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Cal Performances at Home is much more than a series of great streamed performances. Fascinating behind-the-scenes artist interviews. Informative and entertaining public forums. The Cal Performances Reading Room, featuring books with interesting connections to our Fall 2020 programs. For all this and much more, keep checking this page for frequent updates and to journey far, far Beyond the Stage!
Major support for Beyond the Stage is provided by Bank of America.
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Beyond the Stage
Classical Post Podcast: Jeremy Geffen on Building Community
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Classical Post Podcast: Jeremy Geffen on Building Community
“Building Community and Making Introductions Through the Performing Arts”
Interview of Jeremy Geffen, Cal Performances’ Executive and Artistic Director, by Jonathan Eifert, publisher and editor of Classical Post. This content is provided by Classical Post.
In August 2022, Jeremy Geffen was featured on Classical Post, a podcast, digital editorial platform, and newsletter run by the brilliant mind of Jonathan Eifert to “uncover the creativity behind exceptional music.” Other episodes feature leaders and music directors, composers, conductors, musicians, and more. You can view the article written about Jeremy’s interview on Eifert’s digital platform.
Transcript
Jonathan Eifert:
Music is central to our wellbeing. If you’re listening here, chances are you feel the same. The Classical Post podcast uncovers the creativity that exists behind great music. We believe music is interconnected with other art forms and life experiences. It doesn’t exist in a vacuum, but is often influenced by other sources. No matter who you are, cultivating your creativity is fundamental to being better in business and living a more holistic life. Discover more on this podcast. I’m your host, Jonathan Eifert. Thanks for joining me today, and I hope you find something valuable in this episode.
For Jeremy Geffen, Executive and Artistic Director of Cal Performances at UC Berkeley, bringing to life all of the organization’s artistic and educational activities, about 80 events per season, centers around ideas of building and serving communities across the Bay Area. Since arriving on the Berkeley campus in 2019, and during his 12-year tenure as Senior Director and Artistic Advisor of Carnegie Hall, Geffen has worked tirelessly to transform the people he serves through the power of the performing arts. That means first and foremost, making introductions to emerging artists whose new ideas can spark meaningful conversations. As Geffen points out, even the biggest artists with the longest relationships with Cal Performances, including Yo-Yo Ma, Jordi Savall, and the Mark Morris Dance Group, weren’t always stars. When they were just starting out, it was Cal Performances that helped to give them a toehold. And Geffen sees fostering growth in the artistic powerhouses of tomorrow as one of the most gratifying aspects of his role.
In this conversation, we discussed Cal Performances’ upcoming season and how its marquee Illuminations series will explore technology’s many roles in creative expression and human communication. Plus, Geffen opens up about why he sees classical music “as a type of regenerative spiritual health,” how therapy has helped him tap into the creativity of the subconscious mind, and why he heads to Manhattan’s East Village when it’s time to celebrate with sake in New York City.
Jeremy Geffen:
My name is Jeremy Geffen. I am the Executive and Artistic Director for Cal Performances, which is the presenting organization on the campus of UC Berkeley in California. We present music, dance, and drama from around the world, and have about 80 events from August until the beginning of May every season.
Jonathan Eifert:
Where do you find inspiration as a leader in the arts?
Jeremy Geffen:
So, I feel very fortunate to work in the arts because the performances that we hear and see, what we experience in the arts are in themselves the inspiration for leadership. I was a violist and I stopped playing because I had problems with my right hand. But I think about the different roles that I had as a musician, that there are performances in which you are part of a chamber ensemble, small ensemble on stage, and there is no specific, no defined leader for that event. It’s a shared leadership model like a string quartet. And there are performances where there is a conductor before you that is responsible for balancing all the elements simultaneously. So the responsibility is much more entrusted to a single individual.
And even within those performances, with different types of models, there are moments that you step out of those models. That one individual in the ensemble has a moment in the sun and takes on greater weight within the work, and then recedes the next moment to allow someone else that same opportunity. So I really feel that the types of performances that we enjoy as entertainment, or even transcendental spiritual nourishment, give us a lot of the templates that we need for leadership off the stage.
Jonathan Eifert:
And when you think about your, I guess, external things that are shaping your approach to leading an arts organization, is there, I don’t know, various things that you can point to?
Jeremy Geffen:
Well, certainly the thing that I can point to most over the past two-and-a-half years is COVID. Whether or not we wanted it to be part of the factors that determine our course, it is. And I think we’ve all, within the performing arts and just within the world in general, have had to give over levels of agency, and be more fluid with and flexible in the way that we operate. It’s been a constant exercise in determining how to serve and maintain public trust, what constitutes an acceptable risk, and what success looks like under vastly different circumstances than we would’ve had pre-pandemic. So that’s one of the factors that has shaped my approach to leading Cal Performances.
But the others, and this is not pandemic dependent: It’s building community, or actually, it’s probably more accurate to say, for an organization that presents the variety of work that we do, building communities. We need to lead in a way that reflects the needs of our communities and speak to the many different constituencies in languages that they’ll understand. Cal Performances, as I mentioned before, is part of UC Berkeley, and the greater campus community is about 60,000 people, maybe a little bit more, between students, faculty, and administrative staff. And we definitely have a portion of our mission that is geared specifically towards the campus and particularly towards students, but we’re also a public institution. Over half of our audiences have no relationship at all with UC Berkeley, other than coming to Cal Performances. So we speak to the greater Bay Area and the cultural scene within it.
Jonathan Eifert:
When—and, actually, to follow up on that question—do you find that area, being in the Bay Area and that kind of local culture, if you will, is shaping your artistic leadership or influences, or doesn’t it play a role? I’m curious to hear more as it relates to the local area.
Jeremy Geffen:
Absolutely. I mean, I think no two groups of people behave exactly the same. They may be similar. So what works well in New York may not work well in the Bay Area, and may not work well in Billings, Montana, just to choose another place, market at random—one, by the way, that I don’t understand at all or claim no understanding of. So absolutely, one has to be aware of patterns within your constituency, within the communities, what they seem to respond to and what they seem to want more of. And you have to balance that with your own artistic instincts as to what to introduce to a community.
It doesn’t take a lot of artistic administration chops to book a major superstar. They’re absolutely important in this, into the season, and they bring a lot of artistic value. But the bigger risk, and where I think one demonstrates the level of connection that one has to one’s community, is which artists you are going to introduce. And when I say introduce, I mean artists who are at the beginnings of their careers or may not have had exposure in the Bay Area. Because who you choose to present is what defines you as a presenter. So there have been artists who have been coming to Cal Performances since long before I arrived, like Jordi Savall, Yo-Yo Ma, the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, Mark Morris Dance Group, that are really part of who Cal Performances is. And I think our audience members feel that they have very close relationships with those artists, but it’s really important to remember that those artists at one point in their career were not superstars. They were just starting out and it was Cal Performances who gave them a toehold.
And as a presenter, as a programmer, as an administrator, some of the moments that have given me the greatest career satisfaction have been those in which I’ve given an artist I believe in a shot. And more often than not, those artists have knocked the ball out of the park. And that’s as far into sports metaphor as I’m going to go because I’m really terrible at it. But if you demonstrate confidence in someone, more often than not, that confidence will be reciprocated and expectations will be exceeded. So it gives me great gratification to watch artists I saw something in early on grow into their full potential.
Jonathan Eifert:
It’s very interesting for you to frame it that way. It’s really noble because I know a lot of people do want to break into the market and you’re right, it is easy to get the superstars, but then how do you really choose and bet on the right horse, if you will, so that everyone wins? And yeah, no, it’s an interesting process for sure.
Describe a routine you have in place that helps you live a healthier life.
Jeremy Geffen:
I’m laughing at this because I’m not sure that I lead the healthiest life. I don’t have the best work-life balance, so I’m going to discourage anyone listening to this from trying to replicate what I do. But I do believe in the value of exercise, and I love high intensity cardio. High enough intensity that you don’t really, you’re unable to think about anything else. I don’t think I’m alone when I say that I have so many things on my mind at any one time, that those moments when you really are forced to concentrate on something else are so valuable, and that they give me the liminal space that I need to be able to let my subconscious take over and start to solve problems on its own.
I’m happy to say I have a great therapist. I recommend having a therapist to anyone who has the opportunity to have one. And one of the things that she underlines to me is that she raises questions for me, not necessarily for me to actively consider, but to get my subconscious working on them. And I really do believe that things are humming in the background, and there’s a reason why we have those ‘aha’ moments in the shower. It is a space where we’re concentrated on something else and you’re in sort of a state of relaxation, and that just allows something that has not yet jumped through the other side of the membrane to permeate.
So I really do believe in creating the sort of space to allow for ideas to germinate, whether that’s through exercise or through meditation, or through taking walks or through social experiences. I think for everyone, it’s going to be slightly different, but that’s where the breakthrough moments happen for me. I think I really consider myself very fortunate to be working in an area that I am personally very passionate about. And I do recognize in conversation with people of other types of jobs, and to express a sort of wonder that once the workday has ended, that this is what I’m still thinking about. That the performing arts for me, especially music, give me a type of regenerative spiritual health.
They even me out, and with certain pieces of music that I’ve had a relationship with for most of my life, I find that at different times in my life, they have meant something different to me that had not revealed itself previously. And I know that’s about me, as much as it is about the work itself being great, but the work is a mirror.
Jonathan Eifert:
It’s so interesting. I actually want to go back to this idea of the therapist and planting ideas. That’s really fascinating. I totally get the idea of a therapist and how wonderful it is, but I’m not sure if I had heard the concept of this kind of planting ideas and then going forth in your life. And then later on, some great idea appears. I love that idea. And specifically though, having a therapist to almost plant ideas, that’s brilliant.
Jeremy Geffen:
Oh, no. Again, this is her. She is wonderful. If this weren’t a public podcast, I would remember—I would reveal her name, but I want to be able to get appointments with her in the future.
Jonathan Eifert:
But no, it’s a really cool concept on that specifically. Have you, I mean in terms of, I guess this is just can be for life at large, just personal and professional, but for your professional life, have you… I don’t know if she ever had planted a huge, fabulous idea and then later on it came to fruition, and then you executed it and it was a success. I don’t know if you want to talk about, and if that even happened or not.
Jeremy Geffen:
I think when the pandemic began, we were all faced with the question as to how we were going to allow the performing arts to still thrive in circumstances in which we weren’t able to gather together for in-person performances. And although we have, with the common element has been digital performances, the way in which we chose to frame those performances, in fact, the way that we chose to film them—were they being, were they live events that were streamed live and ceased to exist the moment the performance itself was over? Were they edited performances that were treated as one would treat a live performance, or were they edited performances that were treated much more as one would treat a recording? I think we all had to determine a path for our organizations that made sense in that moment.
And I certainly didn’t do this on my own. There is an incredible team of people working at Cal Performances who all have really specialized strengths that allow us to be greater than the sum of our parts. But I think we arrived at a result or a template for results that was successful, and that reached many more people than we were able to reach with in-person operations. We had subscribers and viewers in 36 countries on six continents and had no marketing budget to support that. So that was all through word of mouth.
So as difficult a moment as that was for all sorts of reasons, not just, let’s take the business model question now, but just the basic human questions of existence and health, and how you worry about one’s loved ones. There were so many factors that needed to be considered. An overwhelming number of factors that I think at a certain point, you have to let your tummy guide you.
Jonathan Eifert:
What is one specific product you highly recommend? And a really open-ended question here.
Jeremy Geffen:
I’m going to give you a very—I think this answer here is not going to be very satisfying to you. But I think the most critical product is a scale. And when I say a scale, not the sort of scale [where] the readout that tells you how many grams or how many ounces something weighs, but it’s actually the image of a scale that’s really important to me, because it is about balance. No matter how much you enjoy doing something, you can’t do it all the time or else you’ll cease to enjoy it. So we, in programming, balance is incredibly important. But in life, balance is really important as well. I mean, I love watching performances on at home. I love being in performances live, of course, but if I’m just speaking about home right now. But I also love The Real Housewives. They’re a constant. You have to balance the high and the low. And by the way, what you define as high and low in that with between those two could be completely different.
But swimming pools have shallow ends and they have deep ends, but the pool is still the pool. That’s its identity. So I sort of view myself as the pool and all of these things that I enjoy doing makeup who I am, even if I might be a little bit embarrassed to admit that I watch The Real Housewives of Orange County.
Jonathan Eifert:
I was just going to ask you, which series, so Orange County? Not any of the other ones or that’s your favorite?
Jeremy Geffen:
I started with Orange County because I grew up there, and at the time that it started, I was living in New York and it was a reminder of California. And then I got a little sucked in. That was, let’s say it was a gateway drug to Below Deck.
Jonathan Eifert:
What restaurant or bar do you love to eat at when you’re in New York City? And then the follow-up obviously is what do you order there?
Jeremy Geffen:
Well, let’s start with one that doesn’t exist anymore. It was a sad casualty of the pandemic, but The NoMad at the NoMad Hotel was one of my favorite places to eat. And they made this chicken. Everyone that—people think chicken is boring, but what they did, it was anything but. You know what, I’m not going to do it justice by trying to describe it. So, I loved that place.
My favorite place in New York is Gramercy Tavern. And I eat, I need to eat. I watch the passion that other people have for food, and I realize I’m not a foodie on that level. But what makes a restaurant meaningful, attractive to me is actually the atmosphere. I just love the room at Gramercy Tavern, it’s so comfortable. It’s quiet enough that you can hear your neighbor, hear the people at your table, and you’re not competing with the other tables, which is a big problem in New York. So, people will definitely have more sophisticated food answers than anything I’ll give, but I’m just going to go with a room.
And then for on the occasion that I had, that I stayed out late, I can’t believe I used to stay out past midnight. That’s all really changed since moving to the West Coast and certainly through the pandemic. The rhythm of the West Coast is, in general, much earlier than in New York City, but there was a place in the East Village called Decibel, which was a sake bar. And I think it was around East 10th Street. It was this magical underground place, where I swear I was in a labyrinth and that new rooms were being created as I walked through them. But, it’s one of those things that if I were to try to diagram it, I would never be able to get it right.
Jonathan Eifert:
Let’s take a quick break.
Did you know Classical Post is a brand built for your pleasure by Gold Sound Media, a New York creative studio, developing content for music lovers around the United States? We’re always looking for new opportunities to partner with music presenters, artists, and record labels. If you’re interested in content to build your community, please get in touch. Head to goldsoundmedia.com. Now, back to the show.
Now let’s talk about Cal Performances. So tell us about Illuminations specifically at Cal Performances, and what’s coming up this season.
Jeremy Geffen:
So, Illuminations is an initiative that we began shortly after I arrived. One of the things that distinguishes Cal Performances from other presenting groups, either within the Bay Area or beyond, is that it is our context on the campus of one of the great universities of the world, and a great public university at that. And there is so much fascinating research and thought leadership taking place on this campus that it seemed what was missing was an opportunity to bring all of that research together into a marketplace, where it could be met with by other units on campus, but also by the general public. So Illuminations focuses on one theme, generally a pressing issue of our time, or an idea worth exploring for an entire season. And we invite other units on campus into that exploration to present their own public-facing events, which Cal Performances, as an organization that is very oriented towards the general public, can actually help in getting the word out about.
And this season’s theme is ‘Human and Machine,’ and that’s about how humans have always relied on tools to communicate with each other, but also to amplify and more fully express their ideas, their creative potential. So under this theme this year, we have events that range from a performance on multiple forte pianos by Kristian Bezuidenhout, that shows the evolution of the—we tend to think of the forte piano as a fixed instrument, but it actually, it’s a catchall term for a lot of instruments that represent different phases of musical instrument technology that was dependent on what composers wanted to write for it. Beethoven’s Hamer, Clavier Sonata, I mean, it gives away in the subtitle of the piece, Hamer Clavier. It was subtitled for the name of the instrument for which he was writing it—an instrument that had expanded and dynamic ranges, and actually the base to treble range of the instrument was expanded as well.
So this is an opportunity to think about musical instruments as technology, but then also through some of the other works in the series, like a tribute to Steve Reich, a birthday celebration. Steve incorporated machines and even emulations of machines in his early works and continues to write for electronics today, but he combines them with acoustic instruments as well. And there is what I think is one of the highlights of the season, what William Kentridge’s SIBYL, which has his most recent, what he calls it, a ‘chamber opera,’ ‘Waiting for the Sibyl,’ which is a piece that is about a relationship with technology and the human desire to know our fates in advance, and how that desire meets up with the reality. Kentridge said that if the Sibyl—the Sibyl was the name for a prophetess in the ancient world, and he’s actually referring to a very specific sibyl. But let’s for the moment just say a general sibyl. If the sibyl were alive today, she would be an algorithm; that’s the predictor that tells us our future.
Then Toshi Reagon and her mother, Bernice Johnson Reagon, who founded Sweet Honey in The Rock, have a work that is based on Octavia Butler’s Parable of the Sower, which is a work of science fiction from the 1990s that unfortunately pretty accurately depicts what happens if we rely a little bit too heavily on technology, and the darker side of technology, and how there is perhaps a trade-off between our reliance on, our interest in an alternate world or a technological world, and the destruction of the physical world.
Jonathan Eifert:
Yeah, it’s a really profound way to present a series, I think, to kind of frame it like a human and machine. I think it’s really, yeah, I could see the kind of huge implications of that for people who are attending these various events, and then coming away and pondering this viewpoint or the viewpoints of the different events. Would you say, obviously, I know it’s all connected, but it sounds like you’re kind of talking about different topics, shall we say, or different viewpoints throughout the whole season, even though it’s all under this one theme. Is there a particular message that, one message that is stitching this all together that’s not just like a theme, but more of a message to people who are hearing all of this?
Jeremy Geffen:
I think the message that people are going to take away will be different for each of them, based on what they’ve heard and seen. And I think that that’s by design. One of the things that I value so much about live performance is that you can be sitting next to someone you’ve never met, and you may never see in your life again, but based on the information that you have received together, that experience that you’ve received together, you’re forever bound. And yet, your understanding or what you took away from that performance could be so drastically different from the person next to you. And that is the beauty of live performance, that from the same experience, we get a diversity of reaction and a diversity of thought. And that’s really powerful. So, no, again, there’s no explicit conclusion that we’re asking audiences to draw. That’s why we’re presenting the information, so that they can go on the journey for themselves.
Jonathan Eifert:
Yeah, no, it’s excellent. Yeah, well done with curating all of that because I think that’s, and especially it’s so timely right now as the world grapples with, I don’t know, internet privacy issues and data breaches, and that the numerous other things of the algorithm gods, and the rise of TikTok and that list goes on. So yeah, it’s very fascinating. One last question. In terms of success, it’s personal for everyone. What does it mean to you?
Jeremy Geffen:
I think, in short, success to me looks like connection. It’s going to, it’s sort of like the way I just described what I hope audience members take away from performances. The type of connection is going to be different every time. But the common thread is that one, that a connection has been established between audience and stage, and performer, between audience members and neighbors—in this specific case, between university and broader community. When I lie in bed at the end of the day and feel like I’ve had satisfaction because of something that is accomplished that has happened during the day, it’s generally because I have had some meaningful connection. That something that was not just, that wasn’t transactional.
And just to expand that a little further, the superpower that lies at the center of the performing arts is that they are a moment through which we get to experience the world through another person’s eyes. Whether that’s the author, the composer, or the performer, you’re actually directly receiving emotional information on a non-didactic, completely direct level. And as a result, I think the performing arts are unrivaled in their capacity to build empathy. And that’s what we need more than ever.
So that is the greatest success. And just on it, going back to something that we talked about earlier, it’s also success to me means introducing and creating bonds where there weren’t before. We have some wonderful debut artists coming up this season, soprano Ying Fang and violinist Alexi Kenney, and actually, violinist Rachell Ellen Wong. And this is the first time they will have performed for our audiences. And I know that the audiences are going to love them and that they’re going to be, these artists are going to be part of the future of Cal Performances.
Jonathan Eifert:
Thanks for listening to the Classical Post podcast. I hope you have found it meaningful and that it gave you new ideas to cultivate your creativity, to be better in business and life. So let’s stay in touch. Remember to follow this podcast to get notified of new episodes, and sign up for our monthly newsletter for album recommendations and editorial on leading artists. Just head to classicalpost.com/subscribe.
Related Posts
From the Archive: Now, More Than Ever
![Now More than Ever The Arts Need You](https://calperformances.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/NMTE-header-1920x960-2-e1671737371496.jpg)
From the Archive: Now, More Than Ever
Video and Audio Collections Curated by Jeremy Geffen
During the initial period of challenges created by the global COVID-19 pandemic, Cal Performances launched multiple seasons of online streamed performances via Cal Performances at Home, which was extremely successful and reached audiences throughout the world when we could not have live audiences.
Even before we were able to mobilize Cal Performances at Home, though, beginning in March 2020, Executive and Artistic Director Jeremy Geffen began curating Now, More Than Ever playlists of video performances by great artists past and present. These provided audiences free ongoing contact with the performing arts during a time when gathering together was not possible. The series grew to over 60 issues featuring upwards of 300 performances.
Three playlists were contributed by guest curators: classical singer Julia Bullock, mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato, and cellist Sheku Kanneh-Mason. Now, More Than Ever served as a reminder of the performing arts’ unsurpassed ability to express the power and potential of the human spirit and encouraged viewers to make time each day for the arts.
While a number of the videos linked in this series are no longer active, we have preserved the original playlists and the associated introductions and commentary that accompanied them during their initial launch. You can view all of the issues below.
Now, More than Ever Archive
Gentrification Storytelling: A Panel Discussion
![Gentrification Storytelling panel discussion in Zellerbach Hall](https://calperformances.org/wp-content/uploads/blog/2022-23/gentrification-storytelling-1920x900-1.jpg)
Gentrification Storytelling: A Panel Discussion
An Illuminations: “Place and Displacement” Panel Discussion
Is gentrification a revisionist story about a place? What power do stories have in speaking about or against gentrification? Who are the authors of these stories?
Gentrification presents one of society’s most intractable and debated displacement challenges in our urban environment. During this panel, housing rights activist Regina Williams and Othering & Belonging Institute (OBI) housing researcher Nicole Montojo join Place composer Ted Hearne and performers Sol Ruiz and Isaiah Robinson to discuss the ways in which stories can help us understand gentrification—its nuances, ramifications, and the lasting impact of and on residents at risk of displacement. The conversation is moderated by Evan Bissell, Arts & Cultural Strategy Coordinator at OBI.
This panel was an Illuminations: Place and Displacement event, and in conjunction with the performance of Ted Hearne and Saul William’s Place on the 2021–22 season.
Panelists
Evan Bissell
(he/him) Evan Bissell facilitates participatory art and research projects that support equitable systems and liberatory processes. Projects take varied forms: an interactive online history of freedom and confinement in the United States told through 50 miniature paintings with accompanying curriculum (knottedline.com), visual interventions based on community surveys about policing in the Bronx, and collaborative, life-size portrait paintings created with incarcerated fathers and children of incarcerated parents. Evan has exhibited throughout the US and facilitated projects in schools (K-12) and community settings throughout the country. From 2016-2019 he taught a studio art course on social change at UC Berkeley. He is currently the Arts and Culture Strategist at the Othering & Belonging Institute at UC Berkeley and a cultural strategy advisor at Richmond LAND. He holds a master’s in Public Health and City Planning from UC Berkeley.
Ted Hearne
Ted Hearne is a composer, singer, bandleader, and recording artist. Inspired by the overlay of different viewpoints and their sonic possibilities, he creates personal and multi-dimensional works that often explore unconventional interactions of text and music, and that are rooted in a sense of inquiry.
The New York Times has praised Hearne for his “tough edge and wildness of spirit,” and “topical, politically sharp-edged works.” Pitchfork called Hearne’s work “some of the most expressive socially engaged music in recent memory—from any genre,” and Alex Ross wrote in The New Yorker that Hearne’s music “holds up as a complex mirror image of an information-saturated, mass-surveillance world, and remains staggering in its impact.”
Two Wings: The Music of Black America in Migration Post-Performance Q&A
![Two Wings Q&A](https://calperformances.org/wp-content/uploads/blog/2022-23/two-wings-qa-alicia-hall-moran-jason-moran-1920x900-1.jpg)
Two Wings: The Music of Black America in Migration Post-Performance Q&A
An Illuminations: “Place and Displacement” Discussion
Performers and members of the Two Wings: The Music of Black America in Migration production on February 17, 2022, including Jason and Alicia Hall Moran, were joined by john powell, Director of the Othering and Belonging Institute (OBI) at UC Berkeley, to discuss the performance and make connections to the Great Migration and related research happening through OBI.
This panel was an Illuminations: Place and Displacement event.
Panelists
john powell
john a. powell is an internationally recognized expert in the areas of civil rights, civil liberties, structural racism, housing, poverty, and democracy. He is the Director of the Othering & Belonging Institute at the University of California, Berkeley, where he contributes to the mission of bringing together scholars, community advocates, communicators, and policymakers to identify and eliminate the barriers to an inclusive, just, and sustainable society and to create transformative change toward a more equitable world.
john holds the Robert D. Haas Chancellor’s Chair in Equity and Inclusion and is a Professor of Law, African American Studies, and Ethnic Studies at UC Berkeley. Previously, he was the Executive Director of the Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity at The Ohio State University where he also held the Gregory H. Williams Chair in Civil Rights & Civil Liberties at the Moritz College of Law.
He regularly appears in the major media, offering expert insights on a host of issues. Recent appearances include NPR and WYNC’s On The Media in an episode about free speech and the constitution; Last Week Tonight with John Oliver in an episode about housing segregation; and CBS Evening News where john weighed in on police reform and the Chauvin trial.
john has written extensively on a number of issues including structural racism, racial justice, concentrated poverty, opportunity-based housing, voting rights, affirmative action in the United States, South Africa and Brazil, racial and ethnic identity, spirituality and social justice, and the needs of citizens in a democratic society. He is the author of several books, including his most recent work, Racing to Justice: Transforming our Concepts of Self and Other to Build an Inclusive Society.
The founder and director of the Institute on Race and Poverty at the University of Minnesota, john has also served as Director of Legal Services in Miami, Florida and was the National Legal Director of the American Civil Liberties Union, where he was instrumental in developing educational adequacy theory.
john led the development of an “opportunity-based” model that connects affordable housing to education, health, health care, and employment and is well-known for his work developing the frameworks of “targeted universalism” and “othering and belonging” to effect equity-based interventions.
john has lived and worked in Africa, where he was a consultant to the governments of Mozambique and South Africa, and has also worked in India and Brazil. He is one of the co-founders of the Poverty & Race Research Action Council and serves on the board of several national and international organizations. john has taught at numerous law schools, including Harvard and Columbia University.
Cal Performances 2021-22 Illuminations: “Place and Displacement” series of programming examines the fraught and often devastating effects of migration, exile, dislocations, and separation, on both hyper-local and international scales, through five main stage performances and related online and in person programs with artists, creators, scholars, activists, and thinkers who are part of the outstanding brain trust that is the UC Berkeley community.
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Lead support for Illuminations is provided by the Jonathan Logan Family Foundation—empowering world-changing work.
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Related Posts
Multidisciplinary Perspectives on Climate Displacement
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An Illuminations: “Place and Displacement” Panel Discussion
The World Bank estimates that, by 2050, 216 million people across South Asia, Sub-Saharan Africa, and Latin America will need to migrate from their homes due to sudden disasters such as flooding and fire, slow-onset land degradation through processes such as desertification, as well as social unrest caused by resource scarcity. Climate displacement is accelerating because of climate change, and creates new adaptation challenges for both the sending and receiving regions. In this panel, we will explore the issue of climate displacement with faculty members of UC Berkeley’s new cluster in climate equity and environmental justice (Maya Carrasquillo, Civil and Environmental Engineering; Daniel Aldana Cohen, Sociology; Zoe Hamstead, City & Regional Planning; Meg Mills-Novoa, Energy & Resources Group and Department of Environmental Science; Danielle Rivera, Landscape Architecture and Environmental Planning). The director of UC Berkeley’s Urban Displacement Project and the University of Toronto’s School of Cities, Professor Karen Chapple, will facilitate this lively conversation across the disciplinary perspectives of sociology, city planning, geography, engineering, and urban policy.
This panel is an Illuminations: Place and Displacement event.
Panelists
Maya Carrasquillo
Maya Carrasquillo is an assistant professor in the Civil and Environmental Engineering Department at UC Berkeley and the PI of the JEDI (L)ab. She was previously a Management Consultant at Arcadis US in Atlanta, GA. She earned her PhD in Environmental Engineering from the University of South Florida in 2020 and her BS in Environmental Engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology in 2015. Her research interests include sustainable and equitable urban water infrastructure, food-energy-water systems, community engagement and citizen science in decision-making, and environmental and social justice. She is a certified Envision Sustainability Professional (ENV SP). She is also a College of Engineering Huelskamp Faculty Fellow.
Karen Chapple
Karen Chapple, PhD, is Professor Emerita of City & Regional Planning at the University of California, Berkeley, where she held the Carmel P. Friesen Chair in Urban Studies and served as department chair. She is currently the Director of the School of Cities and Professor of Geography and Planning at the University of Toronto. Chapple studies inequalities in the planning, development, and governance of regions in the US and Latin America, with a focus on economic development and housing.
Her recent books include Planning Sustainable Cities and Regions: Towards More Equitable Development (Routledge, 2015), which won the John Friedmann Book Award from the American Collegiate Schools of Planning; Transit-Oriented Displacement or Community Dividends? Understanding the Effects of Smarter Growth on Communities (with Anastasia Loukaitou-Sideris, MIT Press, 2019); and Fragile Governance and Local Economic Development: Theory and Evidence from Peripheral Regions in Latin America (with Sergio Montero, Routledge, 2018). She has published recently on a broad array of subjects, including the fiscalization of land use (in Landscape and Urban Planning), urban displacement (in the Journal of Planning Literature and Cityscape), community investment (in the Journal of Urban Affairs), job creation on industrial land (in Economic Development Quarterly), regional governance in rural Peru (in the Journal of Rural Studies), and accessory dwelling units as a smart growth policy (in the Journal of Urbanism).
Pandemic-Displaced Choreography: Q&A with Joffrey Ballet’s Nicolas Blanc and Christine Rocas
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Pandemic-Displaced Choreography: Q&A with Joffrey Ballet’s Nicolas Blanc and Christine Rocas
An Illuminations: “Place and Displacement” Discussion
The COVID-19 pandemic has posed unique challenges for performing arts creators. For dance in particular, social distancing and the necessity of virtual rather than in-person interactions were an immense barrier in choreographing new pieces. In this Q&A discussion, moderated by Mina Girgis, Cal Performances’ Director of Education, Joffrey Ballet choreographer Nicolas Blanc sits down with one of the Joffrey Ballet dancers, Christine Rocas, to discuss the inventive workarounds and adaptations implemented during the height of the pandemic to successfully choreograph his latest piece, Under the Trees’ Voices, which had its West Coast premiere at Cal Performances on March 4.
This recording is an Illuminations: Place and Displacement conversation.
Artist Bios
Nicolas Blanc
Nicolas Blanc started his dance training in Montauban, France, continuing at the Academie de Danse Classique Princesse Grace in Monte-Carlo. After winning a scholarship in the 1994 Prix de Lausanne, he completed his education at the Paris Opera Ballet School.
He went on to dance for Nice Opera Ballet, Deutsche Oper am Rhein in Dusseldorf, Zurich Ballet, and San Francisco Ballet, where he was made Principal Dancer in 2004. His repertoire included lead roles in Balanchine’s Jewels, Square Dance, Divertimento No. 15, The Four Temperaments, and Tarantella pas de deux. He also danced the leads in Robbins’ Dybbuk and Mats Ek’s Carmen, Benvolio and Mercutio in Romeo and Juliet, and Cavalier in The Nutcracker, and danced in various ballets by Mark Morris.
Blanc originated roles in Wheeldon’s Rush and Quaternary; Welch’s Falling and Naked, Possokov’s Study in Motion and Reflections; and Tomasson’s 7 for Eight and Blue Rose.
In 2006 and 2007, he created two pieces for San Francisco Ballet School. He also created After Having Been for the International Ballet Competition (IBC) in Jackson, MS.
Blanc was awarded a special prize in performing arts by the city of Dusseldorf in 1998, and a special award of recognition by his hometown in 2004 (and 2013), and he was named one of the “25 to Watch” by Dance Magazine. In 2010, he was nominated with Tina LeBlanc for an Isadora Duncan Dance Award (Best Ensemble in Wheeldon’s Within The Golden Hour).
He joined Scottish Ballet as Ballet Master in 2009. In his time with the company, he coached Page’s Nutcracker, Cinderella, Alice, Fearful Symmetries, Pastor’s Romeo and Juliet, as well as Ashton’s Scenes de Ballet, and Balanchine’s Rubies. In 2010, he was the personal assistant of Val Caniparoli for the world premiere of Still Life.
Recently, he has created Purple, Memories of The Future, Unveiled, The Spell, and Encounter for the annual fundraiser for Embarc, a Chicago organization dedicated to supporting low-income high school students in their training. In July 2014, Blanc received the choreographic award at the IBC in Jackson, Mississippi, for his duet Rendez-Vous. In 2015, his ballet Evenfall made its US debut on The Joffrey Ballet’s spring program.
Blanc was selected to participate in the 2015 National Choreographers Initiative (NCI) and created Orphee, which was presented at the Barclay Theater in Irvine, CA. He was also chosen to participate in New York City Ballet’s New York Choreographic Institute, where he created Mothership, which premiered in New York City Ballet’s 2016 gala. In 2018, he created Beyond the Shore for The Joffrey Ballet, with designs by Katrin Schnabl and music composed by Mason Bates. This commission was supported by the New York Choreographic Institute and Cal Performances in Berkeley, CA. In 2019, Blanc created Desert Transport, also set to music by Bates, for Barak Ballet.
Christine Rocas
Prior to joining The Joffrey Ballet, Christine Rocas danced with Ballet Manila in the Philippines. While there, she had the opportunity to perform in The Nutcracker (Sugar Plum Fairy), Le Corsaire (Medora), La Bayadère (Nikiya), Swan Lake (Odette/Odile), Sleeping Beauty (Bluebird pas de deux), and Don Quixote (Dryad Queen). Rocas participated and won several prestigious awards from multiple international ballet competitions. In August 2003, she received a finalist certificate in the Junior Division of the 9th Asian Pacific International Ballet Competition in Tokyo, Japan. She was also chosen as a full scholar in the 2004 Aberdeen International Youth Festival in Aberdeen, Scotland. In 2005, she participated in the Helsinki International Ballet Competition in Helsinki, Finland, where she became a semi-finalist in the junior division. During that year, she received the Arpino Award and was also the silver medalist in the New York International Ballet Competition.
Since joining the Joffrey, Rocas has performed in Apollo, Cinderella (Cinderella and Summer Fairy), The Dream, Giselle (Giselle), The Green Table, Light Rain, Les Présages, The Nutcracker, In the Night, Reflections, Pretty BALLET, Crossed, Age of Innocence, After the Rain, Stravinsky Violin Concerto, Romeo & Juliet (Juliet), and The Merry Widow.
Cal Performances 2021-22 Illuminations: “Place and Displacement” series of programming examines the fraught and often devastating effects of migration, exile, dislocations, and separation, on both hyper-local and international scales, through five main stage performances and related online and in person programs with artists, creators, scholars, activists, and thinkers who are part of the outstanding brain trust that is the UC Berkeley community.
![Jonathan Logan Family Foundation Jonathan Logan Family Foundation](https://calperformances.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/Jonathan-Logan-Family-Foundation-JLFF-logo-positive-600.jpg)
Lead support for Illuminations is provided by the Jonathan Logan Family Foundation—empowering world-changing work.