Guest Artist Christopher Cayari Brings Research, Performance and Personal Storytelling to Stan...

Music, storytelling and scholarship will share the stage at Stanislaus State as guest artist Christopher Cayari presents Pictures at a Gender[*] Exhibition, a performance that invites audiences to listen, reflect and connect.

Cayari's powerful and authentic performance tells the story of their journey as a gender non-conforming performer navigating music, theater and everyday life. Presented through captivating costumes, heartfelt monologues and songs from Wicked, Hamilton, Sunset Boulevard, Kinky Boots and other musical theater favorites, this cabaret-style revue reflects on and demystifies some trans and gender non-conforming issues.

The free public performance will take place at 7:30 p.m. Friday, March 20 in Snider Recital Hall, with a talkback immediately following, inviting audience members into conversation with the artist.

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Earlier that day, students - and interested faculty and staff - can attend a 1 p.m. cabaret-style performance in Snider Recital Hall during the Department of Music's Directed Listening course. Titled Awkward Teen Phase, the musical set is a world premiere and explores Cayari's experiences growing up, including themes of trauma, identity and self-understanding. Music students will also work closely with Cayari during masterclass sessions throughout the afternoon, creating space for direct mentorship and dialogue.

For students, faculty and staff, the visit provides opportunities beyond a guest lecture or concert. It offers a powerful example of how academic inquiry, creative practice and lived experience can come together to deepen understanding and prepare students for a world that values both critical thinking and human connection.

"Music has from the beginning of time been a way for people to organize, understand themselves and enact change," Cayari said. "No matter what identities you bring, I hope students will see how performance and research can connect."

"Music has from the beginning of time been a way for people to organize, understand themselves and enact change."

- Christopher Cayari

Learning Across Disciplines

Hosted by the Department of Music and supported by campus partners in the Department of Theatre, the Department of Gender Studies and the Office of the Dean in the College of the Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences, Cayari's visit reflects Stan State's commitment to interdisciplinary learning.

Assistant Professor of Music Education Emma Joy Jampole - who collaborates with fellow Stan State faculty as part of the Sounds of Equity group - brought the performance to campus through her long-standing professional relationship with Cayari. The two first met during their doctoral studies and later worked together at another university. "One thing I've often encountered is that my work doesn't fit entirely into one box - it has connections to music, education, psychology and sociology," Jampole said. "This kind of experience shows students that real-world questions and careers don't live in just one discipline. They require multiple ways of thinking."

From Scholarship to Stage

Cayari's work utilizes performance autoethnography, a research method that uses personal experience as a lens to explore broader cultural questions, build dialogue and challenge societal norms. In Pictures at a Gender[*] Exhibition, that scholarship becomes accessible through storytelling and music.

"I will probably have more people hear my research in a performance than if I were to only publish in a top-tier journal," Cayari said.

The show incorporates familiar songs, reimagined in new contexts, alongside original narrative. That combination, Cayari explained, helps audiences engage with complex topics in a way that feels both approachable and meaningful.

"A good performance gets people listening," they said. "And gets those ears primed to be able to receive new knowledge."

The project began in February 2020, just before the COVID lockdowns, and continued to develop as Cayari returned to publicly performing soprano repertoire for the first time since high school.

"I had finally made the choice to start performing soprano music in public," they said. "It started at this place called the Trans Voices Cabaret in Chicago."

From that moment grew a larger vision.

"My vision was to give non-binary, gender non-conforming representation wherever I could share the show," Cayari said. "It was a gender exploration. And if you come see the show, you'll hear that whole journey, what the gender journey really was for me."

Cayari started the project as a lecture-recital, combining familiar songs with narrative and commentary as a pilot study.

"Then I actually had audience members take surveys on their phones as they were watching," they said. That feedback on costumes, creative and musical choices, perspectives and more shaped both Cayari's research and the performance itself.

"I'm making commentary on the performativity of what music and theater expect out of the people who are on stage. The pilot study helped me see what the audience sees as they see me on stage - and how they perceive their role in society as well. The show kind of challenges those roles too, because they had an opportunity to talk to the performer, and then I used all that pilot study data to actually compose what you'll see on Friday."

"This kind of experience shows students that real-world questions and careers don't live in just one discipline."

- Emma Joy Jampole

For Stan State students in any discipline, the experience demonstrates how creative work can also be rigorous scholarship, and how storytelling can be a tool for communication, advocacy and professional impact.

"Chris and I have been able to leverage our common interests in queer studies, trans studies and music studies," said Assistant Professor of Music Education Emma Joy Jampole. "This is work that lives at the cutting edge of multiple fields."

Building Community Through Shared Experience

Jampole emphasized that bringing Cayari to campus was also about fostering a culture where people can learn from one another's experiences.

"Our campus has shown that we can engage with different ideas in ways that are thoughtful and respectful," she said. "This performance adds another perspective - one that invites people to listen, reflect and connect."

She noted that events like this help students and community members see both themselves and others more clearly.

"Everyone needs to see someone that looks like them," she said. "Queers need to see other queers - and people who are not queer need to see queers. I use that term very deliberately because I want to reclaim it. I hope that our queer students and queer community, the LGBTQ+ folks who attend, will feel affirmed, will have a sense of resonance and will see some representation and feel a little bit more community."

Preparing Students for Life Beyond the Classroom

Cayari hopes students leave both inspired and empowered.

"What I hope the audience leaves saying is, 'What can I do?'" they said. "It might be a change in perspective, a change in language or something bigger. But it starts with that question."

At its core, the performance is about connection - between people, ideas and experiences - and about creating a space where those connections can lead to new ways of thinking.

For students navigating their own paths, that kind of space can make all the difference.