Juneteenth LP
Juneteenth LP is a Harlem, NYC-based music collective whose mission is to share the sounds of the African Diaspora through the unique lens of Black classically trained musicians with a focus on access, outreach and community building through music. Continually pushing boundaries in their musical and lecture offerings, Juneteenth LP brings together unexpected classical music and brilliantly crafted arrangements of more popular repertoire for a refreshing take on live performances and educational music experiences.
Our popular annual Juneteenth Celebration Concert at Joe's Pub in downtown Manhattan has grown into a week-long series of concert events across New York. This bold, expansive effort was made possible by a 2024 Creative Engagement grant from the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council (LMCC) and a 2024 grant from the Aaron Copland Fund.
Origins: Juneteenth LP’s Annual Juneteenth Celebration Concert at Joe’s Pub
This event was born out of the desire to introduce audiences to often under-represented repertoire of the African diaspora. The significance of such a concert on this date is profound.
On June 19, 1865, in Galveston, Texas, Union Army General Gordon Granger stood on the balcony of the Ashton Villa and read General Order No. 3 announcing the complete emancipation of slaves as articulated in the Emancipation Proclamation signed into law by President Lincoln just a few years earlier. His reading of the order, buttressed by the presence of a couple thousand Union soldiers announced and guaranteed the freedom of every slave. Juneteenth is first and foremost a celebration of freedom and in the case of our particular Juneteenth concert, it is a celebration of what black musicians did and continue to do with that freedom. It is the celebration of women and men from then to now, who decided that against all odds, they would pick up a violin, a conductor’s baton or a composer’s pen; it is a celebration of women and men who chose a life of creativity in music when most of the world was determined to tell them in myriad ways, big and small, that they could not and that they should not.
In our performances, we give cultural context and historical background to each work, so that audience members can experience a deeper connection to, and appreciation of, the music. The work of Juneteenth LP is four-fold, involving 1) archival research of black classical composers, 2) an educational aspect with a focus on creating learning modules for use in any school system, 3) performances, with the kind of genre-defying programming that invites and welcomes non-traditional audiences into traditional concert spaces and traditional audiences into non-traditional concert spaces and eventually, 4) commissioning new works for our ensemble, thereby growing the chamber music repertoire by African Diaspora composers.
Nnenna Ogwo
Founder & Artistic Director
Eric Cooper
Communications and Production Director