Singing the classic Gershwin tune “Summertime,” from the opera “Porgy and Bess,” takes Christiana Danaé on a journey.

The soprano has been singing it for a while, but there was a time when she wasn’t sure if she should.

“The composers put in the score that only people of color should sing this in an opera context,” said Danaé, who is biracial, from home in Castle Rock.

“Then we get into black face and offensive things. I didn’t want to offend anyone, so me singing that is accepting the fullness of who I am. I’m proud to be who I am. I do identify as a person of color.”

Danaé will perform spirituals and other spiritual songs at the Colorado Springs Conservatory on Wednesday during a free Black History Month Celebration co-hosted by Pikes Peak Opera League and the conservatory, an after-school arts preparatory program. Other performers include conservatory scholarship recipients and their conservatory mentors. Space is limited, and reservations are required.

Originally from Boston, Danaé was born to a Jamaican mother and a white American father.

“Blending two worlds and cultures has been a big part of my life,” she said. “Respecting and honoring those two diverse backgrounds and dealing with the tension sometimes and trying to find the commonalities with the two. Knowing that the commonality is me — I’m a product of two different worlds. What does it mean to navigate all that?”

Being raised in Boston, with its large immigrant population, meant Danaé was surrounded by diverse music. Her father was a pastor at a church where everyone looked different, she says, and they sang songs that were for everyone in order to find unity, a mission that’s still important to her today. Throughout high school, she sang jazz, gospel, pop and R&B in a Berklee College of Music after-school program, hoping to be the next Alicia Keys. But when it was time for college, she went off book and attended Gordon College, which offered only classical music.

“The third year there I fell in love with classical music,” she said. “I had no previous exposure to that. You don’t find that a lot in the inner city. Classical music has a stereotype of who it’s for and accessible to and that often doesn’t feel like inner city brown folks.”

After college, she moved to Denver and earned a master’s at Lamont School of Music in 2018. Nowadays, she teaches and takes voice lessons, works with the choir at her church and performs when she can while caring for two small children.

Being a person of color in the opera industry comes with careful consideration.

“I’m very cautious of what that means for me as a lighter-skinned individual,” she said, “in this opera industry, where sometimes it says we’re not ready to see darker-skinned people fall in love on an opera stage if it’s not ‘Porgy and Bess.’ By singing ‘Summertime’ I’m taking on all of these things and accepting them to be true and still singing it with my background and knowledge and love for music and respect for all the things that are unfolding.”

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What: Black History Month Celebration with soprano Christiana Danaé

When: 1 p.m. Wednesday

Where: Colorado Springs Conservatory, 415 S. Sahwatch St.

Price: Free, reservations required; 719-481-0426, pikespeakoperaleague.org

Castle Rock-based soprano Christiana Danaé will perform spirituals and other spiritual songs at the Colorado Springs Conservatory on Wednesday during a free Black History Month Celebration co-hosted by Pikes Peak Opera League and the conservatory, an after-school arts preparatory program. Other performers include conservatory scholarship recipients and their conservatory mentors.

Courtesy of Christiana Danaé