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WEEK of February 4, 2008
@BFS! archives

Celebrating the Heart, Soul, and Intellect of The Harlem Renaissance: BFS African-American Celebration on Friday, February 8

For the 13th consecutive year, Brooklyn Friends School celebrates the diversity of its community and the distinctive cultural contributions arising out of the African diaspora at its annual African-American Celebration, 6:00 pm on Friday, February 8. This year’s theme is “The Harlem Renaissance,” and the featured presentation is Mickey Davidson and Company in “Swingin’ in Time.”

This joyful and exuberant family celebration takes place at the school’s 375 Pearl Street building. Tickets are $20 for adults, $10 for children and $55 for a family of four. All members of the broader community are invited to attend, with tickets available in the lobby of 375 Pearl Street the days before and at the door on the day of the celebration.

Having already celebrated rhythm and the blues, jazz, Caribbean pan music, dance theater, and the lives of Harriett Tubman and Frederick Douglass, the school’s volunteer planning committee turns its attention to The Harlem Renaissance, an outstanding cultural movement out of which emerged a proliferation of black intellectuals, writers, musicians, actors, and visual artists. Although scholars have differing views on when it began and ended, most agree that the movement was at its height between the dawning of the Jazz Age in 1919 and the stock market crash in 1929. Among the luminaries associated with the Harlem Renaissance are W.E.B. Du Bois, James Weldon Johnson, Marcus Garvey, Claude McKay, Langston Hughes, Marian Anderson, Bessie Smith, Marian Anderson, Zora Neale Hurston, Josephine Baker, Countee Cullen, Duke Ellington, and Fats Waller.

The Harlem Renaissance celebration begins with a soul food buffet dinner in the Cafeteria at 6:00 pm followed by a performance by dancer/choreographer Mickey Davidson and Company in “Swingin’ in Time.” An award-winning dancer, choreographer, and educator, Mickey Davidson has performed throughout the United States and around the world with numerous dance companies. For 17 years, she taught jazz dance and tap as an artist in residence at Wesleyan University. Her company, Mickey D and Friends, explores and performs the interlocking relationship between music and dance.

BFS family members, faculty staff, and students in grades 4-12 will have the opportunity to take part in a workshop series on swing dance with Alfredo Melendez; they will be invited to dance at the performance as well. Download a registration form for the swing dance workshop series.

Another dance and music workshop, on the poetry of Langston Hughes, will take place on Wednesday, February 12 with BFS teacher Marna Herrity. Download a registration form for this workshop.

Download the program for the evening’s events.

All proceeds will be directed to the African American Celebration Legacy Series at Brooklyn Friends School.