Concert 2: Songs by African American Women Composers - Friday 24th October, 7pm
Francesca Chiejina - soprano
Lea Shaw - mezzo-soprano
Nigel Foster - piano
Michaella Moore - speaker

This concert pays tribute to the wonderful heritage of African American women composers, and the struggles they have had to make their voices heard. Songs by Florence Price, Margaret Bonds, B E Boykin, Dorothy Rudd Moore, Jacqueline Hairston, Betty Jackson-King and Nkeiru Okoye, and by the Native American composer Martha Redbone, will be performed alongside readings of the words of women who played a part in the Civil Rights Movement. The voices of these women have, with the notable exception of Rosa Parks, been largely forgotten, and this programme, devised by LSF Director Nigel Foster, seeks to redress that balance. This concert is a plea for equality and for the rights of all human beings, whatever their skin-colour, to be respected and embraced.

Nigerian American soprano Francesca Chiejina is a graduate of the Jette Parker Young Artist programme at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden and winner of the 2023 UK Critics’ Circle Young Talent (Voice) Award. She has sung with the BBC Symphony and Royal Philharmonic Orchestras and the Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal and leading roles with Scottish Opera, Grange Park Opera and ETO, and at the BBC Proms.
Lea Shaw was born in Denver, Colorado, and was an Emerging Artist for Scottish Opera 2021-22. She has sung at the St Magnus Festival and Edinburgh International Festival.
Nigel Foster has performed at Wigmore Hall, the South Bank Centre, Barbican Centre, Royal Opera House Covent Garden (Crush Bar) and across Europe as well as in North and South America, Japan, Malaysia and New Zealand, playing for singers including Roderick Williams, Dame Sarah Connolly, Nicky Spence, Nadine Benjamin, Kate Royal, Lotte Betts-Dean, James Gilchrist, Julien Van Mellaerts, Ashley Riches, Simon Wallfisch, Louise Winter, and Elizabeth Llewellyn.
Michaella Moore is from Delaware, USA. She is a graduate of East 15 Acting School, and her recent credits include; for stage, The Colour Purple (Bridewell Theatre), Prison Plaits (Tower Theatre); for Film/TV, Bank of Dave 2: The Lone Ranger, and Too Much (both Netflix).