Four centuries of Black American history are told in new Kronos Quartet performance

https://www.npr.org/sections/deceptivecadence/2021/11/17/ [login to see] /four-centuries-of-black-american-history-are-told-in-new-kronos-quartet-performa
In her speech, Finney traced a line from an 18th-century proclamation, which decreed that slaves were forbidden from learning to read or write, to the proud, Black literary giants in the room. Taking the stage afterward, John Lithgow, the event's host, looked stunned. "That was the best acceptance speech for anything that I've heard in my life," he said.

Another person who saw that speech, on television some time later, was violinist David Harrington, the founder of Kronos Quartet.

"It was clear that I had to be in touch with Nikky after hearing that," Harrington says, "because I didn't know anyone alive could give a speech like that."