Pop Conference 2022 - "When I Think of Home: Race and Borders in Popular Music"

The Way Back Home: How Musicians Navigate Race and Borders 
An online Pop Conference Keynote panel
in collaboration with
New York University’s Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music
and Billboard

featuring musicians
AROOJ AFTAB
YOUSSOU N’DOUR
LIDO PIMIENTA

moderated by ANN POWERS, writer, NPR Music
produced by JASON KING, New York University

When:
Thursday April 21 at 8 pm ET
This event is free and open to the public.
Please sign up online and register in advance to receive a link to watch.

To kick off the 20th anniversary online edition of the annual Pop Conference, this year’s keynote conversation invites a panel of three trailblazing musicians whose work illuminates the main themes of this year’s conference: borders, home, and race. In their own unique ways, each of this year’s panel participants has been a leader in reimagining the role and power of popular music as it circulates in a rapidly globalized world. Our panelists will explore how their respective music crosses borders of all kinds, and in turn transforms those borders—forcing us, in the process, to rethink notions of home and homelands, as well as race and identity.

This year’s panel includes AROOJ AFTAB, the acclaimed semi-classical, Hindustani, minimalist composer, songwriter and singer, who was recently awarded the Grammy Award for Best Global Music Performance and is the first ever Pakistani artist to receive a Grammy.

Canadian-Colombian, Grammy-nominated and Polaris Prize-winning interdisciplinary artist, musician and curator LIDO PIMIENTA makes work that foregrounds Afro-Indigenous traditions and explores the wider politics of race, gender, motherhood, and identity.

And singer, songwriter, musician, businessman, activist, ambassador and politician YOUSSOU N’DOUR is one of the most highly celebrated African musicians of all time, described by Rolling Stone as "perhaps the most famous singer alive" in Senegal and Western Africa. N’Dour helped popularize mbalax music before achieving unprecedented international success in his collaborations with artists like Peter Gabriel and Neneh Cherry; and he has released numerous border-crossing albums, including 2002’s Grammy-winning Egypt, now celebrating its 20th anniversary.

Ann Powers, NPR Music Critic and author of many books, moderates the open-ended discussion. The event is produced by Jason King, hosted by New York University’s Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music, and presented in conjunction with Billboard.

To register: https://popconference2022.eventbrite.com