Kathleen Battle

In Celebration of African-American Music Appreciation Month

Experience a powerful evening of exploring traditional spirituals and writings by Harriet Tubman and Frederick Douglass through songs and readings.

Five-time Grammy Award-Winner, Kathleen Battle’s luminous voice has been called “ …without qualification, one of the very few most beautiful in the world.” (The Washington Post)

Throughout a remarkable career that has brought her to the stages of the world’s leading opera houses and major concert halls, critics have never tired of rhapsodizing over her limpid, unmistakable sound.

Since her student years, Kathleen Battle has collaborated with colleagues who rank among the world’s most talented musicians. She has been a favorite soloist with the world’s leading orchestras and esteemed conductors such as Herbert von Karajan, Sir Georg Solti, Riccardo Muti, James Levine, Claudio Abbado, Lorin Mazell, Seiji Ozawa, Leonard Slatkin, and Sir Neville Marriner. Her partnerships with soprano Jessye Norman, tenors Luciano Pavarotti and Plácido Domingo, violinist Itzhak Perlman, trumpeter Wynton Marsalis, guitarist Christopher Parkening, flautists Jean-Pierre Rampal and Hubert Laws, and the late saxophonist Grover Washington, Jr., to name but a few, are documented on numerous recordings and video discs.

Kathleen Battle won accolades for the world premiere of “*Honey and Rue*,” commissioned by Carnegie Hall for its 100th Anniversary, and written for her by Nobel Prize-winning author Toni Morrison and composer Andre Previn.

Kathleen Battle’s gifts as a singer extend beyond the realm of classical music. Her work as a great interpreter of spirituals is well documented. Always seeking to expand her artistic horizons, Ms. Battle was joined by stellar jazz musicians for her first crossover album, So Many Stars.

Ms. Battle has been inducted into the NAACP Image Award Hall of Fame, the Hollywood Bowl Hall of Fame, and was the first recipient of the Ray Charles Award, bestowed upon her in 2005 by Wilberforce University in Ohio.

In addition to 8 Honorary Doctorates, 5 Grammy Awards, and an Emmy Award, Ms. Battle was the first American to receive the Laurence Olivier Award, the British equivalent of a Tony Award.