Cultural Caravan & the Future of Chamber Music: Can’t Take My Soul

· The Cultural Caravan rolls into town for a concert featuring this year’s guest artist, the award-winning violinist Njioma Grevious accompanied by Alex Gonzalez (violin), Jordan Bak (violin), Josh Halpern (cello), and Elliot Wuu (piano). The program will span more than two centuries showcasing the energy and artistry of a new generation of classical musicians. Purchase Tickets $18 general admission, $15 members About the Program As Njioma dreamed of the program she wished to bring to the Cultural Caravan, she returned to a provocative musical seed: “At the Purchaser’s Option”, by Rhiannon Giddens. Based on a 19th-century advertisement offering an enslaved 22-year-old mother and, “at the purchaser’s option,” her nine-month-old baby, Giddens gives voice to the mother’s anguish and defiance: “You can take my blood but not my soul.” Can’t Take My Soul honors those who used music to preserve the identity and agency others sought to deny them. The program continues with Germaine Tailleferre’s String Quartet in Three Movements, written during World War I. Despite paternal opposition, destructive marriages, financial instability, and a lifetime spent in the shadow of male colleagues, Tailleferre forged a distinguished career; this concise, brilliant quartet testifies to her resilience. Mozart’s E-flat Piano Quartet represents an artistic refusal of another kind. After his first commissioned piano quartet proved too difficult and serious for amateur musicians—and sold so poorly that his publisher asked him to stop—Mozart wrote a second without compromising its sophistication: an audacious creative double-down. The program concludes with Robert Schumann’s groundbreaking Piano Quintet, Op. 44. Its almost symphonic brilliance emerged during an extraordinarily productive period, even as Schumann’s intense imagination foreshadowed the mental illness that would eventually overwhelm him. An enslaved mother facing separation from her child; a woman composer resisting generations of misogyny; a prodigy defying the marketplace; and an innovator struggling with his own mind: none lived the lives they might have chosen. Yet each held fast to something authentically their own. Their music survives their circumstances—and continues to tell their stories. About the Artist Praised for her expressive tones and elegant playing with the National Symphony Orchestra (Washington, DC), violinist Njioma Chinyere Grevious is a passionate and versatile solo, chamber, and orchestral musician. She received the prestigious 2024 Avery Fisher Career Grant. A 2021 graduate of The Juilliard School, Grevious was awarded the John Erskine Prize for scholastic and artistic achievement. In 2023 she won the Robert F. Smith First Prize and the Audience Choice awards in the Sphinx Competition Senior Division, as well as the Grand Prize of the Concert Artists Guild (CAG) and the Young Classical Artist Trust (YCAT) CAG Elmaleh Competition. As a soloist, during the 2024–25 season Grevious made her debut at the Amsterdam Concertgebouw with the Brussels Philharmonic, and at Carnegie Hall with the Sphinx Virtuosi. She has performed in solo recitals and chamber music concerts across the United States. Born in Newton, Massachusetts, Njioma Chinyere Grevious began violin studies at age four, and was a scholarship recipient through Boston’s Project STEP string training program for Black and Latino youth. For five years, the Cultural Caravan has been integrating high-level performance into the everyday life of Boulder County—activating parks, food banks, bookstores, libraries, cafés, galleries, affordable housing, and other underserved public spaces through curated pop-up concerts as well as world-class MainStage experiences. The Caravan’s year-round season draws together local artists as well as those from around the world in partnership with area businesses, municipal organizations, and social-service nonprofits. This program is part of our Thursday Nights @ the Museum series. Join us every Thursday from Sept. 3 until Dec. 10 for concerts, films, and free talks in the Longmont Museum’s Stewart Auditorium. Explore more Thursday Nights @ the Museum programs Add to calendar Google Calendar iCalendar Outlook 365 Outlook Live