Kori Coleman and D-Composed showcasing Black classical music — and musicians — in Chicago and beyond

It would be understandable to expect the artistic director of D-Composed, a Black chamber-music collective, to be a musician, but Kori Coleman isn’t. She is a music lover but abandoned the violin and oboe as a teenager because she felt culturally isolated and excluded.

The Waukegan native is a new brand of leader who is more an artistic instigator and connector, making sure the core members of Chicago’s only all-Black classical ensemble are essentially co-artistic directors and play a role in all creative decisions.

Coleman, 33, who also serves as D-Composed’s executive director, still works full-time in marketing and advertising and carries lessons from that consumer-driven realm into everything she does with the collective.

“It’s been fun to weave the two worlds together,” Coleman said. “I would say that is the biggest area of opportunity within the performing arts is really applying that audience-centric approach. I think D-Composed — we do that well as a team.”

The ensemble will join forces Oct. 1 with innovative bass-baritone Davóne Tines and the Truth for the Chicago premiere of “Robeson,” a hybrid work focused on 20th-century singer, actor and activist Paul Robeson. It will be D-Composed’s debut at the Harris Theater for Music and Dance and one of its highest-profile outings so far.

“It’s a big deal for us and we’re pretty excited about it,” Coleman said.

Inspired in part by her disappointment in not seeing herself represented in the music world she encountered as a young wannabe player, she founded D-Composed in 2017. Earlier that year, Coleman had learned of an event focused on Black composers by the Fulcrum Point New Music Project, and it struck her that she had never been exposed to those creators despite her early love of classical music.

“I realized I probably wasn’t the only one that felt that way,” she said. “I decided to just go on the internet, and I started researching Black musicians in Chicago, and I came across yelley taylor, who was our former artistic director and violist.”

Together they got D-Composed off the ground, with Coleman providing the marketing and business acumen and Taylor assembling the original ensemble and programming.

“I like to think that if D-Composed would have existed when I was younger,” Coleman said, “I’d probably still at least be playing if I had seen myself represented.”

In a world where just 2.4 percent of musicians in professional symphony orchestras are Black, according to 2024 statistics from the League of American Orchestras, the ensemble works to give Black music and musicians a regular presence on the Chicago classical scene and beyond.

D-Composed calls itself a “creative incubator” in part because of its frequent, inventive collaborations not only with other classical musicians but also poets, artists, dancers and even meditation practitioners. It usually performs as a string quartet, with players for each concert drawn from a roster of eight musicians that Coleman expects to expand in 2025.

One of its most recent collaborations came on Juneteenth, when it teamed with Tricia Hersey, a poet, activist and founder of the Atlanta-based Nap Ministry, for “Freedom Lullabies.” The program at the Gary Comer Youth Center in South Chicago drew 150 people and featured works by poets like Audre Lorde and W.E.B. Du Bois interspersed with music by Black composers.

As a creative strategist who has worked for Twitter and Momentum Worldwide, an experiential marketing agency that designs live events for Fortune 500 brands, Coleman has promoted an “audience first” approach to everything she does at D-Composed. It has developed programs centered on children, literature and mental health and wellness.

“A key thing I like to highlight about our mission is that it’s not just about entertainment,” Coleman said. “We really want to be in service, really fulfilling a need and thinking about how we can use this music to show up for our communities.”

Seeing almost unlimited possibilities in Black stories and creativity, the artistic leader has significant ambitions for D-Composed, and one step toward fulfilling them will come in November. It will make its first trip abroad, venturing to São Paulo, Brazil, for an appearance with Plínio Fernandes, who fuses classical guitar with that country’s folk traditions.

Whatever direction the collective takes, Coleman makes clear it will never turn its back on its hometown.

“While we have big dreams and aspirations,” she said, “I think it’s important for us to have a consistent presence in our community. You’ll always be able to find us in Chicago.”