Songs by Aaron Copland, Franz Schubert, Margaret Bonds, John Musto, Nina Simone o.a.

Indian-American pianist and former BBC Young Generation Artist Kunal Lahiry and Grammy Award-winning tenor Frederick Ballentine are creating a space and a song programme at the Konzerthaus for the Berlin voguing community, an important subculture for Black and LGBTQ communities. Still socially marginalised in the 1970s and 80s, queer black and Latino New Yorkers developed the dance style ‘voguing’ as a way of expressing and finding themselves artistically. The so-called ballrooms are about more than just good music and dance: the stage becomes an emotional catwalk for the conquest of respect, recognition and belonging. On this evening, Lahiry and Ballentine will lead the proceedings from the stage and invite the ballroom community to experience a deeply moving programme of songs ranging from classical composers to traditional spirituals and songs from the AIDS Quilt Songbook to artists such as Nina Simone. It will be a concert like no other, a bridge between two worlds and a moment to understand and commemorate the lost generation of black and LGBTQ people as well as give a voice and stage to the current generation. It illustrates, as Ballentine puts it, ‘our separation from the whole, our constant oppression, our lost loves and souls – but, most beautifully, our resilience.’