Dr. Charrise Barron will be beginning as Assistant Professor in a joint hire between Africana Studies and Music. I know many of you have had the pleasure of working Dr. Barron already: Dr. Barron is currently a Presidential Diversity Postdoctoral Fellow in Religious Studies, Africana Studies, and the Center for the Study of Race and Ethnicity in America (CSREA) and is also the Interim Director of the Brown Center for Students of Color (BCSC). Dr. Barron completed her PhD in 2017 at Harvard University in African and African American Studies with a secondary field in ethnomusicology, and a Master of Divinity from Yale Divinity School.

Composer and pianist Dr. Anthony Cheung will begin as Assistant Professor of Music. He is coming to us from the University of Chicago, where he has taught since 2013. Dr. Cheung has held fellowships in the Harvard Society of Fellows and at the American Academy in Rome. His music has been performed internationally by a wide range of soloists, ensembles, and orchestras. He has served as the co-artistic director of the Talea ensemble and co-director of the Grossman Ensemble at the Chicago Center for Contemporary Composition.

Dr. Enongo Lumumba-Kasongo, who is currently a Postdoctoral Fellow in International Humanities at Brown, will be joining the Music Department as a Mellon Gateway Postdoctoral fellow, which will transform into an assistant professorship in 2022. She came to Brown after completing her PhD in Science and Technology Studies at Cornell University, where she wrote a dissertation on the politics and aesthetics of community studios. Dr. Lumumba-Kasongo also has a vibrant creative career as an Afrofuturist rapper, performing under the moniker Sammus. She is currently working on her seventh album.