The Festival’s opening program, Chicago's Own, will feature songs of composers who were born in Chicago as well as those who studied and taught at many of Chicago's universities and institutions.

​Among those born in Chicago are composers Ernst Bacon and Reena Esmail. We look forward to presenting works from composers who taught and trained at the American Conservatory of Music and Chicago Musical College (now Roosevelt University Chicago College for the Performing Arts), including Ned Rorem, Joseph Schwantner, and Ruth Crawford Seeger. Their songs will be featured alongside some of those teaching and residing in Chicago today, including Clarice Assad, Stacy Garrop, Lita Grier and Eric Malmquist.
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KATHRYN HENRY, soprano
KUANG-HAO HUANG, piano
NICHOLAS PHAN, tenor & CAIC artistic director
ZOIE REAMS, mezzo-soprano