Key Notes on Reformation's Black Nativity Meets Kwanzaa Jazz Vespers Holiday Service

1. About Langston Hughes' "Black Nativity-A Gospel Song Play."

1.1 Considered in his day as the "Poet Laureate of (Black) America," Langston Hughes (1902-1967) also holds the distinction of being recognized (among his peers) as the first widely successful African American/African world freelance writer i.e., the first Black writer to make his living solely by way of his work.

1.2 During the late 1940s and early 1950s Hughes, via trial and error, created a new literary genre which he called "the gospel-song play."

1.3 "Black Nativity (1953)" -then and now- stands as the most successful of Hughes's gospel-song plays (winning not only national but international acclaim).

1.4 More, to date, "Black Nativity" is the most popular holiday revival theater production among both Black Theater artists and audiences alike.   Note: The recent 2013 "Black Nativity" movie production, released during that year's holiday season, Co-Produced by T. D. Jakes, starring Forest Whitaker, Angela Bassett, and Jennifer Hudson, and easily accessible on the internet is a dramatic case in point of the Hughes gospel-song-play's continued popularity during the holiday season.

2. About Kwanzaa.

2.1 Created in 1966 by Dr. Maulana Karenga, Professor and Chair of Africana Studies at CSULB, Kwanzaa is the most widely celebrated African cultural holiday both in the U.S. and throughout the African world. 

2.2 Set apart as a time of ingathering of Africana families, communities, and cultures as well as a time for, to use the words of Dr. Karenga, "recommitment to the best of what it means to be African and human in the fullest sense," Kwanzaa is not necessarily in contrast with but serves as a compliment to Hughes' "Black Nativity."

2.3 The above said Reformation Church-Chicago's service of BLACK NATIVITY MEETS KWANZAA JAZZ VESPERS (A Holidays Are Forever Candlelight Celebration) is envisioned as a unique combining of both excerpts from Hughes' Africana Christmas works as well as excerpts from his Black History and culture works-covering both the Black American and African world experience and history-that serves as a complimentary segue into the Kwanzaa dimension of our distinctive holiday celebration.

3.  About Jazz Vespers.

3.1 Reformation's Jazz Vespers is an evening candlelight worship service organized to serve the African American Jazz community especially but not exclusively.  It is the key outreach arm of Reformation's Jazz Ministry to the Chicago's Africana activists' and artists' communities.  Ours is an uplifting spiritual and not simply an entertainment service.  Reformation's Jazz Vespers is emergent to uplift inner-city Chicago's engaged social actors and creative artists as well as their families and immediate communities.

The target launch dates for "Black Nativity Meets Kwanzaa Jazz Vespers" are Saturday evening, 26 December, 2015 and Sunday evening 27, December, 2015 respectively.

Respectfully submitted: Pastor Joel Washington (Khunanpu Sangoma) for Reformation Church-Chicago's COJAM and BLACK NATIVITY MEETS KWANZAA JAZZ VERSPERS, Updated: 11/4/15.