Monday, March 21, 2022 at 7:30 p.m. | FREE CONCERT | First-Centenary United Methodist Church
“A Speck of Light” is a unique concert blending music, poetry, and spoken-word performance. Sponsored by CHI Memorial and UTC, the primary focus of this event is using the Arts to bring positive attention to behavioral health/mental health, and to a variety of services available locally for mental health. At the heart of the concert is a poetry cycle by American poet Jane Kenyon, titled “Having It Out with Melancholy.” Dr. Jonathan McNair (Ruth S. Holmberg Professor of American Music) composed a new musical work in response to these poems, reflecting through sound-imagery many feelings and thoughts from the poetry. The poems will be read aloud before and in-between the five sections of the music.
Erika Roberts will perform a new Spoken-Word piece she created for this event, and the UTC Women’s Chorale will also perform. Chyela Rowe, Director of Arts Therapies and Well-being at CHI Memorial, will give a brief address on creativity and mental health.
Performers: The Unheard-of//Ensemble, based in New York, including Clarinet, Violin, ‘Cello, and Piano. They are “a group that has been doing more than their part to inject vitality into the new music scene for the last few years” (Jeremy Shatan, “An Earful.”)
~Erika Roberts, a poet and Spoken-Word artist, will perform a new poem she has created for this event. Erika is also a collaborative artist, and in 2020 served as a creative strategist with the City of Chattanooga, helping to shape an artistic vision and creative process of the city’s projects and systems.
~The UTC Women’s Chorale, directed by Dr. Allison Allerton, will perform “Never One Thing” by May Erlewine, with percussion and piano accompaniment. Dr. Allerton is in demand as a choral clinician and presenter.
This event will be held Monday, March 21, 2022 at 7:30 p.m. at First-Centenary United Methodist Church (418 Oak St., 37403) in the sanctuary. Admission is free and open to the public. This facility is handicap accessible. For more information, call (423) 425-4679.
In addition to the generous sponsorship from CHI Memorial, funding is provided by:
– the Ruth S. Holmberg Professorship in American Music
– the UTC Honors College
– the UTC Chancellor’s Office.
Community partners in this event include:
– CHI Memorial Arts Therapies and Well-being Center
– Tennessee Suicide Prevention Network
– NAMI of Chattanooga (National Alliance on Mental Illness).
– Volunteer Behavioral Health
Campus partners include:
– UTC Counseling Center
– UTC Center for Wellbeing
– UTC chapter of Psi Chi (student honor society in Psychology)
– the MSW Program at UTC
– UTC Music Therapy programs.
Representatives of each of these agencies and groups will be present at the concert and offer information to interested persons in the lobby of the venue after the concert.