This summer, head to Newark Public Library for I Dream A World: Song & Verse to Inspire a Nation and prepare to be changed for the better. Presented by visionary producer and director Celeste Bateman, this multimedia performance experience features her 5 Women Performance Ensemble sharing a deeply moving journey through American history as witnessed, survived and shaped by the Black experience. From the slave trade and the Emancipation Proclamation to Reconstruction, the Civil Rights Movement, Black Lives Matter and the 2024 Presidential election, I Dream A World refuses to look away — and it refuses to lose hope.


Live narration, historic photography and archival film footage provide the backdrop as the ensemble moves through songs by Donny Hathaway, Stevie Wonder, James Brown and Laura Nyro, as well as music from the soundtracks of Harriet, Selma and West Side Story. Woven throughout are the words of Langston Hughes, Maya Angelou, MLK, Phillis Wheatley, and others whose voices helped define what America could be.


The program was created in honor of the 250th Anniversary of the United States of America. The title is drawn from Langston Hughes’ luminous poem of the same name, and the work lives up to every word of it.


This event is more than a concert. It’s more than a lecture. It’s a chance for you to sit with history, feel it fully and leave with something meaningful that will change how you see the world around you and the history you thought you knew.