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1 minute read
The Just and the Blind
A WEEKEND OF CONVERSATION, REFLECTION, AND ENGAGEMENT
In April 2022, Celebrity Series presented The Just and the Blind for a two-night engagement featuring a multimedia journey of poetry, music, dance, photography, and projected animation conceived, written, and narrated by the captivating spoken-word artist Marc Bamuthi Joseph. This two-night performance at the Emerson Paramount Center featured live, original music by composer and multiinstrumentalist Daniel Bernard Roumain (DBR). Versatile Boston-based vocalist Débo Ray, a Grammy nominee and a featured artist in several of our Neighborhood Arts performances, joined Bamuthi and Roumain to perform songs with lyrics drawn from famous letters from prison by Assata Shakur and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., while the well-respected King of Flexin’ KingHavoc joined by performing movement inspired by Joseph’s poetry.
The work – framed as Bamuthi’s advice to his teenage son and his meditation about Black fatherhood and boyhood – weaves together a father’s love and pride with fear about how the world sees his child. Following each 60-minute performance, the artists immediately transitioned into an audience talkback from the stage that added greater depth to the performance’s questioning of race, patriarchy, power, and justice.
The Just and the Blind Artist Connections
In addition to the two performances at the Emerson Paramount Center, Celebrity Series surrounded our presentation of The Just and the Blind with numerous engagement activities. These included a virtual panel discussion between the creators and the Network of Arts Administrators of Color; an in-person writers’ workshop with teens at 826 Boston; a moderated conversation between Roumain and students and parents from BEAM (Bridge to Equity and Achievement in Music); and a moderated conversation between the creators and METCO families who had attended the performance.
CONCEIVED & WRITTEN BY MARC BAMUTHI JOSEPH ORIGINAL MUSIC BY DANIEL BERNARD ROUMAIN EMERSON PARAMOUNT CENTER
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