This Black History Month, we partnered with Artivate at Levine artist Deacon Izzy of 1Stop for a special video. Deacon Izzy reminds us that Black History Month invites us all to be students and is an opportunity to explore the countless Black artists who have had and continue to have a profound impact on the musical world.
No matter where you are on your musical journey, we invite you to use some of the resources in our updated Black History Month resource guide as a starting point for further exploration.
Discover Repertoire, Artists, and Genres
- Music by Black Composers fills a major diversity gap in sheet music by publishing books of music exclusively by Black composers and offering robust online resources. Their website includes repertoire directories for violin, piano, and classical guitar, as well as a new volume of beginner-level violin music by Black composers.
- The Library of Congress has many online resources to learn about Black composers, including digital scores, audio recordings, articles, and video performances from the Library of Congress Concert Series.
- The Institute for Composer Diversity at SUNY Fredonia has a searchable and filterable composer database where you can find artist profiles based on the genre and instrumentation they have written for.
- For brass musicians, Last Row Music has an ever-evolving database of music by Black composers for solo brass instruments and brass ensembles of varying instrumentation.
- Pianists can use a variety of identifiers in the keyword search to find music by composers from underrepresented communities on A Seat At the Piano’s database.
- The Archives of African American Music and Culture at Indiana University features resources and materials as well as a documentary video series focused on the music and stories of Black artists across musical genres.
- The Smithsonian Folkways Recordings maintains a catalog of materials showcasing the extensive African American heritage in music and oral traditions across genres.
Last year, cellist and Levine faculty member Johnny Walker shared his playlist of Black composers Click here to learn more about his playlist featuring some of the composers listed below.
Learn More About Black History Month
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- The US’s official website on Black History Month brings together information on events and resources on Black history from across the Library of Congress and the National Endowment for the Humanities, the National Gallery of Art, the National Park Service, the Smithsonian Institution, the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, and US National Archives and Records Administration.
- Discover the origins of Black History Month on the Association for the Study of African American Life and History’s website, from Carter G. Woodson and the annual celebration’s beginnings in 1915 to the 2025 theme of African Americans and Labor.
- Check out events, resources, exhibitions, and podcasts for Black History Month 2025 hosted by The Smithsonian Institute and the National Museum of African American History and Culture.