Oscar nominee, five-time Grammy-winner and 2018 USA Fellow trumpeter/composer Terence Blanchard has been a consistent artistic force for making powerful musical statements concerning painful American tragedies—past and present. From his expansive work composing the scores for Spike Lee films, Blanchard has interwoven melodies that created strong backdrops to human stories. 

In the summer of 2019, Blanchard’s second opera, Fire Shut Up in My Bones, with a libretto by Kasi Lemmons, was premiered by the Opera Theatre of Saint Louis. The opera, based on the 2014 memoir of the same title by Charles Blow, was expanded with added dance sequences and opened the Metropolitan Opera’s 2021-2022 season. Blanchard is the first Black composer to have an opera performed at the Metropolitan Opera since its founding in 1883.

For this event, Blanchard will unite his internationally acclaimed band The E-Collective with the double-Grammy-winning Turtle Island Quartet for an unforgettable night of music.

Student Pricing: $15 tickets available in-person at the Cal Poly Ticket Office with student ID

Sponsored by Mary Kay Harrington & Thom Brajkovich, Michael J. Wilson & Dr. Elaine Yin, KCBX FM