Three names will take center stage in The Mighty Triumvirate: Hansberry, Baldwin and Simone, a two-day cultural program dedicated to the lives and works of writers James Baldwin and Lorraine Hansberry, and pianist and composer Nina Simone. The gathering will take place on the weekend of October 4 and 5 at the Croton Free Library, about eight miles from Peekskill.

The program, scheduled for both days at 2 p.m., will bring together a group of scholars around Hansberry, Baldwin, and Simone—three friends who used art as a political and social tool, and who maintained a personal and creative bond that became part of New York’s cultural history in the twentieth century. The goal of the event is to explore the connections between their works, activism, and the deep relationship that united them.

The historical significance of these three figures will be at the center of the program. Each of them left a mark as both artists and activists. James Baldwin placed race, sexuality, and identity at the heart of the national debate; Lorraine Hansberry (who is buried at Asbury United Methodist Church Cemetery in Croton-on-Hudson) became the first African American woman to premiere a play on Broadway with A Raisin in the Sun; Nina Simone transformed her music into an instrument of activism with anthems such as Mississippi Goddam.

On Saturday, the program will run until 4 p.m., with Soyica Colbert, recognized for her biography Radical Vision: A Biography of Lorraine Hansberry; scholar Rich Blint, an expert on Baldwin’s work; and ethnomusicologist Aja Burrell Wood, affiliated with Berklee College of Music. They will discuss the connections between Hansberry, Baldwin, and Simone, in a space where art, personal life, and activism intersect.

On Sunday, during the same schedule, the format shifts. Jazz singer Charenee Wade, joined by her ensemble and in coordination with the Arts & Humanities Advisory Council of Croton, will perform a repertoire of Simone and her contemporaries, with a concert that echoes the themes of the previous day’s discussion.

Both events are free of charge, but require advance registration at this link. The cultural initiative is organized by the Lorraine Hansberry Coalition (LHC), a volunteer group that has been working since 2021 to disseminate Hansberry’s life and legacy, as well as her connection to Croton, where the playwright lived in the 1960s. Over the past four years, the coalition has hosted more than 20 programs and welcomed over 800 attendees.