A Pop Master Class with Azudi Onyejekwe: Finding the Freedom in Your Flow

Bio: Azudi Onyejekwe is a Brooklyn-based actor, singer-songwriter, educator, director, social justice advocate, and proud first-generation Igbo-American. As an actor, he has performed in numerous productions on Broadway, Off-Broadway, and at multiple Tony award-winning regional theatres across the country including the Guthrie Theatre, Williamstown Theater Festival, and the American Repertory Theater. He is a member of the original Broadway casts of “Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812” and “Violet." He holds an honors degree from New York University with a double major in Africana Studies and Theatre and has served, for the better part of a decade, on the acting faculties of The Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute / NYU Tisch and the LIU-Brooklyn / The New Group BFA Acting Program. As a writer and justice advocate, he has facilitated multiple workshops over the years exploring the intersection of race and art, and his most recent essay which he penned for The Theatre Times in the wake of the murder of George Floyd (“The Dangers of Optical Illusionary Performative Activism”), was translated and republished by Korean Theatre Journal, the official association of the Korean Association of Theatre Critics.  Azudi is a member of the Actors Equity Association as well as an associate member of the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society.

About the Event: In this class, Onyejekwe will lead a vocal warm-up, break down the history of pop outside of the eurocentric lens and explore pop's roots in the African Diaspora. 8 participants will sing a 1-1.5 minute pop song cut of their choice. The goal for this masterclass is to teach artists to learn how to pull from their own authentic source and how to disengage from the assimilationist structures that have squelched our own unique artistry. Class will end with a Q&A open to all!

25% of the Profits will Go to United For Iran