TED Global Fellow Meklit to perform at Purdue

February 11, 2016

Ethiopian-American singer and cultural activist Meklit Hadero will bring her blend of folk, jazz, and global roots to the stage Feb. 27 at Lafayette Theater.

This 8 p.m. general admission performance is presented by the Office of the Provost and the Black Cultural Center, with support from the Office of the System Chief Information Officer, the College of Engineering, and the College of Science. Additional support comes from the College of Liberal Arts and the Honors College.

Ethiopian-born, Brooklyn-raised, and Bay Area-nurtured, Hadero describes herself as an in-betweener, living along musical hyphen lines. She’s as comfortable twisting an indie-rock anthem into a torch song as she is reversing influences by infusing rock undercurrents into interpretations of her native land’s traditional music.

Meklit’s latest album, “We Are Alive” in 2014, is a commingling of sounds, grooves and styles, from reimagining where the musical “A Train” might travel today to the assertion of uplift after hardship in its title track.

She also has wed her gifts for voice and songwriting with her political science studies at Yale to address her passion for social justice and community engagement. Named a 2009 TED Global Fellow, Meklit co-founded the Nile Project in 2011, a curated collaboration of musicians from 11 Nile-basin countries intended to foster cross-cultural empathy and environmental curiosity to help unite a divided region of East Africa. Convocations has named her an Artist-In-Residence for Spring 2016 to participate in immersive classroom activities on campus, as well as to work with student musical ensembles. Her residency culminates in the performance at Lafayette Theater, 600 Main St., Lafayette.

Tickets for Meklit

Buy Tickets
$25 for adults
$18 for children 18 years and younger, Purdue students and Ivy Tech Lafayette students

Tickets are available at the Stewart Center box office at 765-494-3933 or 800-914-SHOW. Group tickets are also available to groups of 10 more. Call 765-496-1977 for more details or visit Group Sales for more information.