Anthony R. Green
The creative output of Anthony R. Green (b. 1984; composer, performer, social justice artist) includes musical and visual creations, interpretations of original works or works in the repertoire, collaborations, educational outreach, and more. Behind all of his artistic endeavours are the ideals of equality and freedom, which manifest themselves in diverse ways in a composition, a performance, a collaboration, or social justice work.
As a composer, his works have been presented in over 25 countries across six continents by various internationally acclaimed soloists and ensembles, including: vocalists Anthony P. McGlaun, Julian Otis, Anna Elder, and Amanda DeBoer Bartlett; violists Ashleigh Gordon, Gregory Williams, Carrie Frey, and Wendy Richman; pianists Stephen Drury, Kathleen Supové, Jason Hardink, Kimi Kawashima, Lewis Warren Jr., Clare Longendyke, Hayk Melikyan, and Eunmi Ko; cellists Matthieu D’Ordine, Patricia Ryan, and Ifetayo Ali-Landing; percussionists Bill Solomon, Michael Skillern, and Dame Evelyn Glennie; saxophonists Neal Postma, Benjamin Sorrell, and Kendra Williams; and ensembles Tenth Intervention (Hajnal Pivnick – violin, and Adam Tendler – piano), ALEA III (with Gunther Schuller, conductor), the Thalea String Quartet, Ensemble Dal Niente, Dinosaur Annex, and Play.
As a performer, he has appeared at venues in the US, Cyprus, France, the Netherlands, the UK, Israel, Germany, Norway, Switzerland, Turkey, South Korea, and Ghana, premiering original works and working with students, emerging, and established composers. His recent engagement in performance art and divergent theatre has yielded presentations of such works in Berlin (Spike Gallery), New York City (Union Square for the Art in Odd Places Normal Project, 2021; JACK in Brooklyn for the 2021 Radical Acts Festival), Oslo (Kulturkirken Jakob for the Periferien “SITES AND SOUNDS” project), and in Kumasi, Ghana.
Through music, text, and entrepreneurship, Green comments on many issues related to social justice. Such issues have included: immigration (Earned – narrator & double string quartet), civil rights (Dona Nobis Veritatem – soprano, viola, & piano), the historical links between slavery and current racial injustice in the US (Oh, Freedom! – spoken word, voice, flute, viola, cello), the contributions of targeted and/or minority groups to humanity (A Single Voice: Solitary, Unified – solo alto sax & fixed media), and more.
His ongoing opera project Alex in Transition highlights the life of Alex – a trans woman – and her journey to truth and authentic living. Other social justice works include short cabaret operas, which are comedic-yet-piquant critiques on capitalism via corporations (one of which was premiered by Strange Trace for their 2021 Stencils Festival); His Mind & What He Heard in Central Park in the Late 90s for solo voice, concerning a gay Black man’s encounters with queer racism and toxic exotification (premiered by Anna Elder at the 2019 Conference: Music & Erotics at the University of Pittsburgh); To Anacreon in the US for solo piano, concerning nationalism – especially US “patriotism” and more.
Green’s most important social justice work has been with Castle of Our Skins, a concert and education series organisation dedicated to celebrating Black artistry through music. Co-founder, associate artistic director, and composer-in-residence, his work with Castle of our Skins has included concert/workshop curation and development, community outreach, lecturing about the history and politics concerning Black composers of classical music, commissioning and supporting young, emerging, and established composers, curating the BIBA (Beauty in Black Artistry) Blog, and more.