Listen!

Join us on Saturday, September 7, 2024, when Saint Paul Almanac and Walker|West Music Academy unite to present Listen! An Evening of Poetry and Music. The performance will inspire a joyful evening brimming with a fusion and rhythm of sounds—an eclectic, dynamic flow of genres, moods, and styles—to edify and delight the Ordway audience.  

Listen! will spotlight Almanac poets Marie Chanté, Arleta Little, Ardie Ann Medina, David Mendez, Michael Kiesow Moore, Loren Niemi, Gabriela Spears-Rico, Mary Turck, Clarence White, and Nerys Zimmerman. Walker|West music instructor and band leader Kevin Washington will lead an ensemble of Walker|West faculty, including Jack Breen, Kavyesh Kaviraj, Ted Olsen, and Solomon Parham, to build a musical soundscape in concert with the poets. This unique performance will enrich both artists and audiences alike.

On September 7, Saint Paul Almanac will launch a year-long celebration of its 20th year anniversary. An America’s Cultural Treasures award recipient, Saint Paul Almanac is a literary arts nonprofit organization that builds and supports an inclusive community of new, emerging, and established poets, writers, editors, and videographers for collaborative change.  

Founded in 1988, Walker|West Music Academy is one of the oldest African American community conservatories in the United State. It continues to foster a diverse community rooted in the African American cultural experience, where everyone from infants to elders can explore, perform, and grow through music. A Regional Cultural Treasures award recipient, the work of Walker|West Music Academy continues to flourish. Due to a successful three-year capital campaign that began in 2021, “The Power of Music to Heal Our Community,” Walker|West will move into its new state-of-the art facility in the Rondo community during the fall of 2024.