Date: Jan 04, 2012

Concert Takes Audience on The Underground Railroad

Original Work by Prof. Nkeiru Okoye Helps Hofstra Celebrate African American History Month

Hofstra University, Hempstead, NY ...  The vocal talents of students, both from Hofstra and Hempstead High School, will combine with that of professional singers and noted musicians in a production titled A Ride on The Underground Railroad. The performance features music from an original opera, Songs of Harriet Tubman, by Hofstra Music Professor Nkeiru Okoye, as well as world premieres and familiar works also centered around themes of freedom and courage.

Dr. Nkeiru Okoye. Photo by Kenneth Royster.

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This concert, presented by the Department of Music and the D'Addario Music Foundation and the D'Addario Music Appreciation Initiative in cooperation with the the Joseph G. Astman International Concert Series in honor of African American History Month, will be performed on Sunday, February 5, 2012, at 3 p.m. at the John Cranford Adams Playhouse.

Dr. Okoye is an adjunct assistant professor of music at Hofstra. A Long Island resident of African American and Nigerian descent, Dr. Okoye will also provide narration during this performance which – in addition to music from Songs of Harriet Tubman – includes Wade in the Water, arranged by Hofstra Professor of Music Chandler Carter; the world premiere of a piece by composer and conductor Julius Williams and a Joplin Rag performed by pianist and composer Roy Eaton.

Also featured are spirituals performed by the Hofstra University Chamber Choir with students from the Hempstead High School Select Chorale; members of the Hofstra University Orchestra; tenor Robert Anthony Mack, who will perform Wendell Logan’s Runagate, Runagate; and contralto Nicole Mitchelle, who will perform a new arrangement of Go Down Moses, written for this occasion. Soprano Diana Solomon-Glover will perform Dr. Okoye’s Songs of Harriet Tubman.

This production of A Ride on the Underground Railroad has been made possible by a generous grant from the D’Addario Music Foundation, the D’Addario Music Appreciation Initiative. Additional sponsors include the Hofstra Cultural Center, Hofstra College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, Hofstra’s Office of Multicultural and International Student Programs, NOAH Program, Hofstra University Honors College, Department of Anthropology and the National Center for Suburban Studies at Hofstra University®, the Hofstra chapter of the NAACP, and the Black Student Union.

Tickets are $15, $12 for senior citizens (over 65 with ID); $5 matriculated non-Hofstra students with ID. Hofstra University students may receive one free ticket upon presentation of their current HofstraCard. Hofstra faculty and staff may receive up to two tickets upon presentation of their current HofstraCard. For tickets and more information visit or call the Hofstra Box Office at (516) 463-6644, Monday through Friday, 11 a.m.-3:45 p.m.

Hofstra University is a dynamic private institution of higher education where more than 12,000 full and part-time students choose from undergraduate and graduate offerings in liberal arts and sciences, business, engineering, communication, education, health and human services, honors studies, a School of Law and the Hofstra North Shore-LIJ School of Medicine.

Read the article about Dr. Okoye in The New York Times - January 29, 2011:

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/29/nyregion/a-ride-on-the-underground-railroad-at-hofstra-recalls-harriet-tubman.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=nkeiru&st=cse

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