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I am grateful to the Society for American Music for recognizing the importance of a biography of Afro-Peruvian cultural icon Victoria Santa Cruz by presenting me with the Judith Tick Fellowship award! I am especially honored to receive a fellowship in support of my book-in-progress that is named for the biographer of Ruth Crawford Seeger and Ella Fitzgerald.

Now available: my essay “París Me Llama: Victoria Santa Cruz en la Universidad del Teatro de las Naciones, 1962-1966” (Paris Calls: Victoria Santa Cruz in the University of the Theatre of Nations, 1962-1966). A partial sketch of Victoria Santa Cruz’s Paris years, my essay brings into focus the details of a highly significant, yet previously neglected, period of Santa Cruz’s career that I explore in far greater depth in my book. My essay, translated into Spanish by Adriana Soldi, appears in CEDET’s latest book of conference proceedings, published in Lima in late 2025: Desafío a la Desigualdad: Una Mirada al Racismo, la Educación y el Impacto de la Pandemia.

It was a pleasure to contribute an article (in Spanish) about the English-translation edition of Victoria Santa Cruz’s book, Rhythm the Eternal Organizer, to a beautiful special issue of the National Library of Peru’s Libros&Artes magazine dedicated to Victoria Santa Cruz and her work. In my essay, I drew from the fascinating testimonials of Susan Polansky (Santa Cruz’s colleague and book translator) and Greg Sims (Santa Cruz’s former Carnegie Mellon University Drama student, now a life coach). it was an interesting experience to work with Pamela Narbona Jerez on the translation of an article about translation!

“A fearless and legendary Peruvian cultural icon, [Victoria] Santa Cruz was convinced that obstacles exist for one reason: so that we may convert them into opportunities. . . ”

My essay commemorating the global life and impact of Victoria Santa Cruz leads off an online forum about Black women across the diaspora on the African American Intellectual History Society’s award-winning blog Black Perspectives. It’s an advance overview of the inspiring and pathbreaking life story that will be taken up in detail by my book in progress.

In late-September 2023 I enjoyed the rare opportunity to present my research about Victoria Santa Cruz’s Paris years . . . at a conference in Paris!

Vera Wolkowicz organized a terrific international conference exploring the topic “Music, Cultural Policies and Identities: Transatlantic Encounters Between Music and Musicians of Europe and Latin America” at the School of Advanced Studies in Social Sciences on Paris’s Left Bank. I am grateful to have shared my work about Victoria Santa Cruz and the University of the Theatre of Nations with this inspiring gathering of scholars and thinkers.

After hours, I found time for a bit of archival research in the collections of the National Audiovisual Institute, where I listened to interviews that shed light on Victoria’s Paris experience at the Theatre of Nations in the 1960s. I also retraced Victoria Santa Cruz’s pathways in Paris by walking to several sites where she studied, lived, worked, and directed theatrical productions. Here is the Chaillot Theatre, where Peru’s National Folklore Ensemble made its Paris debut under Victoria’s direction in 1975 in a world tour produced by Mel Howard. At that time, the Chaillot Theatre’s director was one of Victoria’s former classmates from the University of the Theatre of Nations. More about that in my upcoming book about Victoria Santa Cruz’s international career. . . .

It was such an honor for me to contribute a preface to the newly released book Victoria Santa Cruz: Escritos varios (Victoria Santa Cruz: Collected Writings), beautifully curated and edited by Octavio Santa Cruz Urquieta and published by CEDET in Lima. I also participated as a (remote) speaker at the book release event, held at Peru’s Ministry of Culture on Wednesday, June 28.

Victoria Santa Cruz broke new ground for Afro-Peruvian women when Peru’s Revolutionary Government of the Armed Forces appointed her as founding director of the nation’s first National Folklore Ensemble in 1973. In this important position, Santa Cruz advanced her distinctive, Gramsci-influenced vision of folklore as an agent of individual and social connection and transformation, guided by rhythm. On December 9, 2022, I presented the talk “Rhythm and Revolution: Victoria Santa Cruz and the National Folklore Ensemble of Peru, 1973–1982” at the Second Continental Conference of Harvard University’s ALARI (Afro-Latin American Research Institute). I shared the floor with Denise Barata, Roberto Augusto A. Pereira, and Nicolás Aguía Betancourt in a panel dedicated to folklore, dance, theatre, music, and Black agency in Brazil, Colombia, and Peru.

I am proud to announce that the American Society for Theatre Research (ASTR) has honored my scholarship on the emergence of Black theatre in mid-twentieth-century Peru with its prestigious Errol Hill Award, given annually “in recognition of outstanding scholarship in African American theatre, drama, and/or performance studies.” I am thankful to historian Carlos Aguirre, who invited me to write an earlier version of the winning article for publication in his co-edited book Lima, siglo XX: cultura, socialización, cambio (Fondo Editorial PUCP, 2013) and to Theatre Survey editor Marlis Schweitzer, whose keen editorial vision contributed to the expanded version for English-speaking readers.

On Sunday, October 30, the popular Peruvian television program “Sucedió en el Perú” (It Happened in Peru) profiled Victoria Santa Cruz’s life and legacy, in honor of her Centennial. As a featured guest, I contributed to segments about two vital but lesser-known periods of Victoria Santa Cruz’s career outside Peru: her sojourn in Paris (1962–66) and her years as a professor of drama at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh (1982–1999).

My book about Victoria Santa Cruz (in progress) will explore these fascinating periods in greater detail. Thank you to “Sucedió en el Perú” for the invitation to share a bit of my research with TVPerú viewers, contributing to a fuller picture of Victoria Santa Cruz’s global career and legacy for humanity.

Non-Spanish speakers may use the CC option to translate subtitles.

Francisco Caro and Peru’s National School of Folklore produced a moving documentary film comprised of testimonials about Victoria Santa Cruz’s career and creative legacy along with artistic performances inspired by her oeuvre. The film premiered at the National School of Folklore in Lima (in conjunction with a photographic exhibit) on October 30, 2022 in commemoration of Victoria Santa Cruz’s Centennial, and it is now available on YouTube. I was delighted to contribute my own testimonial to this project!