IMANI UZURI

Imani Uzuri, raised in rural North Carolina, is an award-winning vocalist, composer, librettist, improviser and conceptual artist called “a postmodernist Bessie Smith” by The Village Voice. She composes, performs and creates interdisciplinary works including concerts, ritual performances, albums, sound installations and compositions for chamber ensembles, voice and theater (including experimental and musical theater). As a Jerome Foundation Composer/Sound Artist Fellow and a Camargo Foundation (Cassis, France) Composer- in-Residence, Uzuri made international sojourns in support of her forthcoming ritual opera celebrating the holy and oft controversial iconography of the Black Madonna, which she is currently developing as a HERE Artist Residency Program (HARP) Fellow. Uzuri has been commissioned by Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity, The Ford Foundation, Harvard Fromm Players and her recent Chamber Music America New Jazz Works commission She Knows Suite premiered at Lincoln Center Atrium. Uzuri received her MFA from Goddard College Vermont and her M.A. in African American Studies from Columbia University. The New York Times calls her work “stirring” and Time Out New York says “Uzuri never fails to mesmerize audiences with her narcotic blend…of ethereal sounds.”