The tune of Tona Brown’s music and memoir

Tona Brown sits down for a Q&A with Assistant Professor of English Judah-Micah Lamar at the Smith Library on March 22, 2024 / Photo by J.W. Dennison

By J.W. Dennison

Tona Brown is a violinist and mezzo-soprano vocalist, founder and CEO of Aida Studios for musical instruction, and author of Tonacity: The Tona Brown Story. On March 22, Brown visited Muskingum University to give a musical master class and participate in a Q&A about her recently published memoir.

Brown came to campus at the invitation of Assistant Professor of English Judah-Micah Lamar. Brown’s memoir and the Q&A were on the syllabus for Lamar’s topics in gender class this spring.

“The faculty here [are] very supportive, and it was really an interdisciplinary, transdisciplinary event; it was, you know, a collaboration between English and history and gender studies program and music and the provost office,” Lamar said.  

Lamar and Brown met in high school at the Virginia Governor’s School for the Arts, where they both played violin in the orchestra. Lamar’s personal connection to the teaching material created a new challenge for him.

“It humanizes us...as opposed to, you know, reading Faulkner or Shakespeare when these things happen, you know, in the text,” Lamar said.  “But it's just the literature is different when you have the living and embodiment, like the person who wrote standing in front of you and then people who are, you know, in the book teaching it.”

A career of historic firsts

Brown’s memoir covers a life full of historic firsts, including being the first transgender woman to perform at Carnegie Hall and to perform for a sitting president. Despite these public accomplishments, having her book taught in a college class still feels surreal to her.

“It's a dream come true to know that people are interested in your story and that people feel that it's worthy enough to study,” Brown said. "...I just saw myself as a musician and I'm just so pleased that people want to read about my personal story.”

During the Q&A, attended by Lamar’s students and faculty members from several departments across campus, Brown was asked if and how she dealt with imposter syndrome, a topic she discusses in her book. She said that if you are successful and not an egomaniac, you are bound to struggle with imposter syndrome. However, according to Brown, there are ways to cope. 

“...it took me advice of older musicians, particularly women of color, who were telling me along the way and give me great advice and say, ‘you know, we didn't hire you because you're trans. We hired you because you're a violinist,’” Brown said.

“I’m just me”: imposter syndrome and tokenism

Brown's imposter syndrome is based on concerns of tokenism, that is, when organizations make only a symbolic effort, for example, by recruiting people from underrepresented groups, like the trans community, to give the appearance of sexual or racial equality within an organization.

“...trans is not a big part of my identity; it’s what you all put on me,” Brown said. “So the thing is, we are in a society where everyone has these classifications for everything. I’m just me.”

Lamar recognized these experiences of tokenism from his own time at the Virginia Governor’s School for the Arts.

“We have proximity to certain spaces that make a hegemonic culture and society comfortable with us. ‘You're not like them...you're safe,” Lamar said. “We become the safe negro, if not at times, the magical negro.”

While the current political climate has put the transgender community under a microscope and in the crosshairs of many states' legislative bills, Brown’s experience as a person of color has long ago prepared her for a world of discrimination.

“...for those that have read the memoir even before the transition, I was not in this space that people thought that I should [be] and I’ve always been different, I always thought different and I really don't care for things that everyone else does,” Brown said. “But as far as walking those spaces, you have to walk with your head high and know that you deserve to be there, period.”

During my interview with Brown, I asked her what it felt like to have her existence and part of her identity be such a political issue in the public arena.

Tona Brown sits down for an interview with J.W. Dennison / Photo by Judah-Micah Lamar

“It's very jarring because, again, you're just a transgender person who is just trying to live their life, and to have a whole political machine that is against you is devastating,” Brown said.

Brown worries about the misinformation and disinformation that can be found online about transgender people. In addition to releasing her memoir, part of her efforts to combat these falsehoods is to travel to universities supporting gender, women and sexuality programs.

“This is extremely important. If I could do this full time, I would,” Brown said. “Especially with this transgender conversation...we need to have people who are trained in learning about this. Counseling others, resources for transgender people on the higher levels of learning.”

Brown is a mezzo-soprano vocalist and violinist. She was the first African American transgender woman to play at Carnegie Hall and to play for a sitting president when she played for former president Barrack Obama at the LGBT Leadership Gala Dinner in 2011.

Tonacity: The Tona Brown Story is available now on Amazon and at Barnes and Noble. More information about Brown can be found on her website at Tonabrown.com.