ty Jones is the OBIE Award Winning
Producing Artistic Director of the Classical Theatre of Harlem (CTH). Under Jones’ leadership, CTH’s template of financial discipline, precision marketing, and exceptional programming, resulted in its growth and stability. Jones initiated Uptown Meets Downtown, a program comprising strategic partnerships with downtown theatres designed to share expenses and build artistic bridges between communities. He created Uptown Shakespeare in the Park, bringing free, professional theatre to Harlem’s Marcus Garvey Park. Jones is a vet of 5 Broadway shows including Julius Caesar with Denzel Washington. Principal TV/film work include, When They See Us, Clifford the Big Red Dog, and he’s best known as Agent Donovan on POWER. Graduate and Honorary Doctorate from the University of Delaware.
Harlem Stage and Maysles Documentary Center have brought together a consortium of Harlem-based arts organizations including The National Jazz Museum in Harlem, The Studio Museum in Harlem, The Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, and the Ralph Ellison Memorial Committee to produce a rich celebration of Ralph Ellison’s seminal novel Invisible Man, beginning February 16 and continuing throughout the spring.
The Studio Museum in Harlem, the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, and Cave Canem Present
LAUNCHED THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 16 ON THE STUDIO MUSEUM WEBSITE (STUDIOMUSEUM.ORG)
In celebration of the 70th anniversary of Invisible Man, The Studio Museum in Harlem, the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, and Cave Canem commissioned three ekphrastic poems on the novel and Elizabeth Catlett’s sculpture Invisible Man: A Memorial to Ralph Ellison (2003). The commissioned poets include Cameron Awkward-Rich, Kadeem Gayle, and Lorelei Williams.
In reference to the title of Ellison’s book, Toni Morrison once asked “But invisible to whom?” This collaboration used this question to center the artistic practices of those committed to making the invisible visible. These poetic contributions reframed the narrative around the book by focusing on houselessness, incarceration, and femme, trans, and LGBTQ-identifying people.
The Studio Museum in Harlem, the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, and Cave Canem Present
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 1, 6:30 PM SCHOMBURG CENTER FOR RESEARCH IN BLACK CULTURE (515 MALCOLM X BLVD)
On March 1, 2023, Ellison’s birthday, a public program (Invisible to Whom? A Dialogue in Verse) will feature the poets in discussion at the Schomburg Center. In late spring, the Catlett sculpture, located across the street from Ellison’s West Harlem residence, will be the site of a live reading of the poems commissioned by poets Cameron Awkward-Rich, Kadeem Gayle, and Lorelei Williams.
SATURDAY, APRIL 15, AT 12PM
AMERICAN ACADEMY OF ARTS & LETTERS (633 W 155TH ST)
ADMISSION: $25, $20 SENIORS & STUDENTS
Drawing on themes of space and immersion, Ralph Ellison Memorial Committee Chair John Reddick will lead a walking tour of Harlem centered around Ralph Ellison’s life at 730 Riverside Drive. By sharing stories, reflections, and histories, and visiting the relevant cultural institutions — Academy of Arts and Letters, Trinity Cemetery, and local establishments — of a vibrant and ever-changing Harlem, participants will have the opportunity to immerse themselves in the local geography that has been memorialized through Ralph’s writings and photography.
The National Jazz Museum in Harlem Presents
TUESDAY, APRIL 18, AT 7PM
AT THE NATIONAL JAZZ MUSEUM IN HARLEM (58 W 129TH STREET)
ADMISSION: FREE
There are many intersections between Ellison’s fiction and non-fiction work, none more fascinating than those that relate to music, and specifically, jazz. A combination of readings and music presented by Dr. Steven Lewis will underline the swinging nature of Ellison’s discovery of the blues and it manifested itself in his prose.
Ralph Ellison Memorial Committee and Maysles Documentary Center PresentNational Jazz Museum in Harlem and Maysles Documentary Center Present
RALPH ELLISON SEEN & UNSEEN: JAZZ ON SCREEN (IN–PERSON)
THURSDAY, APRIL 20, AT 7PM
MAYSLES DOCUMENTARY CENTER (343 LENOX AVE)
ADMISSION: $25
A documentary screening and live musical performance in honor of Ellison’s robust record collection and deep love of jazz music.
RALPH ELLISON MONUMENT 20TH ANNIVERSARY CELEBRATION (IN–PERSON)
SUNDAY, APRIL 30, AT 2PM
RALPH ELLISON MONUMENT (IN FRONT OF 730 RIVERSIDE DRIVE)
ADMISSION: FREE
A 20th anniversary celebration of Elizabeth Catlett’s 15-foot memorial in Ralph Ellison honor, outside Ralph and Fanny Ellison’s long-standing former home. Local jazz musicians and writers will perform a curated line-up of jazz tunes and poems. Friends and neighbors will gather outside the monument, in celebratory remembrance of the couple’s life.
Harlem Stage, Maysles Documentary Center, The National Jazz Museum in Harlem, The Studio Museum in Harlem, The Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, and the Ralph Ellison Memorial Committee give special thanks to The Ralph and Fanny Ellison Charitable Trust and the Gordon Parks Foundation for their support of this unique series.
Ralph Ellison Memorial Committee Ralph Ellison Memorial Committee and Maysles Documentary Center PresentOver the course of the 2022/2023 season, Harlem Stage examines the Black Arts Movement of the 1960s to the 1970s, and its relationship to race, gender, sexuality, music, photography, film, poetry, theater, and dance, as well as its intersectionality with the larger Black Power Movement.
Learn more and buy tickets at harlemstage.org/black-arts-movement-examined
Photos by Kwame Brathwaite
This program is supported, in part, by public funds from The New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in Partnership with the City Council.
Harlem Stage’s Programs are made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature.
This project is supported in part by an award from the National Endowment for the Arts.
Harlem Stage is the performing arts center that bridges Harlem’s cultural legacy to contemporary artists of color and dares to provide the artistic freedom that gives birth to new ideas.
For nearly 40 years our singular mission has been to perpetuate and celebrate the unique and diverse artistic legacy of Harlem and the indelible impression it has made on American culture. We provide opportunity, commissioning, and support for artists of color, make performances easily accessible to all audiences, and introduce children to the rich diversity, excitement, and inspiration of the performing arts.
We fulfill our mission through commissioning, incubating, and presenting innovative and vital work that responds to the historical and contemporary conditions that shape our lives and the communities we serve.
Courtney F. Lee-Mitchell, President
Jamie Cannon, Vice President
Michael Young, Secretary
Mark Thomas, Treasurer
Angela Glover Blackwell
Jenna Bond
Jamila Ponton Bragg
Staff
Patricia Cruz, Artistic Director & CEO
Eric Oberstein, Managing Director
Shamar Hill, Director of Development
Shanté Skyers, Associate Director of Development
Julianna Friedman, Development Manager
Carl Hancock Rux, Associate Artistic Director/Curator-in-Residence
Sarah McCaffery, Programming Manager and Associate Curator
Maurice Ivy, Programming Associate
Ashley Areche, Programming & Management Intern
Deirdre May, Senior Director of Digital Content and Marketing
Andre Padayhag, Marketing Manager and Graphic Designer
Ashabi Owagboriaye, Social Media Manager
Jordan Carter, Education & Community Engagement Manager
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Amanda K. Ringger, Director of Production
Clarence Taylor, Lighting Operator
Orlando Alvarado, Audio Engineer
Gabriel Fequiere Jr., Video Operator
David Barrett, Julio Collado, Deck, Lighting, and Audio Crew
JoAnn K. Chase
Patricia Cruz
Hugh Dancy and Claire Danes
Jenette Kahn
Rebecca Robertson
LaChanze Sapp-Gooding
Tamara Tunie
Rodney Bissessar, Director of Operations
Lamont Askins, Operations Associate
Acey Anderson Sr., Maintenance
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DAS Services, IT Consultant
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Development Consultant
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Nobar De leon, Toma Carthens, Marlon Moncrieffe, Julian Norales, Miriam Hernandez, Robert Gibbons