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Brothers Aldo López-Gavilán and Ilmar Gavilán both have a passion and a talent for music, but they were never able to collaborate together — until recently.

This is all part of their narrative. Their story and their music will intertwine as they perform as part of the Chautauqua Chamber Music Guest Artist Series at 4 p.m. Monday, July 11, in Elizabeth S. Lenna Hall.

Ilmar Gavilán is the violinist of the duo; Aldo López-Gavilán is the pianist. Gavilán has many musical influences, from Russian-American violinist Jascha Heifetz to Israeli-American Pinchas Zukerman, but what unites these diverse musicians is not the music they play, but the way they play it.

“Music is not just sounds, but it’s meant to speak, talk, to say something. That’s something that I really admire, and it’s an art that, if we are not too careful, it will disappear,” Gavilán said.

He sees musicians focusing more on being employable, learning the music perfectly and sounding a specific way. While this tactic works for getting a job, it lacks a certain quality. To Gavilán’s ears, that quality is “phrasing, poetry through music.”

When a musician’s focus is only on technique, it loses its deep emotional and storytelling power. López-Gavilán and Gavilán lean into this storytelling aspect, and they have quite the story to tell. At 14, Gavilán moved from Cuba to, what at the time was, the Soviet Union to further his studies. After his time there, he studied at the Reina Sofía School of Music in Spain before coming to the United States and joining the Manhattan School of Music in New York City. He never moved back to Cuba.

López-Gavilán, on the other hand, continued his piano education on the island of Cuba. At just 12, he began his professional career playing for the Matanzas Symphony Orchestra, whose home is in Matanzas, Cuba. In 1999, he recorded his first album En el Ocaso de la Hormiga y el Elefante; it won the 2000 Grand Prix at Cubadisco.

Twenty years later, during summer 2019, after touring Latin America, Europe and the United States, López-Gavilán collaborated with his brother, for the first time, on the album titled Brothers.

López-Gavilán and Gavilán confirmed they will play the title track “Brothers” at their concert this afternoon. The song was written for their PBS documentary “Los Hermanos/The Brothers,” which first aired fall 2021 and was screened Sunday night at the Athenaeum Hotel. “Brothers” was specifically written for the final scene of the documentary, and because the rest of the album was not, the song has a different quality.

“It has a nostalgic feel to it. Of course it’s about the two of us finally being together,” Gavilán said.

The emotion Gavilán feels about performing with his brother and getting to be with him can perhaps only be told through their music.

“It’s something very hard to put into words,” he said, “but it feels great. Now you’re complete, it’s like that.”

Renowned human rights scholar and activist Alison Brysk will kick off Week Three’s Chautauqua Lecture Series, “The Future of Human Rights,” at 10:45 a.m. Monday, July 11, in the Amphitheater.

Matt Ewalt, vice president and Emily and Richard Smucker Chair for Education, said that in programming this week’s lectures, his team was looking for someone who could provide a broad global analysis on the state of human rights.

“We’re looking at both gains made and setbacks, and wanting to provide some historical perspective, but also looking forward,” Ewalt said.

Brysk’s talk will be based on her 2018 book, The Future of Human Rights. The Mellichamp Chair of Global Governance in the Department of Global Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara, she has written seven and edited 10 books on international human rights, including authoring The Struggle from Freedom to Fear and editing Expanding Human Rights: 21st Century Norms and Governances. She has written about topics such as global patterns of gender violence, Indigenous peoples’ rights and strategies for human rights campaigns.

Brysk has lectured in nations across every continent except Antarctica and was traveling in Europe in the week leading up to her lecture. For Chautauqua, she said that she’ll ask: “Where do we stand, how to rethink and what to do next — so how to maintain hope?” 

Ewalt said that as one of the world’s leading scholars in the field, Brysk was invited to propose a framework for addressing global challenges to human rights.

“We’re thinking about the kind of tools we have today, and maybe emerging tools, from forms of activism, to the kind of power that institutions have, to thinking about governance,” Ewalt said. “We wanted her to be able to level-set for us as we begin the week.”

On Brysk’s website, she links a number of resources. She began a 2008 paper titled “Human Rights in International Relations” by writing:

“Human rights is the soul of politics. The essence of human rights is the idea that all persons possess equal moral worth, that social order exists to preserve the essential humanity of its members, and that, therefore, the exercise of all forms of political authority is properly bounded by its impact on fundamental human dignity.”

Ewalt called Brysk’s book The Future of Human Rights one of the definitive texts on global human rights.

“It’s both a sobering analysis of the state of global human rights, but also where we’ve seen some successes,” Ewalt said. “And then, it’s about being able to think more contextually in terms of a framework for how we address these current challenges around the world.”

The alignment of politics with human rights and religion has evolved into a never-ending battle fought among various religious groups. The Rev. Adam Russell Taylor works toward bringing political peace through faith.

As the president of Sojourners, Taylor works with other faith leaders in partnership to build a more inclusive multi-theological democracy.  He will give his lecture, titled “Dignity for All: Faith, Spirituality and Human Rights,” at 2 p.m. Monday, July 11, in the Hall of Philosophy.

His presentation will launch Week Three of the Interfaith Lecture Series, “The Spirituality of Human Rights.”

Taylor will start with the history surrounding human rights, then dive into a discussion on a religious commitment to human rights.

“To bring human rights to life, we desperately need to better tap into the power of spirituality and religion,” Taylor said. “There’s a bit of a risk and danger that human rights can feel fairly technocratic.”

A lot of people, particularly in the United States, aren’t knowledgeable about the importance of human rights, Taylor said. He hopes to use religious traditions to gain greater support for a commitment to human rights.

“If we want to live in a free society where everyone is able to thrive and where everyone’s rights are respected, we need to understand the nature of human rights,” Taylor said.

Taylor said behind the discourse and framework on human rights is a commitment to human dignity. Human rights are lived out through law, practice and policy, but he wants the religious community to be an advocate for human rights.

“Unfortunately, human rights are under assault around the world,” Taylor said. “We see a really alarming rise of religious persecution, of xenophobia, of various forms of nationalism. … We see (an) increasing rise of more authoritarian and autocratic styles of leadership.”

Human rights in the United States are in jeopardy, Taylor said, but he believes shared commitments and values are aiding the process to defend and protect human rights. He also encourages religious people to engage politically, not just through voting but also through civic acts, advocacy and building relationships with their respective members of Congress.

Sojourners, a Christian ecumenical peace and justice organization, focuses its work on mobilizing advocacy and partnering with people of other faiths, and has a magazine and a digital publication that discusses the intersection of faith, politics and culture.

“It’s exciting and it’s a privilege to be able to inspire people,” Taylor said.

He said the broken police system, the right to vote, democracy, immigration, poverty and economic justice are some of the issues he works to fix with Sojourners.

“Our faith calls us to be engaged in the world and to bring our values to bear on some of the greatest injustices that we see around us,” Taylor said. 

Taylor quoted Martin Luther King Jr. to exemplify the need to separate church and state:

“The church must be reminded that it is not the master or the servant of the state, but rather the conscience of the state.”

While most people come from their own preconceived religious convictions, Taylor said politics are not a spectator sport, and religion should be a factor — but not a solution —  in addressing human rights issues.

“I think it’s important … that we don’t try to take over one political party (and) only make a religious argument,” Taylor said. “We’ve got to make another argument that is going to resonate and convince the broader public about what is right and what we think is best.”

Taylor was part of the advisory council for a study conducted by The Fetzer Institute focused on spirituality in America, which found that spirituality is highly correlated with social attitudes and activities, as well as civic engagement.

“I’m going to really try to make the case that we need more and better spirituality, not less of it, in order to supercharge campaigns and movements that have enabled us to make our commitments to human rights real,” Taylor said.

Pianist Aldo López-Gavilán first had his original compositions performed at Chautauqua in 2017, when he joined the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra for an evening of Cuban music. Now, he’s back with another of Chautauqua’s orchestras. The Music School Festival Orchestra, under the baton of their Artistic and Music Director Timothy Muffitt, will perform with López-Gavilán and his violinist brother, Ilmar Gavilán, at 8:15 p.m. Monday, July 11, in the Amphitheater.

The evening’s program includes Mexican composer José Pablo Moncayo García’s “Huapango,” Alberto Ginastera’s “Four Dances” from Estancia, two of López-Gavilán’s own compositions — “Viernes de Ciudad” and “Emporium” — and a piece from the brothers’ father, Guido López-Gavilán, titled “Guaguanco.”

López-Gavilán and Gavilán come from a deeply musical family — both musicians, they’re the sons of a concert pianist and a composer and conductor. While Gavilán moved abroad to study music, López-Gavilán stayed in Cuba. 

The two collaborated for the first time in 2019 on the album Brothers, featuring the title song that they wrote for a PBS documentary which first aired in 2021. Growing up, Gavilán “was a very big factor,” in his brother’s musical journey, López-Gavilán told the Daily in 2017. “When I was a teenager, he always reminded me to keep composing and doing my own musical language.”

It’s a language he wants to keep perfecting. Earlier this year, López-Gavilán told Robin Lloyd of “KNKX Public Radio” that he wants to enhance his composing career.

“I want to compose more for bigger formats, like symphony orchestras. I want to play. I want to compose for piano concertos. I’ve been composing a clarinet concerto for a long time — I haven’t finished yet,” he told Lloyd. “But yes, I want to enhance my composition side.”

He also told Lloyd he would also like to collaborate with other musicians more. 

“I love collaborations with different people from different parts of the world,” he said. “I would like to collaborate with Indian musicians because I really enjoy Indian music, and African composers and players. And of course, here in the U.S., there are so many musicians I would love to collaborate with.”

Connections. Ministry is all about connections. For the Rev. Michael-Ray Mathews, Week Three chaplain-in-residence at Chautauqua Institution, it is about making connections between communities that, in turn, work to build communities of belonging, that uphold sacred resistance to injustice and work to heal the world. 

Mathews, a public theologian, senior pastor, grassroots leader, community organizer and psalmist, will use “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” the Black National Anthem, to guide his sermon series for the week. He will use his over 30 years of leadership to make the connections between faith and the longing for justice.

At the 10:45 a.m. ecumenical service of worship and sermon Sunday, July 10, in the Amphitheater, Mathews will preach on “Lift Every Voice.” His sermon titles for the 9:15 a.m. morning worship services Monday through Friday in the Amp are “Facing the Rising Sun,” “The Place for Which the People Sighed,” “Treading Our Path Through Blood,” “Weary Years, Silent Tears,” and “May We Forever Stand.”

Mathews is host of the “Prophetic Resistance Podcast,” where he engages leaders from multiple faiths in conversations about building community and sacred resistance to injustice. The podcast is part of the work of Faith in Action initiative, where Mathews serves as deputy director. The purpose of the podcast is to explore “what it means to embody love in the face of fear, to show up like hope in seasons of despair, to stand ready to be light in the darkness and water in a parched land. … And together, we are investigating how — in this moment — leaders of faith and moral courage can cultivate prophetic resistance rooted in revolutionary love.”

The “Prophetic Resistance Podcast” has a first cousin, “The Four,” described on Apple Podcasts as a “fearsome faith foursome talkin’ Black life, love, power and joy … a podcast for everyone.”

Mathews is the co-host with a variety of “dear friends who have all been guests on the ‘Prophetic Resistance Podcast’ ”: the Rev. Dr. Jacqui Lewis of Middle Collegiate Church in New York, (an Interfaith Lecturer in 2017) Lisa Sharon Harper of Freedomroad.us in Philadelphia, (a 2021 chaplain of the week) and the Rev. Dr. Otis Moss III of Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago (a long-time Chautauquan and favorite preacher.)

Mathews is president of the Alliance of Baptists, a progressive movement for justice and healing that came out of the Southern Baptist Convention, and is the co-editor of Trouble the Waters: A Christian Resource for the Work of Racial Justice. He is co-founder and public theologian-in-residence of Sympara, a multifaith and interspiritual community, repurposing spiritual assets for the common good. Mathews is a visiting professor of public theology at Berkeley School of Theology, and he’s a senior fellow at Auburn Seminary in New York.

A native of Compton, California, Mathews earned a B.A. in social sciences and communications from the University of Southern California and a Master of Divinity degrees from Berkeley School of Theology, formerly American Baptist Seminary of the West, and the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, California. 

To policy scientists who seek to resolve complex public policy problems in the common interest and whose benchmark goal is human dignity, the late Eleanor Roosevelt is a rock star.

Not only did Roosevelt serve as the first chair of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights, which drafted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, but she also championed civil rights and social activism within the United States.

At 2 p.m. on Saturday, July 9, in the Hall of Philosophy, historian, prolific author and highly entertaining speaker Candace Fleming will give the second presentation in the Chautauqua Women’s Club’s weekly Contemporary Issues Forum series: “Eleanor Roosevelt: An Emblem of Hope.”

Fleming’s talk will draw from her extensive research for her book, Our Eleanor: A Scrapbook Look at Eleanor Roosevelt’s Remarkable Life, for which she received nine awards and honors, including Publishers Weekly Best Books of 2005, New York Public Library’s 100 Titles for Reading and Sharing in 2005, Parent’s Choice Gold Medal, and School Library Journal Best Books: 2005.

“Eleanor Roosevelt was influential,” Fleming said. “Where did all of that come from? (She was) an awkward, scared, fearful young woman. … My favorite quote of hers is: ‘No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.’ … She was still self-conscious at the end of her life, and still wrestling with not feeling (she was good) enough.”

Despite being a tall-tale-teller in preschool and a story writer since 7, becoming an author wasn’t something that Fleming had really thought about, according to her website’s biography, which she wrote.

College history courses revealed her passion. Fleming earned both her B.A. and M.A. in American history at Eastern Illinois University, “in a little town called Charleston, which is really seriously in the heart of (Abraham) Lincoln country.”

“I didn’t realize it then, but studying history is really just an extension of my love of stories,” she wrote in her website’s biography. “After all, some of the best stories are true ones — tales of heroism and villainy made more incredible by the fact they really happened.”

Marriage and children followed college graduation, and Fleming’s fascination with history continued.

“When I had kids, I was writing history articles for American History Illustrated, American Heritage and other places that wanted history, like the Chicago Tribune Sunday Magazine,” she said. “… And then I started writing history for young people, and I discovered that’s what I really loved.”

But, according to Fleming, “writing children’s books is harder than it looks.”

“For three years I wrote story after story. I sent them to publisher after publisher,” Fleming wrote in her biography. “And I received rejection letter after rejection letter. Still, I didn’t give up. I kept trying until finally one of my stories was pulled from the slush pile and turned into a book. My career as a children’s author had begun.”

Oh what a career! More than 40 books later — all edited by Anne Schwartz, the person who accepted her first story — Fleming’s in-depth historical research and engaging storytelling have earned her numerous awards, as well as appreciation from countless teachers and families.

Fleming’s Boxes For Katje (2003) won 22 separate awards and honors; Family Romanov: Murder, Rebellion, and the Fall of Imperial Russia (2014) earned 21; 17 for The Rise and Fall of Charles Lindbergh (2020); The Lincolns: A Scrapbook Look at Abraham and Mary (2008) won 11.

“I have a lot of ideas and I think about (them) all the time,” she said. “I have more ideas than time to write. I think, ‘a publisher might want to buy this, but do I really want to spend time with it?’ I have several topics that take years of research and writing. I always push those away; they’re too big. But, if (an idea) keeps coming back, if it nags at me — like with Eleanor Roosevelt — if it stays in my head, (I’ll write about it).”

Fleming appreciates the freedom having Schwartz as her long-term editor has brought her.

Being “lucky enough to be with the same editor, probably for 25 years now, if I have a project I say I’d like to do a book about, let’s say, Eleanor Roosevelt, (Schwartz) says ‘OK,’ ” Fleming said. “So, I don’t have to write it first (and then ask her). We’ve been together so long that she trusts me.”

Fleming is able to juggle two book projects at a time and said it has worked well for her.

“While I’m working with big books that take years, I write shorter books, mostly fiction,” she said. “It’s a right brain, left brain thing. Doing all that helps me creatively. … Writing a picture book is a lot of fun. You remember how to tell a story. It keeps my storytelling tools sharp while I’m figuring out how to tell that big nonfiction story.”

Over the years, the challenges of writing have changed for Fleming, especially recently.

The biggest challenge, “used to be trying to get my writing done with children at home,” she said. “Now, it’s about balance; I think it might be from COVID. How much work do I want to do, and how much time do I want for myself?”

Fleming said that publishing has shifted over the years, incorporating more researching and writing.

“Authors are expected to do our own and write blogs.,” she said “Suddenly your hours get filled up with not writing (books) because of the advent of social media. I’m not the biggest fan. … It used to be you could ‘just’ churn out a book and pop in at a conference. You didn’t have to do anything else.”

In fact, Fleming said that until about 10 years ago when Highlights for Children built its own conference center, she had come to Chautauqua Institution several times to speak at their annual conferences, which were held in July. She looked forward to them.

“Now, there’s a virtual book tour that you can do from your own house,” Fleming said. “Suddenly I’m making a video, a home video for marketing at Random House for its book launch. … But it’s not just a 30-second home video. It’s a neat (workspace), it’s putting on makeup — what’s that? — and also a dress. And you have to think about what you want to say, even if it’s just for 30 seconds.”

Finding balance between “What should I do?” and “What do I want to do?” has become increasingly difficult. Particularly so, one might surmise, for someone who has always had more ideas about what to write than actual time to write.

“I’m excited about Chautauqua and Eleanor,” Fleming said. “… What I’m going to do is tell seven stories about her, what people may not have realized she did, and (talk about) something she carried in her wallet her whole life.”

People may think that “nonfiction is like reading the encyclopedia, dull and dusty,” Fleming said. But, she knows how to make history come alive. 

“My goal with nonfiction is to write a story so that it reads like a novel,” Fleming said. “Nonfiction is like the step-sister, yet these are true stories, and they’re entertaining and enlightening and they can change minds, opinions and viewpoints.”

Policy scientists embed Roosevelt’s humanity, as expressed in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights drafted by the human rights commission she conscientiously chaired, in the goals they set for their public policy problem solving work. 

Via anecdotes few people know, first-hand historical accounts and animated narrative, Fleming said she will show “how Eleanor Roosevelt’s decency, determination and generosity of heart changed the world; how her vision of a more generous world still lingers; and how her example matters now, more than ever.”

The Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra has a brand of magic that never fails; some power in their corner. The double bass and the percussion section? Some heavy ammunition in their camp. One might even say that they’ve got some punch, pizzazz, yahoo — and how.

All they have to do is rub that lamp.

And at 7:30 p.m. Saturday night, July 9, in the Amphitheater, under the baton of Principal Pops Conductor Stuart Chafetz, the CSO will grant the audience a wish (or two, or three) with “Aladdin Live in Concert” as they play Alan Menken’s Academy Award-winning score while the 1992 animated Disney classic plays on screens overhead.

In a phrase: “It is going to be ridiculously fun,” Chafetz said.

“Aladdin” earned two Oscars for its soundtrack, which includes, of course, “Arabian Nights,” “Prince Ali,” and “Friend Like Me” — as well as the first and only song from a Disney feature film to earn a Grammy Award for Song of the Year: “A Whole New World,” sung by Peabo Bryson and Regina Belle. The film led to two direct-to-video sequels (the third installment featured Robin Williams’ return to the role of Genie.) Then came the Broadway adaptation, and a 2019 live-action film starring Will Smith.

“For the audience, there’s always that ‘wow’ moment, when a movie plays, and you hear the music, and it reminds you of your childhood. It takes you right back to where you were,” Chafetz said. “For me, that’s definitely the case (with live movie score performances). With ‘Aladdin,’ all those familiar tunes, it’s such a part of the culture.”

The CSO has been performing live to classic, popular movies for several years now, so they’ve got the likes of the Harry Potter series, “Star Wars: A New Hope,” and “The Nightmare Before Christmas” under their belts. Chafetz often conducts live-music movies, from “E.T.” to “Raiders of the Lost Ark” all across the country.

They know the pacing, the use of click tracks, the locking in of every single cue. But “Aladdin,” Chafetz said, is a bit different.

“There is a lot of music — it barely stops,” he said. “Other films, you might have five, six minutes without music, but with ‘Aladdin,’ it’s more like 12 seconds, and then it’s on to the next thing. We’re constantly playing. It takes a tremendous amount of concentration.”

Recording a film’s score in a studio would occur in chunks: record a section, take a break, maybe re-record. But live? 

“This was never designed to be played live, because it’s so difficult. And on top of that, you have to play it all the way through,” Chafetz said. “There’s a lot of adjusting you need to do, tuning changes, percussion sets moving from wind chimes to gongs and back. In the studio, you stop, reset, take the next section. Here, you have to anticipate it as it’s going by, which means it requires incredible virtuosity.”

More than that, it’s not just that “Aladdin” features almost-constant music; it’s that the kind of music is incredibly varied.

“There’s jazz, there’s this Middle Eastern sound, there’s classical,” Chafetz said. “The variety of styles within the music is truly amazing, and will really show off just how awesome the CSO really is, to switch styles like it’s nothing, because it’s not nothing. You have to know jazz, bossa nova, and it takes years to do something like that. But that’s why it works so well here: The CSO is amazing, the Amp is perfect. I just love it.”

In a film packed with nearly non-stop music, beloved lyrics, stunning visuals and the voice talents of such heavy hitters as Williams, Gilbert Gottfried — and then the addition of Smith to the roster by virtue of the live-action adaptation — Chafetz pointed out another diamond Chautauquans can experience: One of their own.

Jonathan Freeman, who voiced Jafar in the original 1992 film, and in the Broadway stage adaptation, is the nephew of longtime Chautauquans vic gelb and his wife, Joan.

“When I realized this, I was just starstruck,” Chafetz said. “That one line, when he asks Aladdin, ‘Where are you from?’ and the answer is, basically, ‘Places you’ve never been.’ And then Jafar says: ‘Try me.’ I love that line, the way he delivers it. And to have that Chautauqua connection is really, really cool.”

Pull out a map and travel with John Philip Newell; on the western coast of Scotland, there’s a small island named Iona, where Newell, pilgrim and former minister, takes people who are looking to connect with their faith on pilgrimages at least four times a year.

Newell, who visited Chautauqua Institution as a chaplain-in-residence and lecturer in 2016, will give his lecture “The Grace of Nature” at 2 p.m. Friday, July 8, in the Hall of Philosophy to finish the Interfaith Lecture Series Week Two theme, “Reconnecting with the Natural World.”

“(I’m going to) particularly look at Celtic wisdom that celebrates the essential sacredness of Earth, the sacredness of every human being, and looks at that as having a radical impact on how we see and view and handle one another,” Newell said, “… (and) how we live in a sort of interrelationship with all things as part of our well-being, as part of our healing.”

Iona is referred to as Scotland’s “holy island,” and Newell said in the sixth century, Christianity began in Scotland. He said Iona has been a place for pilgrimages for people from all over the world for hundreds of years.

“At least four times a year, I lead pilgrimage weeks on Iona,” Newell said. “People come from all over the world to reflect together; to enter times of meditation and prayer together; to have times of hiking on the island; to have times of very intentional study and reflection; times of very simple spiritual practice (and) the practice of sharing meals together.”

Newell said he wants his Hall of Philosophy audience to take away “a renewed sense of sacredness” and to appreciate everything, from life to breathing to the sunrise. 

He hopes attendees will use the sacredness and appreciation to reflect on how they’re going to live with one another with these views toward nature.

“We need to change how we are relating to the Earth, specifically, and to one another if there’s to be a future path for humanity on this planet,” Newell said. “I came away (from the most recent pilgrimage) with a strong sense of the challenge ahead of us. But, I came away once again with hope that people are wanting to access this vision. … So once again, Iona produced a note of hope.”

Newell said he always makes sure to take a day of solitude for himself on the island once everyone else has left.

“That’s what the vision of Iona has always been,” Newell said. “It’s not a place to go and stay forever, so much as a place to be renewed so that one can reenter the challenging places.”

In addition to being a former minister of the Celtic Christian faith, Newell was a teacher within the faith. At one point in his life, he said he started to reflect on his own integrity and decided to step down from ministry.

“I realized what I had signed up to do as a young man, in terms of the doctrinal and creedal statements of the Church of Scotland, simply did not reflect what my passion of belief is,” Newell said. “It was important for my own integrity to say that it doesn’t reflect what I’m teaching.”

Newell said he still has respect for those still practicing within the four walls of a church, but that he sees it now as more of a disconnect between faith and life.

“I’m aware that we’re in a transition time in Western Christianity,” Newell said. “My decision to relinquish ordination was to stand much more clearly and emphatically with those outside of the walls of religion as a way of saying we’re hungry for change; we want more than what has historically and traditionally been presented within our church inheritance.”

Thousands of people walk the streets of New York City everyday. Photographer and author Brandon Stanton works to put a story to every face.

After losing his lucrative job in Chicago as a stock broker in 2010, Stanton decided to move to New York with one plan in his mind — and little money in his pocket.  

His master plan: interview and photograph a total of 10,000 strangers on the streets of New York, the epicenter of anonymity.

Stanton is the creative mastermind behind the photoblog “Humans of New York,” where he first started documenting photographs, interviews and stories from his impromptu street conversations. 

Now, what started out as a small blog has become an internet sensation, and taken him all around the world. Since 2010, Stanton’s work has expanded to numerous other formats, including three New York Times best-selling books and over 20 million followers across all his social media platforms. He has photographed and interviewed political figures, such as President Barack Obama and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. 

Stanton will discuss his work and life journey at 10:45 a.m. Friday, July 8, in the Amphitheater to close the Chautauqua Lecture Series Week Two theme of “The Wild: Reconnecting with Our Natural World.” 

“Stanton’s work is all about human connection, our common stories and shared identity,” said Vice President and Emily and Richard Smucker Chair for Education Matt Ewalt. “His photographs also show us how our environments help define us, from the urban spaces we have made, to the natural spaces we seek out, in the densest of cities.” 

Ewalt said that Stanton’s works challenge us to question “what it means to truly see each other, from those who we may walk past on the streets of New York, to those on the other side of the world that share common stories with us.” 

Stanton’s conversations and photographs formed the basis for his book Humans of New York. In his book, he features thousands of portraits and interview snippets from his intimate conversations with ordinary people walking the streets of the city. The conversations range from light-hearted and comical to heart-wrenching and emotional. 

In a cultural era characterized by technological advancement, political polarization and physical separation, Stanton reminds us of the value and importance of remaining present in the moment, and of remembering to take time to connect with those around us. 

Through his photographs, captions and astute observations, he offers his viewers insight into the intimate life experiences and stories of complete strangers. His work shows that there is truly no such thing as an average person. Rather, we all have unique life stories, backgrounds and experiences that have shaped who we are as individuals — making us each extraordinary in our own right. 

“I think there is something timeless and inherently good about having conversations with random people on the street,” Stanton said in a November 2020 New York Times interview. 

During this interview Stanton shared how the pandemic had affected his work.

“There’s something about the magic of having a deep conversation with a random person that I truly miss,” Stanton said.

Through his storytelling, Stanton paints a portrait of the shared human experience. In closing out Week Two’s theme, he will draw on his work, which aims to facilitate natural human connections in a world that is becoming increasingly influenced by human-made distractions. 

“I’ve always felt that Chautauqua, at its core, is all about human connection and conversation, and our ability to be present with one another, learn from one another and be part of a larger conversation — not just with friends and family but with those we meet for the first time,” Ewalt said, noting that Stanton makes for an apt replacement for previously announced lecturer Nick Offerman. “I hope that we can treasure these opportunities more, not just here at Chautauqua but in our lives year-round.”

When Chautauquans gather tonight in the Amphitheater, ready for an evening of Broadway hits and a superstar headliner, that is exactly what they’ll get.

Just maybe not from the superstar they’re expecting.

In a last-minute, under-the-wire program pivot, Hamilton star Renée Elise Goldsberry had to cancel her Amp performance; in a matter of hours Thursday morning and afternoon, a new headliner was announced: Brian Stokes Mitchell, a Tony Award-winner whose baritone voice has been a staple on the Great White Way for decades. He’ll perform with his longtime collaborator and friend, pianist Tedd Firth at 8:15 p.m. Friday, July 8, in the Amp for a program titled “Songs and Stories.”

When Deborah Sunya Moore, senior vice president and chief programming officer, got the call Thursday morning that Goldsberry had tested positive for COVID-19, she and her team sprung into action. 

“When someone cancels — and of course, this has happened before in our programming, and it will happen again, especially in this time of COVID — even on a short timeline like this, the first thing we try to honor is something that’s in the same vein as what everyone was expecting,” she said. “And so for me, the first thing was: ‘Stick with Broadway.’ ”

And since the mid-1990s, Mitchell has been synonymous with Broadway. Nominated for four Tony Awards and earning the win for Best Actor in a Musical for his 2000 role in Kiss Me, Kate, he’s also known for Ragtime, Man of La Mancha, and King Hedley II. Simply put, Moore said, Mitchell is “a Broadway star. People truly think of him as Broadway royalty.”

Honored in 2016 with the Isabelle Stevenson Award for his work chairing The Actors Fund, which supports members of the entertainment community in crisis or transition, he also made headlines at the beginning of the pandemic for similar acts of heart.

“He was the one leaning out of his New York City apartment balcony, singing to the essential workers, honoring them and uplifting them,” Moore said. 

Mitchell took to his tiny balcony on Broadway and West 98th Street, night after night in the spring of 2020 — the height of lockdown, isolation and despair — to sing one song: “The Impossible Dream,” from Man of La Mancha, for which he had been nominated for a 2003 Tony.

Mitchell continued the performances of “The Impossible Dream,” a song with fresh relevancy and comfort during the pandemic, until the crowds outside his apartment grew too large to continue.

“Singing both felt like a performance and I didn’t want to do that,” Mitchell was quoted in the outlet Chelsea News in May 2020. “ ‘The Impossible Dream’ is the perfect song for the moment. It gives people hope. It’s also a song about trying — just to hear the lyrics — ‘to fight the unbeatable foe, bear with unbearable sorrow, and to run where the brave dare not go.’ ”

During the pandemic, The Actors Fund was able to provide $4 million in emergency assistance to thousands of artists and actors left jobless when Broadway went dark.

Beyond his work on Broadway, Mitchell has a longlist of acting credits, from “Frasier,” “Trapper John, MD,” “Glee,” “Madam Secretary,” and many more. He’s twice performed at the White House, and has appeared with such acts as the United States Marine Band, the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, and the Muppets.

“He’s done everything,” Moore said. “I think the minute people see him, see his face and hear his voice, they’ll say, ‘Oh, my gosh. That’s Brian.’ ” 

Moore said that the quick shift in programming, coming together in mere hours between Goldsberry’s cancellation and Mitchell’s confirmation, is a testament to both the draw that Chautauqua has for artists, and the way in which performing arts organizations and venues have leaned on each other during the pandemic. 

“This community has become so supportive of one another. One of the things that has happened with COVID, in our industry, is that it has felt less and less competitive and more supportive,” Moore said. “We’re a closer-knit community. … That’s one of the things that’s come out of this, in a really positive way.”

And when Chautauquans take their seats, they’ll bear witness to what that community has been able to do, and what actors and artists have been able to accomplish with each other, and for each other.

“This is going to be one of those evenings of intimate sharing of stories and personal experiences on Broadway, with incredible singing,” Moore said. “That makes it one of those evenings Chautauquans will love because it’s not just the talent. It’s not just the Broadway songs. It’s going to Brian, with Tedd, who is one of his best friends, sharing their experiences in that way of storytelling that really resonates with this place.”

As one of the people who recommended Robin Wall Kimmerer’s 2013 nonfiction book Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teaching of Plants for the Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle, Stephine Hunt feels its merits are numerous and far-reaching.

“(When I recommended it) I was thinking about how we can speak specifically to our relationships with land, and with this term ‘wilderness’ that tends to place the human outside of nature,” said Hunt, the CLSC Octagon Manager. “There’s this idea that the wild needs to be outside of the human in order to be wild. I think this book does a lot of work to show us that human and nature are one and the same and work together to very simply survive.”

Part of the reason Hunt suggested Kimmerer — a botanist, author and Potawatomi citizen — as the CLSC author for Week Two was because Hunt wanted to see an Indigenous voice on the season’s roster of CLSC authors.

“Kimmerer brings with her this depth of knowledge that we really need to bring into the conversation about nature,” she said, “especially if we want to build a relationship outside of the dichotomy of human and nature that we often encounter in narratives of wild and wilderness.”

At 3:30 p.m. Thursday, July 7, in the Hall of Philosophy, and simulcast into the Hall of Christ, Elizabeth S. Lenna Hall, and to CHQ Assembly. Kimmerer will discuss her book Braiding Sweetgrass. In her book, Kimmerer — an enrolled member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation — connects Native traditions to Western science and methodologies, drawing the two together. Braiding Sweetgrass won the 2014 Sigurd F. Olson Nature Writing Award, and appeared on numerous bestseller lists.

“If we’re thinking about how we generate a relationship with the knowledge that Kimmerer is sharing, it asks us to be more conscientious about the land that we’re on, and all of our daily activities — where we live, where we work, where we play,” Hunt said. “It also asks us to be knowledgeable of whose traditional territory this is that we call home.”

According to Sony Ton-Aime, Chautauqua’s Michael I. Rudell Director of Literary Arts, Braiding Sweetgrass focuses much of its energies on “how we are all connected to the Earth, and how the Earth is providing to us all, and how best we can be a steward of what the Earth has offered us.”

Ton-Aime also appreciates the knowledge of Indigenous culture Kimmerer offers. 

“Robin Wall Kimmerer is someone who is deeply interested and is deeply observant of the wisdom of Indigenous people in the United States,” he said. 

Ton-Aime said that many Chautauquans over the years have recommended Braiding Sweetgrass be added to the CLSC list, and in 2022, the opportunity arose.

“If we listen to the people who have been inhabiting this land for so long, and couple Western scientific knowledge with their knowledge, we will be better stewards of this land that we have,” he said. “It’s about going back to the essence of what land is and what our place in it is.”

Connecting with God is a main focus for a majority of religious and spiritual believers; novelist and creative writing teacher Sophfronia Scott writes about how to connect with God through natural efforts. Scott said she has felt a sense of God since her childhood, and it came from an urge to observe the outdoors.

“That aspect has always been with me,” Scott said. “To understand what that feeling was took a while, and that was and has been my spiritual journey.”

Scott will give her lecture “In the Water and the Air: Embracing the Divine Through Nature” at 2 p.m. Thursday, July 7, in the Hall of Philosophy for the Interfaith Lecture Series Week Two theme, “Reconnecting with the Natural World.”

“The main points of the lecture are about the inevitable, ineffable nature of the divine in how we seek to understand God and embrace God,” Scott said. “We make that hard on ourselves, when really all we have to do is embrace nature.”

Scott keeps the Bible verse John 10:14-28 on her desk. The verse begins with “I am the good shepherd.” Scott said she was once sent a post from a woman on Facebook who chronicled her time reading Scott’s book The Seeker and the Monk: Everyday Conversations with Thomas Merton. 

In the book, Scott refers to religious icons as objects that people have in their possession that may help them facilitate a stronger connection with God. 

In her Facebook post, the woman has jealous thoughts toward people who have mystical encounters with the love of God, as is described in Scott’s book. Scott said in the post, the woman takes her favorite religious icon off the shelf and holds it in her lap while she reads.

After holding the icon while reading, she follows up on her original Facebook post with, “for the rest of the story, see picture.”

The icon was the good shepherd. 

“The point is that she’s sitting there complaining that nobody else has mystical experiences, but then she does have one for herself. I think that’s pretty cool,” Scott said. 

God can mean different things to different people, so Scott said she uses the word “divine” to refer to God. She said she appreciates the serenity nature offers.

“I do think God speaks to us through nature,” Scott said. “I think there’s a silence in nature that is the voice of God, and we can be ignorant of that.”

Scott said people can take nature for granted by looking at it at face value, such as the weather. She said she wants her audience to take away a new appreciation for nature.

“(I want to help) people make a connection with God that is wholly their own,” Scott said, “something that they can access — and it doesn’t necessarily come from someone else, but to recognize that we are all beloved children of God. When I see someone able to make that connection, and find a newness to their faith because of it, that’s exciting to me.”

Scott has delivered numerous lectures and workshops, including keynote addresses for the Thomas Merton Center and the Mark Twain House & Museum.

Scott said she isn’t a spiritual director or coach, but wants people to connect with religion through her writing.

“I usually am mainly talking about my experience,” Scott said. “I teach my students that if you tell your own story well enough, that you will hit a universal note. It will resonate in such a way that other people are reading themselves into the work.”

Between arid arches and majestic mountains, the scenery of Utah, where award-winning author and naturalist Terry Tempest Williams grew up, differs greatly from Chautauqua’s  lush lakeside location. Utah has greatly influenced Williams’ writing; the effects of nuclear testing in the West from the 1940s to the 1960s, both on the environment and those living there, takes center stage in her memoir Refuge: An Unnatural History of Family and Place.

Williams will be interviewed by David Lamfrom, vice president of regional programs for the National Parks Conservation Association, at 10:45 a.m. Thursday, July 7, in the Amphitheater as part of the Chautauqua Lecture Series Week Two theme, “The Wild: Reconnecting with Our Natural World.”

Lamfrom connects Williams’ writing with the time he worked in the California desert.

“For me, (Williams) was background reading for helping to understand, to create a deeper sense of place,” Lamfrom said. 

Williams has received numerous awards and honors for her work as an author and a naturalist, including the National Wildlife Federation’s Conservation Award for Special Achievement, the Sierra Club John Muir Award, a Hemingway Foundation Literary Grant and honorary doctorates from several U.S. colleges. She’s currently a writer-in-residence at the Harvard Divinity School 

As the author of more than 15 books, ranging from nonfiction to essay collections to children’s literature, Williams combines scientific concepts with her personal experiences to emphasize the interconnection of social and environmental issues. Similarly, within his work, Lamfrom incorporates elements of nature, history and culture to protect the national parks. He looks forward to interviewing someone whose work has influenced his field. 

“One of the things I get to do is, I get to express my gratitude to (Williams) for the work that she’s done to protect places that I really love,” Lamfrom said. 

Williams’ writing leans into a poetic eloquence that draws readers into the pertinent subject matter. Lamfrom identifies as a storyteller himself, and he appreciates the ability of the written word to transcend barriers. 

The reader produces the story that somebody else experienced, Lamfrom said, which because of the reader’s unique background, adds new meaning to the work. 

Lamfrom hopes to guide his interview with Williams in a way that makes the crucial subject matter accessible to a diverse audience of people. 

“I feel really confident that between her ability to tell her story and my connection and care to those places (that have influenced her), that we can create a big enough circle that can invite everybody in the room in,” Lamfrom said, “to have a really deep and meaningful, but also plain-worded, conversation.”

Lamfrom believes the conversation will introduce a new layer of meaning to Williams’ work.

“It’s a really unique and important experience for people, especially for people who are trying to metabolize the theme. … It’s like, for example, when you have songs that you love, songs that are just important to you in your life. And then when you hear the artists talk about what it meant to tell and make that song, it changes and gives it texture, right?” Lamfrom said. “That is the opportunity and I think that it’s an incredible one.”

Though the work of both Williams and Lamfrom have taken them across the country, the ideals that they hold can be applied in any environment, including here at Chautauqua.

One of the most important composers to Alexander Gavrylyuk — a composer he grew up listening to, in fact — is Sergei Prokofiev.

“Since he was born in Ukraine, same as myself, there was always this special link,” said Gavrylyuk, a Ukrainian-born Australian pianist. “My father’s side of the family comes from the very region (Prokofiev) was born in. Prokofiev’s music, I find, is always very theatrical, very charismatic, very satirical.”

At 8:15 p.m. Thursday, July 7, in the Amphitheater, Gavrylyuk will perform Prokofiev Piano Concerto No. 1 in D Flat’s major, op. 10, alongside the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Music Director Rossen Milanov. Following Prokofiev, the CSO takes on Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 8. Together, the evening’s performance is titled “Passion and Struggle.” 

“(The Prokofiev concerto) is a work that he composed when he was only 20 years old, and he performed it at the graduation for his conservatory in St. Petersburg,” Gavrylyuk said. “What’s interesting about Prokofiev is that he was actually born where some of the fiercest fighting is happening right now, in the Donbas area.”

For Gavrylyuk, the concerto is an optimistic work, one with plenty of musical jokes peppered throughout the piece that he said he’s excited for Chautauquans to experience.

“There’s a lot of humor in this piece,” he said. “But there are also quite a few daring musical ideas that Prokofiev purposefully included in defiance of the conservatory’s teachers. It’s a daring work that was very successful, in fact.”

As a performer, Gavrylyuk said one of his most important goals is to find the artistic truth behind a given piece of music.

“By learning about the background and history for a composition like this, I can more easily achieve that goal,” he said. “And by trying to get inside Prokofiev’s mind and inside his emotional world, and by imagining the reasons and inspirations that he had at the time, I can more accurately play his music.”

Performing with the CSO, Gavrylyuk said, is “a gratifying experience,” in part because of how in tune the two musical entities are.

“We’ve only had one rehearsal, but because we’ve performed together so many times, we really know each other’s way of playing,” he said. “It’s a really organic kind of process every time we play together. It’s a wonderful orchestra with a truly positive psychology and approach to rehearsing. They share the Chautauquan mindset: a nice, really inspiring energy that occurs on stage, that you can feel.”

Gavrylyuk said that even though he performs constantly with many different orchestras, playing with the CSO is “very personal.”

“I’m so excited to share this music with everyone,” he said.

Majora Carter is a woman who wears many hats: real estate developer, urban revitalization strategy consultant, a MacArthur Fellow, a Peabody Award-winning broadcaster, a lecturer at the Keller Center at Princeton University.

At the heart of her work is the idea that “nobody should have to move out of their neighborhood to live in a better one” — words emblazoned on the walls of the National Museum of African-American History and Culture, a Smithsonian Institution.

“Even despite how horrible things may seem outwardly,” Carter told Jake Neher of WDET in March 2022, with regards to lower income communities, “there’s also always a sense of community in those areas, but it’s often overshadowed by this idea that those communities inherently have no value while we’re in them.”

At 3:30 p.m. Wednesday, July 6, in the Hall of Philosophy, Carter will deliver the Week Two installment of the Chautauqua Speaker Series, programmed by the African American Heritage House. Carter is editor and senior producer at GroundTruth, the outlet based out of the nonprofit Groundswell, dedicated to telling stories of people building community power. 

She’s also the author of Reclaiming Your Community: You Don’t Have to Move Out of Your Neighborhood to Live in a Better One. 

Largely, her work focuses on talent retention to reduce “brain drain” in America’s low-status communities. She has much experience pioneering sustainable economic development in one of America’s most storied low-status communities: her hometown of the South Bronx.

“I’m not saying that talent retention is going to solve gentrification, but gentrification will not be fixed without talent retention because the underlying problem is the lack of wealth creation and retention in those same communities,” Carter told David Brancaccio for “Marketplace Morning Report” in February 2022. “Because when you think about it, gentrification generally involves outsiders coming in to change a community to suit (their) needs.”

Reclaiming, she told Brancaccio, “involves retaining the talent that is already there to improve our surroundings and our own economic future.”

In the South Bronx, Carter launched the Boogie Down Grind, a hip-hop themed specialty coffee and craft beer spot, and the first commercial “third space” in the Hunts Point neighborhood of the South Bronx since the mid-1980s.

“(Community members) want to feel as though there’s something to look forward to in their community that just speaks to them,” she told Brancaccio. “And it has things like cafes and restaurants and parks and bookstores where they can meet other people and express themselves and just feel good about where they are.”

For her work, Carter has been named among the “100 Most Intriguing Entrepreneurs” by Goldman Sachs, a “Silicon Alley 100” by Business Insider, and she was awarded the Liberty Medal for Lifetime Achievement by News Corp., among other honors. 

She’s served on the boards of the U.S. Green Building Council, Ceres, The Wilderness Society and the Andrew Goodman Foundation.

Water may not be typically defined as a living organism, but it is a sacred, necessary nourishment for all life on Earth. Yet the Earth’s water sources, both freshwater and saltwater, are becoming increasingly depleted and contaminated. 

Kelsey Leonard, the newly-named Canada Research Chair of Indigenous Waters, Climate and Sustainability at the University of Waterloo, has dedicated her life’s work to water justice and responsibility. 

Leonard will give her lecture at 10:45 a.m. Wednesday, July 6, in the Amphitheater, contributing to Week Two’s Chautauqua Lecture Series theme of “The Wild: Reconnecting With Our Natural World.” 

“The talk is largely structured around … a new way of thinking about our relationship to the environment through our legal systems and what’s more commonly known as Earth Law, or Earth jurisprudence,” Leonard said. “(It is) largely about how we create systems of law that support the natural ability of our environment to exist, to thrive, to evolve, to be free from human domination, corruption and damage.”

As an enrolled citizen of the Shinnecock Nation and as a First Nations person, Leonard has borne witness to the abuse of water sources. 

Shinnecock Nation is located on the east end of Long Island, and the territory is directly impacted by climate change, ranging from sea level rises to extreme storm events.

“(Being an Indigenous person has) very much informed a lot of my environmental knowledge and my motivations and impetus for doing these types of work, especially because we’re a coastal Algonquian tribal nation,” Leonard said.

She attributes her keen interest and career in environmentalism to her Shinnecock roots. Leonard feels her ancestors had a clear understanding of humans’ role on Earth to protect finite resources and allow the natural world to thrive.

In college, Leonard studied abroad in Samoa, a small island country in the South Pacific Ocean.

“I saw firsthand a lot of the access issues in terms of water, sanitation and scarcity concerns facing a small island developing nation,” she said. “And they seemed almost duplicative of the experiences I saw on my reservation back home.”

When thinking about the common denominator, Leonard realized both places are home to Indigenous people and had ongoing issues of colonialism that impacted how their water is governed. This experience led her to earn her master’s in water science, a law degree and a doctorate focused on environment and water.

Leonard also represents the Shinnecock Indian Nation on the Mid-Atlantic Committee on the Ocean, and is a member of the Great Lakes Water Quality Board, which advises the International Joint Commission.

“Regional ocean partnerships (of the Mid-Atlantic Committee on the Ocean) are spread across the U.S. in different regions, and they help to inform interjurisdictional coordination between states, tribes and federal entities, as well as fishery management councils for ocean protection and ocean suitable uses,” Leonard said. “I’ve been involved in that policy work for close to 10 years now. So, that has shaped a lot of the work that I do and what I’ll be distributing in my lecture.”

Her work on the Great Lakes Water Quality Board centers around freshwater and saltwater habitats and ecosystems. She aims to create a “more holistic approach to conservation and management of our hydrologic cycle.”

As a professor and educator, Leonard is constantly expanding her knowledge of environmentalism through her students’ inquisitiveness and curiosity. 

“I think a lot of the crises we see in our world today, whether water or climate, are actually crises that are socially constructed and human driven,” Leonard said. “They’re crises that stem from perhaps miscommunication or lack of understanding of how to ask a diverse set of questions.”

She hopes that those attending her lecture will take action, no matter how small or large, to promote environmental protection. 

“I think sometimes folks are better at listening … to diverse ideas and new ideas, but we are at such a critical point in our human history that we no longer can just sit and listen,” Leonard said. “We actually have to do something.”