If you’ve followed the festival for a while, you know that we’re not just about putting great artists on stage to perform for you. We encourage you to jump in and sing, dance, tell stories and to learn a bit about diverse performing artforms and about how people from all walks of life express themselves creatively.
One of the events we’re most excited about this year is a workshop called Sing Like a Bird, led by renowned choral master and conductor Marika Kuzma. It’s an hourlong program in which Kuzma will free up your voice, lead joyful singing and, with her quartet, teach a simple Ukrainian song. It starts at 5 p.m. on Saturday, September 23, on the festival’s interactive stage on the Guilford Green.
Kuzma led the choral program at the University of California-Berkeley for 25 years and has led choirs in performances around the globe, in venues such as Carnegie Hall, Los Angeles’ Disney Hall, Pixar Studios, St. Stephen’s Cathedral in Vienna, Montreal’s Place des Arts and Brazil’s Sala Sao Paolo.
Of Ukrainian descent, Kuzma has gained recognition for her scholarship, performances and recordings of Slavic music. In honor of her Ukrainian heritage, we’ll be collecting freewill donations for the Yale-based Doctors United for Ukraine and World Central Kitchen Ukraine, a charity run by Chef Jose Andres that feeds refugees from Russia’s war with Ukraine.