At the Kennedy Center, our systemic commitment to social impact lives in our belief that the arts hold unique power in our society to build community, center joy, inspire action, and drive meaningful change. We leverage the arts for non-arts outcomes to advance justice and equity in all that we do.
Release, Heal, Transform, Repeat is an enlightening workshop that offers a unique opportunity for participants to delve into the transformative power of poetry while learning more about the process of writing “Arms, Legs, Hips and Thighs”, a book of poetry that reflects on one’s healing and personal growth. Walk-Ins Encouraged; Tickets Not Required.
Mateusz Krzyżowski is the winner of the International Competition for Young Pianists Arthur Rubinstein in memoriam (2021) and the International Piano Competition Ignacy Jan Paderewski (2022). In 2021, he reached the semi-finals of the International Frederic Chopin Piano Competition. In 2024, Mateusz Krzyżowski returns to the USA with a second concert tour (the previous one took place in 2023).
Singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and producer Royal Wood has established himself as a true musical talent. Since being proclaimed “Songwriter of the Year” by iTunes (2010), Wood has continued to evolve and hone his musical craft while maintaining a unique identity.
Join us for the debut performance from the third cohort of a national apprenticeship program for women and non-binary improvisers in jazz with the intersection of gender and race as a guiding principle. The mission of Next Jazz Legacy is to increase opportunities for musicians most underrepresented in the art form and to create waves of lasting change that benefit the whole community.
Curated by Chitra.MOVES Dancing Identities: Finding Self, Sanctuary, and Freedom, is a day-long series of free classes that explore dance as an act of authentic self expression, confidence, character, and unapologetic self-care. Classes are taught by incredible DC-based artists who carry these themes in their movement and practice, and build powerful community in our city.
Join us for the debut performance from the third cohort of a national apprenticeship program for women and non-binary improvisers in jazz with the intersection of gender and race as a guiding principle. The mission of Next Jazz Legacy is to increase opportunities for musicians most underrepresented in the art form and to create waves of lasting change that benefit the whole community.
Join us for a FREE film screening in the Justice Forum at the REACH. The Color Purple (2023) is a musical adaptation of Alice Walker’s novel. The film follows the lifelong struggles of an African American woman living in the South during the early 1900s.
Join us in the heart of our Nation’s Capital to honor Jewish American Heritage Month (JAHM) with an electrifying concert featuring the rich tapestry of traditional Jewish music from Eastern Europe, Turkey, Cuba, South America, the Levant, and the Arabian Peninsula.
Only Make Believe performs interactive and accessible theatre for children in hospitals, care facilities, and schools dedicated to serving children with disabilities. Now is your chance to experience a rare public performance! Step under the Big Top into the magical world of the circus.
The Columbia Heights Educational Campus (CHEC) Music Department is proud to showcase its comprehensive arts programming featuring performances by our middle school choir, flamenco ensemble, honors instrumental ensemble, high school orchestra, and jazz ensemble.
Life can be loud and busy, come to Millennium Stage in search of finding the quiet for a much-needed break. Join the Kennedy Center Youth council in an eye-opening, breathtaking evening. Through spoken word, music, and dance, youth artists will present their talents in a way that silences the noise.
Join us for FREE film screenings in the Justice Forum at the REACH. Champions centers on a basketball team training and competing in the Special Olympics, under the guidance of an imperfect but dedicated coach Marcus.
The Mongolian children of the diaspora in America will present a remarkable concert showcasing traditional Mongolian culture. 30 students from the Anura Music studio will participate in the concert, alongside Mongolian dancers and traditional long song singers.
Over the last three decades, Kristin Hersh’s prolific career has seen her heralded queen of the alternative release. She returns with a new solo record Clear Pond Road released in September 2023. The album is a cinematic road trip; it’s a series of personal vignettes from a fiercely independent auteur, plush with layers of atonal, edgy-dreamy strings and mellotron.
The formation of the School Without Walls Instrumental Music Department in the fall of 2007, the school’s first instrumental ensembles of any type in its over 70-year history, marked a new stepping stone in the pursuit of a better education. Along with being well-rounded in rigorous academic subjects, students in the instrumental music department now have the opportunity to learn what it is like to play in a band orchestra and various other ensembles.
This special Dance Sanctuaries serves as a kick off to the Conflux events from National Black Theatre. Over three classes, learn the technique and history of the Ring Shout from Master Instructor of the Gullah Geechee Ring Shout, Griffin Lotson.
Eleven black dancers from historically white ballet companies were commissioned by ²ÝÝ®ÊÓƵÃâ·Ñ°æapp to create and perform a brand new ballet in just two weeks. This is their story...
The Cartography Project seeks to use music as both a source of healing and a way to open dialogue about the future of anti-racism. The NSO, WNO, and Kennedy Center commissions composers and librettists from regions spanning the entire country to create work that responds to an event that has occurred in that region and also asks, “Where do we go from here?”
Active Hope explores how the country’s vanguard artists and arts leaders can shape this transformational, historical, and polarizing moment in history. After emerging from a global quarantine while still figuring out what the new normal is, the second season of our podcast orbits the theme of “Organizing Hope”.
Get the fascinating story behind the new play by Alexandra Palting, the 2022 Artist-in-Residence at the Kennedy Center with the Local Theater Residency Program. The piece is named for the number of letters that Alexandra’s grandparents wrote to each other during a three-year long-distance courtship between the U.S. and the Philippines.
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Impact Performance
We showcase visionary artists throughout the year, who leverage their profound talent to highlight issues of social impact.
The cornerstone of our Impact Performance, Millennium Stage serves to reduce barriers to engaged participation in the arts, celebrate the human spirit, and encourage intercultural understanding. Catch FREE performances Wed-Sat at 6 p.m.
Arts Across America performances explore art as a catalyst for public healing, decolonization, and genuine global change.
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Artist Empowerment
Artists are never visitors at the Kennedy Center. Our stages belong to them. We prioritize the visionary leadership of marginalized people over institutional norms and control. This gives us the ability to amplify authentic voices and honor stories that are so often silenced.
Join us for free movement-based classes on select Saturdays in the REACH. Dancers are invited for three one-hour structured classes and an optional Open House Hour. Free, pre-registration is highly recommended.
Local Theatre Residency is a curated developmental residency program for local DMV theater companies and playwrights. Hosted at the Kennedy Center’s REACH, we seek those who leverage their artistry to amplify stories that are often overlooked.
Office Hours is a curated developmental residency program hosted at the Kennedy Center’s REACH. Provided with access to studio space in the REACH, artists have the sole task of creation. Office Hours seeks artists with an interest on site-specific work and supports the ideas of playful exploration and spatial intervention.
Social Practice is collaborative, specific, and intentional. Residence engage specific communities and propose critical interventions within existing social systems that inspire debate and social change. This, with a focuses on the interaction between the audience, social systems, and the artist.
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Community Empowerment
We dismantle real and perceived barriers between ‘fine arts communities’ and the richly diverse communities surrounding us here in the nation’s capital. To maximize our impact beyond our walls, we humbly and continuously engage new communities through artistic expression, creative collaborations, and shared learning experiences.
A conflux is the place where two flowing rivers meet and become one. ²ÝÝ®ÊÓƵÃâ·Ñ°æapp sits on a conflux where the Anacostia and Potomac Rivers meet. The Conflux program is a confluence of efforts where the Kennedy Center and a flagship national community partner – each with its distinct missions, values, and social impact objectives combine efforts. The result is a series of transformative programming that advances the field and maximizes our collective impact.
Impactful Connections, a new partnership with the District of Columbia Public Libraries, focuses on creating access through transportation for D.C. residents to experience free local, national, and international arts and culture programming at the Kennedy Center. Impactful Connections is a free shuttle program in partnership with the District of Columbia Public Libraries, focusing on creating access to Social Impact programming at the Kennedy Center.
The Cartography Project is a multi-year commissioning project engaging artists from around the nation to map Black dignity. The Cartography Project seeks to use music as both a source of healing and a way to open dialogue about the future of anti-racism. The NSO, WNO, and Kennedy Center are commissioning composers and librettists from across country to create work that responds to an event that has occurred in that region and also asks, “Where do we go from here?”
Composed of leaders from around the country, with a hyper-focus on membership from the D.C. region, the Community Advisory Board Members serve as leaders, advisors, and advocates for impact-driven programming at ²ÝÝ®ÊÓƵÃâ·Ñ°æapp that extends across the DC regional community.
Community Partners convene to facilitate discussion and planning for the seeding of two community-based touchstone programs with Social Impact and other Programming departments at the Kennedy Center, including artist workshop/masterclass, panel discussions, performances, presentation, and more.
The Culture Caucus is a group of 10 individuals and organizations, based in the D.C. area. The Caucus is an incubator and residency program for culture makers. We wish to make the REACH a creative home for the Caucus and for their constituencies. The Caucus works in coordination with Social Impact team to produce a variety of events, the majority of which occur at the REACH.
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Cultural Leadership
We mobilize the arts and a wide spectrum of perspectives to challenge societal norms, test the boundaries of acute progress, and inspire change that transcends the audiences directly before us.
A collaboration between the Apollo Theater, National Sawdust, and the Kennedy Center, the Active Hope Podcast explores creative thought and cultural leadership through conversations and performances. The resulting dialogue illuminates challenges and outlines strategies for the cultural field.
As we look at our outstanding cultural and artistic leaders of the last 50 years, who are the direct torchbearers of their legacies? We believe artists have a place in the leadership of this country and beyond, not just from our stages, and these 50 leaders will be at the forefront of continued transformation.
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REACH Activation
The REACH aims to both mobilize people and bring them together. To educate groups in mass, and inspire individual reflection. With bold and engaging programming and a warmly inviting atmosphere, it’s a shared space for collective healing, exploration, and experimentation across disciplines.
A conflux is the place where two flowing rivers meet and become one. ²ÝÝ®ÊÓƵÃâ·Ñ°æapp sits on a conflux where the Anacostia and Potomac Rivers meet. The Conflux program is a confluence of efforts where the Kennedy Center and a flagship national community partner – each with its distinct missions, values, and social impact objectives combine efforts. The result is a series of transformative programming that advances the field and maximizes our collective impact.
Join us for free movement-based classes on select Saturdays in the REACH. Dancers are invited for three one-hour structured classes and an optional Open House Hour. Free, pre-registration is highly recommended.
Local Theatre Residency is a curated developmental residency program for local DMV theater companies and playwrights. Hosted at the Kennedy Center’s REACH, we seek those who leverage their artistry to amplify stories that are often overlooked.
Office Hours is a curated developmental residency program hosted at the Kennedy Center’s REACH. Provided with access to studio space in the REACH, artists have the sole task of creation. Office Hours seeks artists with an interest on site-specific work and supports the ideas of playful exploration and spatial intervention.
Curated by Chitra.MOVES Dancing Identities: Finding Self, Sanctuary, and Freedom, is a day-long series of free classes that explore dance as an act of authentic self expression, confidence, character, and unapologetic self-care. Classes are taught by incredible DC-based artists who carry these themes in their movement and practice, and build powerful community in our city.
Join us for a FREE film screening in the Justice Forum at the REACH. The Color Purple (2023) is a musical adaptation of Alice Walker’s novel. The film follows the lifelong struggles of an African American woman living in the South during the early 1900s.
Launched as a partnership between Mark Morris Dance Group and the Brooklyn Parkinson Group, this program offers internationally acclaimed dance classes for people with Parkinson’s Disease in more than 250 communities and 24 countries.
Dance scholars provide commentary, via wireless headsets, about the choreography, dancers, and history of the art form as Alonzo King LINES Ballet rehearses Deep River.
The Moonshot Studio at the REACH celebrates creativity and the artist in everyone through hands-on art-making. The recommended age is 5 years old and above. Stop by anytime from 11 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. on (most) Saturdays & Sundays to explore our projects.
Join us for FREE film screenings in the Justice Forum at the REACH. Champions centers on a basketball team training and competing in the Special Olympics, under the guidance of an imperfect but dedicated coach Marcus.
This special Dance Sanctuaries serves as a kick off to the Conflux events from National Black Theatre. Over three classes, learn the technique and history of the Ring Shout from Master Instructor of the Gullah Geechee Ring Shout, Griffin Lotson.
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Support Our Work
The Center's Social Impact Initiatives are made possible due to our dedicated artists, advocates for change, and donors. Join our community of supporters by making a gift to Social Impact Programs. You can make a donation in two ways: Receive exclusive benefits when you join as a Member and designate your gift to Social Impact Programs, or make a fully tax-deductible philanthropic contribution.
