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Austin360 blogs > Austin Arts: Seeing Things > Archives > 2010 > March > 15 > Entry
It was more than a little auspicious Sunday afternoon at the Paramount Theatre that opera singer Barbara Smith Conrad was greeted with waves of applause and standing ovations during the premiere of “When I Rise,” the intelligent, poignant and ultimately liberating documentary by Austin filmmaker Mat Hames chronicling Conrad’s life.
After all, when Conrad was a gifted young music student at the University of Texas in 1957 — part of the first group of African Americans to be admitted as undergraduates to Texas’ flagship university - she wasn’t initially allowed into the Paramount to see a film that her drama professor sent the class to see.
Produced under the auspices of UT’s Briscoe Center for American History, “When I Rise” is ultimately about the extraordinary grace of an extraordinary woman.
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