Our Commitment to Diversity, Equity & Inclusion

At Voices of Ascension, our artistry expresses our humanity, and our humanity requires us to work toward a more inclusive, diverse, and equitable future. We are committed to embedding racial and gender equity into all of our systems and work. We recognize that systemic racism and bias silence the voices of many, and that arts organizations are often shaped by the very inequities they seek to alleviate. We are committed to making change happen, not only through the transcendent and healing beauty of choral music, but also in our organizational practices.

We pledge to initiate the following changes to create a stronger artistic and organizational culture for Voices of Ascension:

• We will establish a more open audition process to build a more diverse professional ensemble that celebrates Black voices and all voices that have been silenced by the history of systemic racism. Audition for voices.

• We will research and present music created by people from historically underrepresented communities in classical music.

• We will actively seek artistic and organizational partners whose vision and endeavors complement our own and activate our engagement with a broader community.

• We will expand and develop our board and staff, seek additional funding to support new initiatives, and review our vendor relationships.

We recognize that we are in a hinge moment in history and commit to advancing racial justice in all that we do. We will not settle for short-term solutions designed for expediency. We will share our progress as we establish meaningful benchmarks and embed institutional change. We are grateful to the people of color within our community whose wise counsel is helping us to begin our journey toward becoming a more pluralistic organization, and we recognize our need to listen and learn.

By interrogating how our practices and individual biases contribute to creating barriers and reinforcing the structural inequities that Voices of Ascension is committed to remedy, our team can contribute to the creation of a more whole and just world.