Seattle, WA
March 21, 2023

Town Hall Seattle

Art as Empowerment: Fresh Family Concerts for 2023

by

Northwest Folklife 50th Anniversary LogoTown Hall Seattle is proud to partner with Northwest Folklife this winter and spring to curate a series of Saturday Family Concert events! Through music, dance, and visual art, the series showcases the diverse cultures here in Seattle and the Pacific Northwest and offers a special opportunity for young people and families to interact with culture, not just be witness to it.

The season’s theme focuses on Art as Empowerment, exploring how protest music is a form of liberation, emancipation, and validation of identity. The 4-part Winter/Spring series brings awareness to issues that affect everyone at any age, and encourages and enables young people and families to explore their heritage — past, present and future — as a source for individual and collective identity.

All Saturday Family Concerts are FREE for ages 22 and under.

Here’s the lineup:

1/28 at 11am
Gil Scott-Heron Tribute Band
Music, Art, and Poetry of the Civil Rights Movement
Get Tickets

2/25 at 11am
Adriana Giordano & Special Guests
From Alaska to Amazonas: Indigenous Music, Culture, and Resistance
Tickets on sale soon!

3/18 at 11am
R E P O S A D O and Jean-Paul Builes
Rediscovering Latinx Heritage through Poetry, Music, and Dance
Tickets on sale soon!

5/20 at 11am
lhawlhaw
Celebrating Filipino songs of protest past and present
Tickets on sale soon!

A Response from Town Hall – 10/20/22 Event

by

After credible threats of disruption to Town Hall Seattle’s programs on Thursday, October 20, Reza Aslan’s event has been postponed. Our core mission is to be a collective resource for regional nonprofits and we cannot risk jeopardizing other events in our building. For the additional context of that decision, here’s the note that accompanied our notice of postponement.

—

Dear friends,

Thank you, sincerely, to everyone who reached out with concerns around our previously-scheduled appearance by Reza Aslan. Before addressing this, I wanted to share a few thoughts about our organization generally.

Town Hall Seattle is a 22-year-old nonprofit dedicated to maximizing the expression of ideas and creativity in our region. Programs on our stages originate either with dozens of independent organizations or from the program team at Town Hall itself; when we program an event, we don’t pay and are not paid to host it. Our in-house programs are driven by curiosity, by local relevance, and by the belief that arguments that are respectfully conceived, researched, and delivered will be received as such by a broad, curious audience. We believe that a willingness to consider multiple perspectives can lead to increased empathy that can restore mutual respect to our political and social discourse.

We don’t advocate for specific perspectives; Town Hall Seattle is explicitly non-partisan and the opinions expressed on our stages should in no way be assumed to be those of the organization, its staff, board, membership, or affiliated institutions. In short, we contradict ourselves all the time here — it’s the nature of open discourse.

At the same time, we are also deeply rooted in community — so it’s been important to us to have the chance to hear the feedback we’ve received in the last 24 hours about Dr. Aslan’s planned event on the life of Howard Baskerville. As you may know by now, we’ve decided to postpone his appearance indefinitely, and we will keep all the most thoughtful considerations and concerns in mind in future programming decisions.

Thank you again for taking the time to reach out, and we hope you’ll consider joining us at a future Town Hall event.

Wier Harman
Executive Director

A Big Change: Or Is It?

by

For as long I’ve been at Town Hall Seattle — almost 17 people years (or 119 dog years, but who’s counting?) — our organization has been defined by 1) a broad and curious program, brimming with ideas collectively-sourced from across our community and beyond; and 2) the belief that as many as possible should be able to enjoy it. We’ve called this second part a commitment to access. The meaning of “access” has evolved over the years, but we’ve tended to use it in a somewhat limited way: as a commitment to lower financial barriers to producing and attending things here.

We’ve taken a lot of pride in the structural inclusivity of our model, always insisting on the result of a more genuinely welcoming community for all. Town Hall will fulfill its true potential when people who have long felt at home here continue to feel a sense of belonging, while we work to be more deeply meaningful and relevant to even more people across this community. That said, as we work to embrace a richer understanding of accessibility, we want to be clear: our commitment to affordability for all remains critical to the heart of Town Hall.

This season, we’re rolling out a new “Sliding Scale” approach to ticket prices for Town Hall-produced lectures. What does that mean for us? People will always be able to choose a $5 ticket for these programs (and tickets will remain free for youth 22 and Under). But the Sliding Scale pricing option is an approach founded on lots of existing data. Over time, we’ve seen that many patrons choose to make an extra contribution to Town Hall when they purchase tickets, and now we’re giving the people the option to pay what they’re comfortable with for Town Hall programming. No matter where you place the sliding scale ticket price, your ticket purchase helps support our programming and our operations.

Town Hall was founded in 1999 and we’re moving into a new era, finally installed in our newly-renovated building and full of the optimism and possibility of new leadership, all while serving a society in flux. As we begin to imagine the next Town Hall, we need to ensure it can thrive for another 23 years and beyond. In a time of deep vulnerability for cultural presenters like us — financial uncertainty and shifting audience behavior — our goal is to protect our mission-driven commitment to broad community access while securing modest extra revenue that will support our operations and create a solid foundation for the Town Hall to come.

In the end, we hope the new pricing approach is simply an invitation to pay what is comfortable for you. I know you know this, but $5 tickets have never reflected the value of our programs (priceless!) or the true cost of operating Town Hall (pricey-but-worth-it!) We’ve always said that membership here is an act of generosity toward the community at large, assuring affordability for all — and that’s still true. But for some, it’s simply easier to add an extra contribution into the value of their ticket when they can. We believe that in asking those who are inclined to consider paying more, we will create an even deeper sense of belonging and pride within Town Hall’s extraordinary community of supporters.

I can write at this kind of length, with this kind of candor, and all my, let’s call it eccentric punctuation because the Town Hall community is thoughtful and generous. You’re in it for what it means to you, but you’re ALSO in it for each other and for what it means to the city. We are sincerely grateful to all of you, for making Town Hall a uniquely compassionate and collegial place, defined by a thoughtful, caring, and honest community. You can prove it by telling us honestly what you feel about this pricing approach (or anything else) at membership@townhallseattle.org.

With gratitude and affection,

Wier

Are You Free Thursday, and Would You Do Me a Favor?

by

Part One in an Occasional Series About How You “Do” Town Hall

Hi friends,

For the last 15 years, I’ve visited Munich annually with Barbara and the girls to see their grandparents. This rhythm means I miss a bunch of stuff at Town Hall every summer — and this time, that includes an event that I’m really drawn to, personally.

First, a little backstory. Questions about technology and its social implications have been woven throughout our calendar for years, as far back as 2006 when Ray Kurzweil gave me the chills at a packed Great Hall conversation about his book The Singularity is Near: When Humans Transcend Biology. Who wants or needs anything like “a singularity,” I asked? (Note: I have subsequently asked the same thing about NFTs and blockchain, but I remain optimistic that I need not fret about the answers to those questions.)

Artificial Intelligence, or AI, is different. In its implementation, we’re asking and answering questions about what (and eventually, who) constitutes humanity, at lightning speed. And when I say “we” I mean the comparatively small group of scientists, researchers, and schemers motivated by altruism, curiosity, or commercial opportunity — or maybe a little of each.

And so this Thursday, July 14, we have the latest stitch in the weave, a powerhouse discussion at what feels like AI’s rubicon moment. Honestly, that moment was probably years ago, maybe even when Ray released that scary book. But I’m talking about last month’s reporting of a Google engineer’s contention that the Google AI chatbot LaMDA has been “consistent in its communications about what it wants and what it believes its rights are as a person.”

I think this issue would feel like a bigger deal to all of us were it not for the continually chaotic news cycle permeating our lives. But I have to ask myself what problem exactly we’re addressing here and if any of this is what the rest of humankind signed up for. And if we did, was it buried somewhere in the small print, like a Terms of Use Agreement for some digital appliance, showing up bundled in the next upgrade foisted on our lives?

Fortunately, some of the brilliant, well-meaning folks building the building are coming over on July 14 to talk me down off the ledge. Blaise Aguera y Arcas is a VP and Fellow at Google Research, and an active participant in big-picture considerations around AI and ethics, fairness, bias, and risk. Melanie Mitchell is a professor at Santa Fe Institute, a student of Douglas Hofstadter, and a leading forecaster and translator of the implications of AI to the general public. And just announced — the event will be moderated by Lili Cheng, Corporate VP for Microsoft’s AI and Research. It will be a spirited discussion featuring three visionaries staring into the world of AI. We couldn’t have asked for more perceptive observers or more respectfully divergent perspectives, and you should come if you can (you can get tickets here)!

And now, here’s the favor — I’ve got a question I’m hoping you can ask during Q&A:

As we invite technology to support/supplant human decision-making across so many fronts, I’ve started to believe that maybe making mistakes and valuing imperfection is essential to humanity. And that we should resist efforts to use technology to eliminate the fallibility of our incomplete knowledge or poor judgment, or to avoid choices that might fail to fulfill expectations and lead to disappointment. As we begin to invite AI into so many dimensions of life, how can we protect space for fallibility?

It’s time to level with you. For some, Q&A has long been a controversial part of our programs where people make windy speeches (like the one you just read from me — sorry) before a question that feels like an afterthought. Q&A is central to what makes Town Hall special: bring an open mind, and you get a chance to grapple with a deeply informed perspective on a topic, followed by the honor of an opportunity to interrogate a presenter’s conclusions through a direct question.

Being present for Q&A means you showed up, no matter the weather; you stayed engaged to the end and actively collaborated in the meaning of the event. Great questions help us pick up pieces we missed and help our speakers understand new things about their arguments; great questioners help make meaning for all of us. It’s one of the best ways to “do” Town Hall.

We believe that our programs can be more than infotainment; they help us understand issues and decide how we want to live our lives. Not to mention how we express our desires, especially as our daily lives are yoked to intuitions formulated, data gathered, and decisions made by computers that think.

In the end, AI is poised to change a lot about the society we share, and we all have a right to formulate our own perspectives on how we feel about it. This program will undoubtedly offer a rich conversation, and I hope you will be there to join it — and to tell me how it went!

Wier

P.S. We’ve also just announced that the event will feature an appearance by another unintended inevitability of AI: a chatbot evangelist called The Word of the Future. The interactive exhibit by Jacob Peter Fennell and Reilly Donovan was first presented at the Museum of Museums on First Hill last summer. Come early/stay late to be moved by the spirit of a full-on Digital Deity.

Town Hall’s July 14 event will also feature an appearance by The Word of the Future, an interactive exhibit by Jacob Peter Fennell and Reilly Donovan.

The Road Ahead, The Road Behind

by

The end of the season is always a time of reflection at Town Hall. It’s unsurprising that the 2021-22 season has had its challenges and uncertainties, but times like these can also feel inspiring — that’s the story of this year, too. We learned firsthand that Town Hall remains essential, especially to the members and volunteers who have eagerly returned each time we (re-)opened our doors. Over and over, people have shown their affection for Town Hall by returning to rebuild the community that we have created here.

And so — from my place here in the very middle of the road, as I consider where we’ve been and where we’re headed, inspiration and gratitude as far as I can see — I’m writing to announce my departure from Town Hall Seattle at the end of 2022.

My time at Town Hall (over 17 years!) has been the gift of a lifetime, and I am deeply proud of our accomplishments. Our audience has grown steadily over the past several years, and we’ve welcomed over 100,000 patrons annually for a broad, diverse calendar that embraces an impossible range of issues and ideas. We kept our tickets and rental rates affordable and supported other nonprofits with skilled production and promotional services. We completed an ambitious $35.5 million renovation of our building, spending almost two seasons Inside/Out in dozens of venues and neighborhoods across our region.

But I am most proud of what Town Hall has modeled for our city, and for each other. Town Hall is a place devoted to the pursuit of equity; it’s a place to investigate ideas and share new experiences, where differing and unexpected perspectives are not just tolerated but celebrated; and it is a place of curiosity, creativity, and empathy. Above all, I’m proud of how we model the simple act of showing up with and for each other — learning, tangling with new ideas, and sitting side by side with strangers, neighbors, and friends.

I don’t know anywhere else quite like Town Hall — and believe me, I’ve looked. We have created something entirely unique to Seattle and I am overwhelmingly grateful for the opportunity to shape this place in real time with each of you — as members, donors, patrons, renters, presenters, and community partners. This has been a joyful experiment in the idea of creating a welcoming community — and YOU have made this work beyond joyful.

I get the platform of writing a note like this, but YOU are the reason for all the good we have done over Town Hall’s 23 years, and you will continue to be the reason for the community we build here in the decades to come. I trust that this place will continue to be the vessel for the experience of community that we all need so much right now. Our role is simple and profound: to remind us that some things must be experienced together, and that “coming together” is often its own reward.

And that’s the core of my gratitude — I don’t know how another job could have possibly offered me so much energy and purpose. I am humbled to have been entrusted with leading Town Hall, and I’m excited to welcome our next leader alongside you all. My family and I are staying in Seattle; my children grew up here — as in, at this building, at our events — so I’m thrilled by the prospect of joining you in the pews as an enthusiastic member and passionate advocate (my predecessor, founder David Brewster, has modeled that for me).

Thank you for being my friends, collaborators, and co-conspirators on the road behind us, and thank you for being my inspiration on the road ahead.

With gratitude,

Wier Harman
Executive Director

P.S. We’ll have more to share about our transition timeline and the new Executive Director search process at the end of June. In the meantime, please direct any questions to our team at search@townhallseattle.org.

A Bittersweet Farewell: 10 Questions with Joshua Roman

by

Joshua Roman has been the Artistic Director of our beloved Town Music series for 15 creative, vibrant, transformational years. With bittersweet emotions, we’ll send him off with an epic Final Cello-bration in The Great Hall on June 7 at 7:30pm. We can’t wait to see what endeavors Joshua embarks on next — but before he does, we sat down for a quick Q&A that spans everything from his favorite moment to his favorite Seattle sandwich spot.

1. Favorite show?

Every show! But the Final Cello-bration will be the feather in my cap.

2. Favorite commission?

I love them all —  it’s been amazing to see pieces go on to have a life that began at Town Hall.

3. Biggest regret?

Not capturing every single Town Music moment on HD video from the beginning.

4. Moment of bliss?

Fratres with all the cellos.

5. Moment of panic?

Turning a page during the premiere of Gabriela Lena Frank’s solo sonata and seeing that an entire movement was missing.

6. Artist you wish we’d been able to present?

I’ll never tell!

7. Best after show meal spot?

Ba Bar on 12th Ave — consistently delicious, close to Town Hall, and open late.

8. Favorite sandwich?

The Market Grill (in Pike Place Market)! It’s a Seattle gem with great views, and I love taking guest artists there for lunch.

9. Thing you’ll miss about Seattle?

The Town Hall audience! Hopefully I’ll be back often enough not to miss y’all too much!

10. Thing you’ll miss about Town Hall Seattle?

The whole team. Town Hall is truly special, and there’s so much good energy with everyone there, including all of our supporters and audiences. I wish every audience listened with that much care and interest! And The Great Hall…love the sound in that room…

Click here to read Joshua’s farewell letter to the community on our blog and check out his playlist of past performances.

An Easier Way to Request Accessibility Services

by

As many of you know, accessibility is one of Town Hall’s core tenets. We aim to provide a space that convenes community, hosts new ideas, and inspires connection for all — $5 tickets and free tickets for everyone 22 and under are just some of the ways we bring those values to life.

There are many more ways to continue to improve access for all at Town Hall, whether you’re in the building or engaging through the magic of technology. One of the simplest ways of showing up for our community comes in the form of a single question: What do you need to fully engage with Town Hall Seattle? 

Last month, we rolled out a new ticketing system that promises a more streamlined and intuitive ticketing experience. As Executive Director Wier Harman explains in the video below, our patrons told us that one of the things they needed most was being able to purchase a ticket easily, free from frustration. Indeed, a vital first step on the journey to engaging with Town Hall!

 

Even more exciting, because of our improved ticketing platform, there’s one small but mighty option that now appears each and every time anyone makes a ticket purchase: An Accessibility Services Request.

When an Accessibility Services Request is added to a cart and the purchase is completed, our Patron Services team is notified and will reach out for more information so that Town Hall can meet each patron’s needs. Whether it’s ASL, CART, wheelchair or service dog seating, or something else, we want to hear about what our community needs as we work to normalize and operationalize accessibility on our virtual and live stages.

Questions? Contact our Patron Services team at patronservices@townhallseattle.org or call (206) 504-2857.

A Ticketing Reboot

by

As we jump into the energizing days of spring, we’re excited to unveil an important project that promises to make your Town Hall experience a whole lot breezier. From our historic building to the events themselves, we strive to inspire, excite, and fulfill curiosity — and our ticketing system is a critical part of the patron experience. We’ve worked to improve ticketing over the past few years, but not without challenges. We know that our current ticketing system hasn’t met your needs, we’ve taken your feedback seriously, and we’re pleased to announce a change!

On April 27, we’ll take Town Hall’s ticketing to the next level with a new, improved system. It’s been quite a journey, and we’re grateful for your patience and feedback and for weathering the shifts right alongside us. Here are a few of the perks of our new system:

  • More intuitive interface
  • Streamlined member account login and checkout
  • Member vouchers applied automatically at checkout when logged into your account
  • Simplified event check-in process
  • Direct access to virtual videos – no login required!

We want to extend a special note of gratitude to our members. Town Hall members have always been core to our mission and community and have been instrumental to Town Hall’s growth —  from providing feedback to help us shape our ticketing needs, to the financial support to help us take this critical step forward.

Current ticket holders and Town Hall members: Please keep an eye on your email this week for important information!

We know change isn’t easy, but we hope you’ll spring forward with us as we enter this new era. As always, please reach out to membership@townhallseattle.org if you have any issues with your membership or patronservices@townhallseattle.org if you have any issues purchasing tickets.

Disability in Fiction with Sarah Salcedo, John Wiswell, and Ross Showalter

by

On April 26th, authors John Wiswell and Ross Showalter will join our Writer-in-Residence, Sarah Salcedo, for an evening of short fiction and craft talk. Amongst other topics related to the craft of writing, John, Ross, and Sarah will specifically discuss how they approach the topic of disability within their work

Sarah Salcedo, who planned the event as part of her residency, explained what she was looking forward to most about the evening. “We live in an ableist society with a truly abysmal national sense of what the word ‘healthcare’ means. We approach disability for ourselves in our work as a deeply personal practice, but we also consider how we write these identities for those both within and outside of our communities. We write about our joy, our pain, our day to day experiences, and with every story, the practices of how we balance ourselves and our exploration of self within our work varies.”

“I am a bit in disbelief that I get to talk to these writers and have this discussion. Both John and Ross have written stories that have not only made me feel seen as a disabled person but you make me want to be a better and bolder writer. When I received this residency, I was told I could create events that reflected the conversations I wanted to have in my writing, and I cannot wait to learn from and chat with these two amazing authors.”

“When I asked my guests about the discussion ahead of the event:

John Wiswell wrote, ‘I love normalizing various critical and underrepresented parts of life, and disabilities are among them. It’s wonderful to just happen to have characters share my hearing issues, or chronic pain, or whatnot, without it being centered. But there are bigger things that need saying, and those call for stories that center the experience. Yet in writing lived experience, there is always the questioning of how much of the truth will fit within the word count and the plot.’

Ross Showalter replied, ‘I see fiction as a channel of empathy, and if I could show folks what it’s like to live in this world and not be able to participate as much as you want to, then I’m inviting people to empathize with a point-of-view that, personally, I think should be given much more space. Selfishly, I think writing fiction also allows me to work through some complicated feelings regarding my own disabilities and my own state of being. All fiction is personal, in some way, in the questions we ask and the way we tell the stories, and we just have to acknowledge that it is something that can be seen objectively.’ ”

If you’re not familiar with the writers’ work, you can visit their websites below to find a full list of their stories available online.

Sarah Salcedo’s website // Twitter
John Wiswell’s website // Twitter
Ross Showalter’s website // Twitter

For more information, and to get tickets to Sarah’s free virtual event on 4/26, click here.

From the Town Hall Archives: Celebrating Black History Month

by

It’s Black History Month, and Town Hall invites you to deepen your knowledge of key historical figures like Fannie Lou Hamer, Phyllis Wheatley, Malcolm X, and more. The programs below are available to watch any time in Town Hall’s Audio and Video Library, a treasure trove of past events! 

Tamara Payne

An Unprecedented Portrait of the Life of Malcolm X | WATCH NOW

In 1990, Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist Les Payne embarked on a nearly thirty-year-long quest to interview anyone he could find who had actually known Malcolm X. His goal was ambitious: to transform what would become over a hundred hours of interviews into an unprecedented portrait of Malcolm X, one that would separate fact from fiction. Following Payne’s unexpected death in 2018, his daughter Tamara Payne heroically completed the biography.

Original Event Date: Sun 11/15, 2020, 6:00pm

 

Keisha N. Blain with LaNesha DeBardelaben

What a new generation of activists can learn from Fannie Lou Hamer | WATCH NOW

Fannie Lou Hamer was born in 1917, the youngest of 20 children in a family of Mississippi sharecroppers. Black, poor, disabled by polio, and forced to leave school early to support her family, she lived what seems like a lifetime of oppression by the time she reached young adulthood. As she continued to work and live in the south during the 1950s and 1960s, she became interested in — and later heavily involved in — the Civil Rights Movement. Despite the insurmountable challenges she faced (she experienced racist attacks, was sterilized without her consent in 1961, and was beaten by police in 1963), Hamer was committed to making a difference in the lives of others by advocating for Black voter rights and social justice. 

Original event date: Tue 11/16, 2021, 6:00pm

 

Annette Gordon-Reed with Marcus Harrison Green

The History and Future of Juneteenth | WATCH NOW

On June 19, 1865, in Galveston, Texas, the end of legalized slavery in the state was announced. Since then, a certain narrative and lore has emerged about Texas. But as Juneteenth verges on being recognized as a national holiday, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Annette Gordon-Reed — herself a Texas native and the descendant of enslaved people — reworks the traditional “Alamo” framework, forging a new and profound narrative of her home state with implications for all

Original event date: Mon 6/14, 2021, 7:30pm

 

Farah Jasmine Griffin

The Profound Wisdom of Black Life and Literature | WATCH NOW

Phyllis Wheatley, the first African-American author of a published book of poetry, wrote, “Imagination! Who can sing thy force?/Or who describe the swiftness of thy course?” Wheatley could very well have been calling to the Black creatives, writers, orators, and leaders who would follow her. The imaginative force of Malcolm X and Toni Morrison, James Baldwin and Ta-Nehisi Coates, Barack Obama, and Langston Hughes are imparted by Farah Jasmine Griffin in a series of meditations on the fundamental questions of art, politics, and the human condition in Read Until You Understand: The Profound Wisdom of Black Life and Literature.

Original event date: Mon 9/27, 2021, 6:00pm

 

Jeffrey Stewart with LaNesha DeBardelaben

Alain Locke, the Father of the Harlem Renaissance | WATCH NOW

A tiny, fastidiously dressed man emerged from Black Philadelphia around the turn of the century to mentor a generation of young artists, including Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, and Jacob Lawrence, and call them the New Negroes — the creative African Americans whose art, literature, music, and drama would inspire Black people to greatness.

Original event date: Thu 2/18, 2021, 6:00pm

 

Tina Campt with Elisheba Johnson

Contemporary Black Artists Who Are Changing the Way We See | LISTEN TO THE PODCAST

Elisheba Johnson interviews Tina Campt about her latest book, A Black Gaze. In the book, Campt explores the work of eight contemporary Black artists who are shifting the nature of visual interactions with art and demanding that Blackness be seen anew. She considers, “Rather than looking at Black people, rather than simply multiplying the representation of Black folks, what would it mean to see oneself through the complex positionality that is Blackness — and work through its implications on and for oneself?”

Original event date: Mon 11/15, 2021, 1:00pm

Looking for more? Find speakers like Derecka Purnell, Keith Boykin, and more in our Audio and Video Library and on YouTube. 

For even more ways to celebrate Black History Month, don’t miss upcoming events with Laura Coates, Tiffanie Drayton, and Elie Mystal, held in-person, livestreamed, or both!

Send this to a friend