ISSUE Project Room and Representing NYC host an evening of innovative performance by New Yorkers ages 5 to 75. Students hailing from Bedstuy, Bushwick, Corona, and Elmhurst, present performance works developed at the Arts and Literacy after school program, joined by Charles Gayle, Mantra Percussion, Nuit Blanche, and ESP TV. Saxophonist Charles Gayle performs a live set in response to the youth art and performances, Mantra Percussion present a new structured improvisation inspired by student-made field recordings, and Nuit Blanche and ESP TV facilitate live projections from collages developed by students of the Arts and Literacy program on the digital publishing platform to.be. The Oracle Djs— AKA Sam Hillmer, founder of Representing NYC— spins world bass and regional American dance music.
A collaboration with ISSUE Project Room provides rehearsal space and a public platform for artists of Representing NYC. The March 12th performance marks the first in a series of public concerts at ISSUE.
The Arts and Literacy After School and Summer Program addresses the educational needs of Bushwick children by providing them with opportunities to create, think, communicate, and problem solve. Program activities build literacy in the widest sense of the word through creative writing, the visual arts, theater, photography, video, creative movement, music, martial arts, media literacy, gardening, and Yoga. The interdisciplinary curriculum builds upon the children's interests and strengths, using the same effective, holistic, multicultural approach which is the hallmark of all of the Coalition's programs. The program operates out of Public Schools 116, 377 and 123 in Bushwick Brooklyn. In Queens it operates out of Public School 92 in Corona and Public School Q377 in Elmhurst.
Charles Gayle does not mean to comfort you. He began his recording career 25 years ago with a series of tenor-saxophone albums whose unstinting ferocity he’d forged during decades spent playing on the streets of New York City. But as listeners came to expect him to keep flying the fire-music flag, he’s repeatedly turned the tables on them. He’s dialed back the heat and upped the abstraction (often on other horns), he’s turned jazz standards such as “Softly, as in a Morning Sunrise” into ruminative stride-piano fantasias, and he’s set aside music entirely to speak to his audiences about abortion, killing, and homelessness. He’s performed in sad-clown makeup under the name Streets, and lately his preferred instrument has been the acoustic bass.
— Bill Meyer, The Chicago Reader, February 13, 2014.
Committed to expanding the future of percussion music, Mantra Percussion commissions and performs new, significant works for large percussion ensemble by both established and emerging composers. Devoted to engaging new audiences, Mantra Percussion challenges the standard classical concert format by producing evening-length events that look toward a grander artistic vision. Hailed by The New York Times as "finely polished...a fresh source of energy" and by TimeOut New York as "forward thinking" was recognized by The New Yorker and TimeOut New York for presenting one of the ten best classical performances of 2012.
Nuit Blanche New York (NBNY) designs, curates and produces immersive environments that uniquely engage audiences. Recent projects have included a building-scale projection on a contemporary art museum, an audio-visual performance space in a waterfront factory, a 3D video installation in New York’s oldest cathedral and the lighting design of a public night bazaar. Nuit Blanche collaborate with architects, designers, musicians and have presented new site-specific work by notable visual artists including Krzysztof Wodiczko, Marilyn Minter, Vito Acconci, Will Cotton, Marco Brambilla and Rita Ackermann.
E.S.P. TV is an organization dedicated to promoting the performing and media based arts through live studio broadcasts, a program on public access television, and theatrical performance. E.S.P. TV is recorded in front of live audiences, with real-time green-screening, signal manipulation and video mixing. The show is edited and produced for Manhattan Neighborhood Network public television (MNN), aired every Tuesday at 10PM. E.S.P. TV’s core mission is to preserve public broadcast as an outlet for transmission based art, as well as showcase the ongoing use and ability of analog media in a digitally run world.
The Oracle DJs (Sam Hillmer) sits at the intersection of ambient drone, world bass and sound system music, and regional American dance production styles. Musician, DJ, artist, and curator Sam Hillmer is the mind behind seminal Brooklyn noise band/chamber ensemble ZS, the You Are Here Festival (aka the maze, conceived and produced with his visual art duo Trouble), and Representing NYC. Hillmer curated the weekly out music party 'PRACTICE' at the erstwhile Williamsburg venue Zebulon until the time of Zebulon's demise, and now at the new venue Trans Pecos in Ridgewood Queens.
Representing NYC is a network of music and culture organizations local to New York City. The object of this network is to create opportunities for musicians and artists working in undercapitalized settings, or in settings that block opportunity artists working in normative settings would take for granted. Representing NYC coordinates this network to provide advantages to the musicians and artists we represent so their work can reach a broader public than it would otherwise. Representing NYC has released records for The Fly Girlz and Nine 11 Thesaurus on True Panther Sounds and The Social Registry respectively.
The work featuring youth on this program was developed through a partnership between Representing NYC and to.be. to.be is the studio space where you can collage the internet. Create share and collaborate in open spaces called fields. Turn your favorites into one of a kind t shirts and prints. Discover new work, pull and edit fields, explore the user-generated libraries, and support the creative community.