Blackbird, fly
BLACKBIRD, FLY
Storytelling via spoken word and live music, from sons of Haitian immigrants
BLACKBIRD, FLY weaves together an enduring tapestry of movement, narrative, music and Haitian folklore to engage audiences in dialog about critical questions of our time. Steeped in hip-hop aesthetic, this intimate duet between two preeminent sons of Haitian immigrants —composer/violinist DBR, and arts activist & spoken word artist BAMUTHI —unveils their life stories in search of their identity and role models, and explores universal themes of tolerance and inclusion.
This work is a culmination of DBR and BAMUTHI’s collaborations with Atlanta Ballet, Boston Children’s Chorus, University of Houston, SF Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, and Opera Philadelphia. In each of these communities, they have created and premiered new works offering myriad experiential arts education opportunities. Introspective yet uplifting, BLACKBIRD, FLY heightens our collective consciousness and sheds a new light on the arts as a powerful tool for social and civic engagement.
BLACKBIRD, FLY has toured all over North America, including the Apollo Theater, New York; Vancouver, BC; Raleigh, NC; Cleveland, OH; Orcas Island, Washington; and San Antonio, TX.
“This profoundly reflective and powerfully uplifting work explores the artists’ Haitian heritage, while delving into universal themes of cultural identity, tolerance and inclusion”
ABOUT MARC BAMUTHI JOSEPH
Marc Bamuthi Joseph is a TED Global Fellow, an Emerson Collective Dial Fellow, an inaugural recipient of the Guggenheim Social Practice initiative, and an honoree of the United States Artists Rockefeller Fellowship. He is also the winner of the 2011 Herb Alpert Award in Theatre, and an inaugural recipient of the Doris Duke Performing Artist Award. In the Spring of 2022, he was elected into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. An internationally renowned cultural strategist, Bamuthi is the co-creator of the paradigm-shifting allyship training HEALING FORWARD™. He has lectured in 25 different countries and his TED talk “You Have The Rite” has been viewed more than five million times.
Bamuthi has most recently completed commissions for Yale University, the Albany Symphony Orchestra, The Minnesota Orchestra, The New Jersey Symphony Orchestra, and the Washington National Opera. His new opera "Watch Night" with music by Tamar-kali and direction by Bill T. Jones premiered at PAC NYC in 2023, and his collaboration with NYC Ballet Associate Artistic Director Wendy Whelan "Carnival of the Animals" premiered at Meany Center, Seattle in 2024 and is currently touring. His most recent orchestral work “Good News Mass” with music by Carlos Simon will premiere with the LA Philharmonic in April 2025. His latest collaboration with composer Daniel Bernard Roumain (DBR), Forgiveness, had an album release in 2025 with Albany Symphony. Select works by Bamuthi are available for purchase and rental on SozoMart.com.
An emergent on screen talent, he is among the featured performers in HBO’s screen adaptation of “Between the World and Me” by Ta-Nehesi Coates. He is currently the Chief of Impact at SOZO. A proud alumnus of Morehouse College, Bamuthi received an Honorary Doctorate of Fine Arts from the California College of Arts in the Spring of 2022 and was the recipient of a second Honorary Doctorate from Middlebury College in the Spring of 2023.
Learn more about Marc Bamuthi Joseph
ABOUT DANIEL BERNARD ROUMAIN
Daniel Bernard Roumain (DBR) is a Black, Haitian-American composer who sees composing as collaboration with artists, organizations and communities within the farming and framing of ideas. He is a prolific and endlessly collaborative composer, performer, educator, and social entrepreneur. “About as omnivorous as a contemporary artist gets” (New York Times), Roumain has worked with artists from J’Nai Bridges, Lady Gaga and Philip Glass to Bill T. Jones, Marin Alsop and Anna Deavere Smith.
Known for his signature violin sounds infused with myriad electronic and African-American music influences, Roumain takes his genre-bending music beyond the proscenium. He is a composer of solo, chamber, orchestral, and operatic works, and has composed an array of film, theater, and dance scores. He has composed music for the acclaimed film Ailey (Sundance official selection); was the first Music Director and Principal Composer with the Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Company; released and appeared on 30 album recordings; and has published over 300 works. He has appeared on CBS, ESPN, FOX, NBC, NPR, and PBS; and has collaborated with the Brooklyn Academy of Music, Kennedy Center, Lyric Opera of Chicago, and Sydney Opera House. He was Artist-in-Residence and Creative Chair at the Flynn in Burlington, Vermont. Currently, he is the first Artistic Ambassador with Firstworks; the first Artist Activist-in-Residence at Longy School of Music; and the first Resident Artistic Catalyst with the New Jersey Symphony.
Roumain is an Atlantic Center Master Artist, a Creative Capital Grantee, and a Hermitage Artist Retreat Fellow. He has won the American Academy in Rome Goddard Lieberson Fellowship; a Civitella Ranieri Music Fellowship Award; an Emmy Award for The New Look of Classical Music; National Sawdust Disruptor Award; and the Sphinx Organization Arthur L. Johnson Award. He has been featured as a keynote speaker at universities, colleges, conservatories and technology conferences, and was the first ASU GAMMAGE Residency Artist. He has lectured at Yale and Princeton University and was a Roth Distinguished Visiting Scholar at Dartmouth College. He currently serves as a board member for the Association of Performing Arts Professionals (Vice Chair), the League of American Orchestras, and is a voting member for the Recording Academy GRAMMY awards.
A student of William Albright, Leslie Bassett, and William Bolcom, Roumain graduated from Vanderbilt University and earned his doctorate in music composition from the University of Michigan. He is currently a tenured Associate and Institute Professor at Arizona State University Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts.
