Forgotten Voices: Violinist Kelly Hall-Tompkins on Fifteen Years of Nourishing Hope and Providing Food for the Soul via Music Kitchen
Kelly Hall-Tompkins and Emanuel Ax at a Music Kitchen event. Credit: Carnegie Hall.
Music Kitchen – Food for the Soul commemorates its fifteenth anniversary with Forgotten Voices – a composite song cycle with text created by those experiencing homelessness set to music by fifteen award-winning composers. The full work had its world premiere in March 2022 at Carnegie Hall.
"The fifteen songs of Forgotten Voices explores the full range of the human experience, from loss to exhilaration, gratitude to hope, flights of imagination to intimate dialogue, and takes us to a place of soaring inspiration. We are elevating great artistry in service of social justice and giving a voice to the voiceless in an unprecedented way.” – Kelly Hall-Tompkins
Kelly Hall-Tompkins remembers when the idea for the Music Kitchen struck her. The celebrated professional classical violinist – winner of a Naumburg International Competition Honorarium Prize; featured artist in the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture; and acknowledged as the New York Times’ “New Yorker of the Year” – was rehearsing for a series of solo concerts in the winter of 2004. “It all began in my church basement at Holy Trinity Lutheran’s men’s shelter program,” she reminisces. Rather than practicing in front of her usual group of colleagues and friends, Hall-Tompkins decided to play for the men in the shelter.
“When they asked me if I would return a second night,” she says, “I knew something really special had just happened. Some had never heard classical music before and some were knowledgeable about it, but all seemed drawn into and moved by the music.” So Hall-Tompkins did return. And she brought friends.
FINDING NOURISHMENT AT MUSIC KITCHEN — FOOD FOR THE SOUL
"I believe that music reaches the core of our being and can play a vital role in nourishing hope, love and strength.”
In 2005, Hall-Tompkins made it official, founding Music Kitchen – Food for the Soul with the mission to share the inspirational, therapeutic, and uplifting power of music with New York City’s disenfranchised homeless shelter population. The organization regularly presents 45-60 minute informal and engaging chamber music performances in a friendly, relaxed setting, geared toward those who are experiencing homelessness and are in need of shelter, both physically and emotionally.
In the intervening years, Hall-Tompkins has brought in over 200 artists to participate in these concerts, among them pianist Emanuel Ax, violinist Glenn Dicterow, New York Philharmonic principal cellist Carter Brey, and Berlin Philharmonic principal oboist Albrecht Mayer. Music Kitchen has reached over 30,000 homeless shelter clients coast-to-coast, from New York to Los Angeles, and has even ventured to Paris, France.
REMEMBERING THE FORGOTTEN VOICES WITH A WORLD PREMIERE SONG CYCLE
“I want people to understand that homelessness can happen to anyone…I believe a shelter exists to provide not only physical but emotional and spiritual support to those who, for whatever reason, have lost the foundation of their homes and communities.”
In Zankel Hall, Carnegie Hall on March 31, 2022, Music Kitchen – Food for the Soul premiered Forgotten Voices – a collaborative song cycle three years in the making. The organization launched the Forgotten Voices project in 2019 in commemoration of fifteen years of service and over one hundred concerts given. Text for the composite song cycle was comprised of prose feedback comments about Music Kitchen concerts gathered from shelter participants who have been present for the Music Kitchen’s concerts throughout the years, and offers fifteen commissioned pieces by award-winning composers: Courtney Bryan, Jon Jeffrey Grier, Gabriel Kahane, James Lee III, Beata Moon, Paul Moravec, Angélica Negrón, Kevin Puts, Steve Sandberg, Kamala Sankaram, Jeff Scott, Carlos Simon, Errollyn Wallen, Ellen Taaffe Zwilich, and Kelly Hall-Tompkins, herself. Those who have performed the work include sopranos Allison Charney and Adrienne Danrich, baritone Jesse Blumberg, bass Mark Risinger, violinist Ling Ling Huang, violist Andrew Gonzalez, cellists Alexis Pia Gerlach and Peter Seidenberg, and bassist John-Paul Norpoth. For the full cycle premiere performance, NBC News’ correspondent Harry Smith joined the musicians and actress Jessica Hecht for a moderated post-concert Q&A session.
Since the Forgotten Voices project began, one new song premiered in shelters each month. Forgotten Voices was featured on NPR’s Performance Today, NBC TODAY Sunday with Harry Smith, a United Nations Concert at Lincoln Center benefiting the homeless, the 2019 Composers Now Festival, and the Gateways Music Festival. In the works is an album release on a European label and an international performance tour. Hall-Tompkins was elated when the chance arose to premiere the full cycle at Carnegie Hall in 2022.
“This is the most exciting project I’ve ever created in my life,” says Hall-Tompkins. “I think of Carnegie Hall as the ‘people’s house.’ And I was thrilled when they were so passionate about bringing this project to the ‘people’s house.’”
The COVID-19 pandemic has had a particularly devastating effect on shelters, with a record number of housing evictions coupled with a reduction in the number of available beds. Despite this, Hall-Tompkins was undeterred in her desire to serve those in need of emotional nourishment. In 2020 she initiated “Music Kitchen Bridging the Distance,” coordinating with shelters to present ZoomCasts of curated video content from concerts in 2019 and early 2020 with live interactive sessions between musicians and clients.
While preparing for the Forgotten Voices concert series, Hall-Tompkins was able to meet with people whose lives have been impacted by the Music Kitchen concerts. “We mostly do not have the benefit of contact with clients once they leave the shelter system,” she says, “but there are some notable exceptions.
Grace Noel – an artist and aspiring actress – speaks in the film about how the Music Kitchen gave her comfort during a tremendously difficult period in her life, saying, “It felt like a warm embrace, it really felt like the music engulfed me and held me tight.” Shawnte Perryman says, “[Music Kitchen] gave me insight into opening my mind and seeing things for what they are. I never knew that classical music could be that touching – that real. I didn’t realize that it was that powerful.”
“I want to take the voices of marginalized people and cause paradigm shifts in how people think.”
So what comes next for the Music Kitchen and Kelly Hall-Tompkins? “To get back into the shelters as soon as it is possible to do so,” she says. “Forgotten Voices was the first time Music Kitchen has had a reason to present to the public. Now that the world premiere has occurred, we will continue on parallel tracks of the private shelter concerts and the public presentations of Forgotten Voices.”
“We are the category creator of bringing classical music to those experiencing homelessness. We will continue to serve that role at a high level, expand where it serves the overall vision, and continue to collaborate with organizations in service of that mission.”
For those who wish to support the work of Music Kitchen – Food for the Soul: Checks may be sent to P.O. Box 907 New York, NY 10040, Paypal or Zelle to MusicKitchennyc@gmail.com.
