| Numinous The Music of Joseph C. Phillips Jr. |
14: 2013
Numinous at 25
14. 2013
#numinous25
#numinousmusic25
“R&B is about emotion, issues purely out of emotion. New Black Music is also about emotion, but from a different place, and finally, towards a different end. What these musicians feel is a more complete existence. That is, the digging of everything.”
-LeRoi Jones (Amiri Baraka), “The Changing Same” (1966)
Just as 2012 really consisted of two musical things, 2013 mainly was about Changing Same. The six movement work premiered on March 16, 2013 at the Ecstatic Music Festival at Merkin Hall. We also performed along with vocalist/composer Imani Uzuri at the Festival.
Changing Same speaks to the “dichotomies of high and low, inside and outside, tradition and innovation” within black culture and explores the richness and complexity of being black in 21st century America; but also it is music that resonates a more universal expression filtered through an intimately autobiographical perspective, a genuine search to create an organic fusion of artistic and cultural influences, to create a new personal artistic statement that is more than the sum of its parts. This is mixed music.
A couple months after the Festival we were in the old Systems Two recording Changing Same in what became our 3rd recording for New Amsterdam Records released in August 28, 2015. And on October 10, we performed at Simone Dinnerstein’s Neighborhood Concert Series at my school PS 321, which was a warm, fun, joyous concert filled with my many of my students and their families!
#numinous25
#numinousmusic25
“R&B is about emotion, issues purely out of emotion. New Black Music is also about emotion, but from a different place, and finally, towards a different end. What these musicians feel is a more complete existence. That is, the digging of everything.”
-LeRoi Jones (Amiri Baraka), “The Changing Same” (1966)
Just as 2012 really consisted of two musical things, 2013 mainly was about Changing Same. The six movement work premiered on March 16, 2013 at the Ecstatic Music Festival at Merkin Hall. We also performed along with vocalist/composer Imani Uzuri at the Festival.
Changing Same speaks to the “dichotomies of high and low, inside and outside, tradition and innovation” within black culture and explores the richness and complexity of being black in 21st century America; but also it is music that resonates a more universal expression filtered through an intimately autobiographical perspective, a genuine search to create an organic fusion of artistic and cultural influences, to create a new personal artistic statement that is more than the sum of its parts. This is mixed music.
A couple months after the Festival we were in the old Systems Two recording Changing Same in what became our 3rd recording for New Amsterdam Records released in August 28, 2015. And on October 10, we performed at Simone Dinnerstein’s Neighborhood Concert Series at my school PS 321, which was a warm, fun, joyous concert filled with my many of my students and their families!
Thanks and credit to all the original photos on this website to: David Andrako, Concrete Temple Theatre, Marcy Begian, Mark Elzey, Ed Lefkowicz, Donald Martinez, Kimberly McCollum, Geoff Ogle, Joseph C. Phillips Jr., Daniel Wolf-courtesy of Roulette, Andrew Robertson, Viscena Photography, Jennifer Kang, Carolyn Wolf, Mark Elzey, Karen Wise, Numinosito. The Numinous Changing Same album design artwork by DM Stith. The Numinous The Grey Land album design and artwork by Brock Lefferts. Contact for photo credit and information on specific images.