Founding Mothers

PROTESTRA will present a concert on Saturday, June 27 at 2 PM at St. Paul and St. Andrew United Methodist Church (263 W. 86th St.). Titled “Founding Mothers,” the program will feature works by contemporary and historic American women composers in an effort to equalize the frequent gender imbalance of traditional July 4th concert programming. Tickets are $30 general admission, $10 for students, and PROTESTRA will donate proceeds to two NYC-based charities whose work supports and uplifts women and girls: Hour Children and Girls for Gender Equity.

The concert will be led by PROTESTRA Music Director and Founder, Michelle Rofrano, and newly-appointed PROTESTRA Associate Conductor, Kamna Gupta. The program will feature two world premieres of works by two women composers living and working in NYC. Both pieces were commissioned by the American Composers Forum as part of their multi-year Recomposing America initiative. Timed with the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, Recomposing America aims to refresh and reimagine the “who,” “what,” and “why” of the United States and the stories therein. 

These two new orchestral works highlight concepts of girlhood and womanhood as they relate to the history and future of America. Matriarch, by PROTESTRA Associate Conductor Danielle Jagelski, was written in honor of the knowledge systems created and sustained by the enduring wisdom of indigenous female leadership. The other premiere, JL Marlor’s YELLFIRE, features voice and electric guitar alongside the orchestra and explores female rage becoming a force of transformation.

The whole concert is a nod to women from around the world who have shaped American history and culture. It will include Allegro, one of the rare existing orchestral works by French composer Nadia Boulanger, who as composition professor trained some of the most well-known American composers of the 20th century. PROTESTRA will also pay tribute to “women who are adventurous and take risks” with composer Joan Tower’s Sixth Fanfare for the Uncommon Woman. 

The PROTESTRA Wind Quintet will perform Pastorale, a poignant meditation on nature by the earliest prominent American woman composer, Amy Beach. A staple of contemporary woodwind repertoire follows: Umoja (“Unity”) by renowned contemporary flutist and composer Valerie Coleman, inspired by the African-American celebration of Kwanzaa. The program closes with Florence Price’s Symphony No. 4, the final symphony composed by the first African-American woman to have her work premiered by a top American orchestra. 

If you are unable to attend the concert but would still like to contribute to the crowdfunding campaign for Hour Children and Girls for Gender Equity, you may donate here.

More About the Commissions:

Matriarch by Danielle Jagelski honors the knowledge systems created and sustained by the enduring wisdom of female leadership. These systems honor a diversity of abilities, roles, and ways of knowing. They resist binaries of any kind and instead center the sacredness of kinship. Within these frameworks, the goal is not just “survival,” but to thrive in ways that keep a community healthy — through nourishment, connection, artistry, and innovation. A care that extends to all generations to come.

YELLFIRE is a single-movement orchestral work by JL Marlor exploring women’s rage and the ways girls are taught to swallow anger, frustration, and intensity rather than express it outwardly. The piece moves through a series of volatile and contrasting sound worlds that trace how suppressed emotion is redirected inward, often manifesting as control, thinness, silence, or self-erasure. It culminates in a final section for voice and electric guitar, as Marlor joins the orchestra, merging personal voice with orchestral force.

About Danielle Jagelski

Danielle Jagelski is an award winning composer and conductor. Her work has been performed around the world including Roulette Intermedium, The National Gallery of Art, Performance Space New York, and Green Room 42. Recent and upcoming commissions include works for Portland Opera, American Composers Forum, Voices of Ascension, New Native Theatre, North American Indigenous Songbook, Colleen Bernstein, CUNY-Segal Center, MoreArt, Lorena Navarro, and Michigan State University.

Recent and upcoming conducting engagements include Voiceless Mass by Raven Chacon with International Contemporary Ensemble, NextGen3 with Beth Morrison Projects, Amistad by Anthony Davis with Harlem Opera Theatre, and Indians of Vacation with Edmonton Opera. She is currently associate conductor for The Witcher In Concert live-to-concert National tour. Danielle is the Artistic Director of Renegade Opera and received grants from Opera America, Native Arts and Cultures Foundation, and Oregon Community Foundation.

About JL Marlor

JL Marlor (she/they) is a Brooklyn-based composer, electric guitarist, and songwriter whose work “churns with fury” (The Washington Post.) JL is known for her relentless exploration of girlhood and rage, drawing from the worlds of riot grrrl punk and DIY punk. Their operatic work has been commissioned by Washington National Opera and American Opera Projects, and has been performed by JACK Quartet, Wet Ink Ensemble, LoftOpera and more. In 2021, JL was named a Toulmin Creator in collaboration with National Sawdust for her work with youth to songs and lyrics for the first time as a pathway to empowerment and activism. She is a frequent performer in her own works, as an electric guitarist and a frontwoman. Beyond her work as a composer, JL performs with her indie rock band Tenderheart Bitches, which was hailed as “arriving on the indie rock scene with something serious to say” by The Wild Honeypie and was listed in Them’s 2021 list of best new songs written by queer artists.

ABOUT PROTESTRA

PROTESTRA (protest + orchestra) is a grassroots orchestra based in NYC that bridges the divide between advocacy and classical music. Since 2017, PROTESTRA has educated audiences about contemporary issues of social justice through orchestral performances, donating a portion of ticket proceeds to mission- and policy-driven nonprofit organizations related to the concerts’ themes. ​​Since September 2020, PROTESTRA has held ten issue-centered benefit concerts that have reached several thousand in-person and online viewers, collectively raised $50,000+ in audience donations for nonprofit beneficiaries, and provided $44,000+ of paid work to 300+ musicians.

ABOUT AMERICAN COMPOSERS FORUM

ACF’s mission is to support and advocate for individuals and groups creating music today by demonstrating the vitality and relevance of their art. We do this by empowering composers, modeling creative partnerships, and advocating for new music through storytelling and connections. Working with an ecosystem of artists, programmers, presenters, teachers, funders, and audiences, we frame all of our work with a commitment to anti-racism, believing that creating a fairer world for artists benefits all of us.

Founded in 1973 by composers Libby Larsen and Stephen Paulus as the Minnesota Composers Forum, the organization continues to invest in its Minnesota home while connecting artists and advocates across the United States, its territories, and beyond. ACF frames our work with a focus on anti-racism and includes within that scope (but does not limit it to) equitable engagement of diverse gender identities, musical approaches and perspectives, religions, ages, (dis)abilities, cultures, backgrounds, sexual orientations, and broad definitions of “American.” Visit www.composersforum.org for more information.

Recomposing America is a multi-year initiative led by American Composers Forum that highlights artistic perspectives unique to the United States and the broader Americas through direct commissions, institutional collaborations, and public dialogue. Timed with the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, Recomposing America aims to refresh and reimagine the “who,” “what,” and “why” of the United States, and the stories therein.

Music has always told the story of the United States. From anthems that forged unity and protest songs that challenged power, to the intimate soundtracks of our daily lives, music composition is a vessel to chart the stories, ideas, and origins of people and communities. Recomposing America is a platform that expands on this legacy by centering the role of music in our past and future stories — an evolving score shaped by many people and cultures across the U.S.