C O V E R
S T O R Y
Transforming a Classic Sebastian Blue creates concept album of William Shakespeare’s “The Tempest” PHOTO CREDIT: LARRY HIRSHOWITZ
Del Rey resident Sebastian Blue is a senior at New Roads School and a local music performer who received a full-tuition scholarship to Berklee School of Music in Boston for next year. By Bridgette M. Redman ebastian Blue wasn’t about to let a pandemic slow him down from creating and getting the most out of his high school experience. A sophomore when his school sent students home in 2020, he is now a senior and launching several parts of his multi-year project — an album and stage production of a de-colonized “Tempest” by William Shakespeare. His recorded album — done in collaboration with artists around the world — was released on all streaming media on Black Friday. The hour-long concept album called “Full Fathom Five” has 13 tracks that Blue did as part of an independent study project with New Roads School in Santa Monica. Blue, a Del Rey resident,
S
performs throughout the area and recently received a fulltuition scholarship to the Berklee School of Music in Boston. He started the Shakespeare project in March 2020 just as lockdown was beginning. “On March 13, we were told to leave and never come back,” Blue said. “That day I bought my very first electronic piano. I had been playing piano for 12 years and never owned a keyboard. The head of the school said, ‘Find a project to do with your life,’ so I bought a keyboard and I wrote an EP for myself.” Blue said he had been playing music all his life, but this marked the beginning of his journey into creating music. He would take his keyboard out to local parks, the marina, Westchester restaurants and the beach
PAGE 12 THE ARGONAUT DECEMBER 16, 2021
so he could share his music and listen to the ocean.
Project morphs into retelling of Shakespeare Then the school announced that any sophomores, juniors or seniors could do an independent study project where they could create whatever they wanted and use school resources. Many of Blue’s fellow students wrote papers, but he wanted to go in a different direction and create an album. As for the choice of story, Blue said “The Tempest” has long been a favorite of his. When he was 10 or 11, he was really into magic tricks so his father took him to see a production of “The Tempest” in which Raymond Teller from Penn and Teller was performing as Prospero.
“This production had magic tricks and live music, it was so amazing,” Blue said. “I’m not sure I knew what it was about, but it was so cool to look at.” Later, he learned that his dad had a shared love for the play and used it as his thesis in journalism school. Blue approached his English teacher, whom he knew was a Shakespeare scholar, and told him he wanted to do a concept album on “The Tempest.”
Themes pull artist up short Not everything went smoothly at first. Blue started to write the music and re-read the script. As he dove into it, he realized that there was a lot of pro-colonialism in the story. “I don’t want to advocate for
colonizing countries and owning slaves — and those are the good guys,” Blue said. “So, I sat back and took a break.” During the detour, he turned to one of his teachers who was a priest of Santero, also known as Lukumi, an African-based religion brought from Yoruba to Cuba. Blue reached out for help on a song he wrote that he was supposed to play at the school’s jazz festival which was canceled because of the pandemic. They read through several books of songs belonging to Lukumi and there was one where the words perfectly fit his melody. Each of the religion’s songs belong to a particular deity or spirit and have their own rhythms and songs. The one that jumped out to Blue was about a particular orisha named Eshu. Orisha are the spirits and
