Arts administrator and musician Lecolion Washington (B.M., Music Studies, 1999) will address the class of 2023 at commencement ceremonies for the College of Fine Arts at The University of Texas at Austin. The ceremony takes place at 11:30 a.m. on Friday, May 5 in Bass Concert Hall.
Washington has been the executive director of the Community Music Center of Boston since 2017. Prior to moving to Boston, he served over 15 years in academia as the bassoon professor at the University of Missouri-Columbia and the University of Memphis. As a bassoonist, Washington has performed solo recitals and master classes at colleges and universities all over the world. Washington has been a featured solo and chamber musician throughout the U.S., Brazil, South Africa, Canada, and Switzerland among others. He was the Co-Founder/Executive Director of the PRIZM Ensemble in Memphis from 2009-2017, and he was the founder of the PRIZM International Chamber Music Festival. He also served as the inaugural Director of In-Schools Programs for the Memphis Music Initiative from 2014-2017. In 2015, he was named as one of the Memphis Business Journal’s Top 40 Under 40. In 2019, he was selected as one of Musical America’s Top Professionals of the Year honoring Innovators, Independent Thinkers and Entrepreneurs, and he was celebrated as a 2020 Boston HUBWeek “Change Maker.”
Washington has worked all over the country as a racial equity thought leader. In high demand as a speaker, he has presented at conferences such as the Chamber Music America Conference, Sphinx Connect: Diversity in the Arts Conference, National Guild for Community Arts Education Conference, and as a featured guest on the Art Accordingly Podcast, sponsored by the Arts Administrators of Color Network, in an episode entitled "Deconstruction. Reconstruction." Washington has had residencies at institutions such as the University of Oregon, Carnegie Hall, and the Juilliard School. He also recently co-taught a course at the Longy School of Music entitled "Disrupting White Supremacy in Arts Organizations Through Transformative Leadership."