July 14th,  2022, Brevard, North Carolina

Brevard Music Center 

Afrophilia is the love of Africa and everything of African descent. This love, however, cannot be expressed and lived simply. Afrophilia is a sonic expression of my passion for African and African diasporic music. It is a response to years of growing up listening to Black music that has greatly informed my musical senses. This work features harmonic and rhythmic idioms reminiscent of jazz, and gospel music. Throughout the piece, each instrument will demonstrate improvisatory-like solos representing the different genres of Black music that have made a prominent presence in my life. The essence of Afrophilia lies in my sonic manifestation of self-love: a love of Blackness as an essential aspect of who I am