FREEDOM

This snippet is an excerpt from the 14-minute FREEDOM scene in my blended-roots Opera, MELIOR Opus Griot. The clip is of me at home recording music instrumentation and FX sounds onto computerised software via my digital piano for the musicians to study before our next rehearsals and theatre performance are scheduled. I also recorded myself singing all the lead and harmony vocals. The footage includes imagery by visual artist Sandra Whetham and video editing by Bazooka Media. 

I originally wrote this work about the nearly three-decade long incarceration of Nelson Mandela. He was still on Robben Island when the music came to me as I was driving on the multi-highway interchange in Atlanta, Georgia, en route from work to pick up my child. My stepfather Bobby Byrd was on child-minding duty, and when I arrived at his house, Pops recognised the music creator look in my eyes. He instinctively instructed his grandkids to “go outside and play” so that I could get to the piano and record the melodies, harmonies and motifs that were swirling around in my mind. I used an audio cassette player, the only resource for recording that I had back then.

In 1988, I composed music solely for myself, mainly for my personal healing. Singing for my supper was not in my life plan. The following year, Pops implored me to serve as the opening act for his Bobby Byrd and the JB All Stars Revue at the Town & Country Club in London (now called the Forum in Kentish Town). This led to me being introduced to Marco Nelson and Femi Williams, the founders of the Young Disciples. They invited me to write music for their album “The Road to Freedom”, which was released in 1991. The collective work included my song, FREEDOM.

Over thirty years later and I’m rearranging the music I composed all those decades ago - now to suit a scene in my aquatic-themed dramatic music theatre story. It expands on the Nelson Mandela backstory and the US slavery system to include the parallels of battered women, abused children, casualties of war and the many all over the world who endure tortuous terrible situations in oppressive environments.

MELIOR Opus Griot is a fantasy about an ideal ocean-floor society whose main character, Cassie, is a time-travelling Artist Messenger who flows between her spiritual training in the deep Sea to delivering harmonious messages to land dwellers over many centuries. The music is a combination of Gospel, Jazz, Soul and Opera, accompanied by an eclectic Quintet, a choir, interpretive dancers and filmic imagery. It had a successful preview premiere at Hall for Cornwall in November 2022. This crowdfunding campaign is set to cover the recording expenses for a Double Album with all the scenes from the staging, plus the operating costs for a fully staged production.

MELIOR Opus Griot aims to establish a platform for a fresh approach to the theatrical staging of music stories that existing and emerging artists can build upon. But, above all, it seeks to share harmonious uplift to those who choose to receive it.