Songs of Resilience

Overview

Special Guest Hosts:
Katherine Duncan and Mark Tewksbury

Songs of Resilience aims to uplift and empower the audience, while providing an opportunity to foster connections and a broader understanding amongst community.

Casting a contemporary queer eye on a century’s worth of popular song, the Queer Songbook Orchestra reveal the LGBTQ backstories and personal narratives that richly populate the music of the past several generations. Building a living archive of songs by queer songwriters and performers, the ensemble is drawing attention to the stories and contributions of artists who worked and lived in the shadow of intolerance.

Exploring an element of collective memory, the QSO express personal stories of individuals from within the community relating to songs that have had particular resonance with them. This intimate element of the project examines the elusive nature of song and the pockets of memory where they tuck away, highlighting music as a source of personal pleasure and communal comfort; a private balm and a generational bond.