Imani Uzuri, raised in rural North Carolina, is an award-winning vocalist, composer, librettist, and improviser called “a postmodernist Bessie Smith” by the Village Voice. She creates interdisciplinary works and performs at international venues and festivals. Her ritual performance Wild Cotton was recently cited as one “with subtlety and vision” by The New York Times. Uzuri was a recent commissioned composer for Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity. In 2019, Uzuri was a Jerome Foundation Composer-in-Residence at Camargo Foundation in Cassis and is currently a Chamber Music America New Jazz Works commissionee. Uzuri is the founder and artistic director of Revolutionary Choir,  intergenerational singing gatherings teaching historical and new freedom/protest songs to communities around the globe. Time Out New York says, “Uzuri never fails to mesmerize.”