MacPhail Presents: Sounds of Summer
Sounds of Summer is MacPhail Center for Music’s vibrant festival, showcasing eclectic and collaborative performances by students, faculty, and guest musicians. This event spotlights two notable programs: the Global Music Initiative and EMRA (Electronic Music Recording Arts), celebrating their unique contributions to the music scene.
Sounds of Summer 2024 Schedule
4-4:30 Juniper, EMRA student/songwriter performance
4:40-5:20 First Avenue Ensemble
5:30-6:10 KNOWN MPLS, directed by Courtland Pickens
6:20-7:00 GMI Faculty Ensemble: Dr. Chris Rochester (sax), LA Buckner (drums), David Feily (guitar), Greg Byers (bass), and Michael Cain (keys)
7:10-8:00 Brandee Younger with MacPhail friends
Performers
The sonically innovative harpist Brandee Younger is revolutionizing the harp for the digital era. Over the past fifteen years, she has worked relentlessly to stretch boundaries and limitations for harpists. In 2022, she made history by becoming the first Black woman nominated for a Grammy® Award for Best Instrumental Composition. That same year, she was also nominated for an NAACP Image Award and, later, the winner of the 2024 NAACP Image Award in the category of Outstanding Jazz Album for her latest album, Brand New Life. Ever-expanding as an artist, she has worked with cultural icons, including Common, Lauryn Hill, John Legend, Pharoah Sanders, and Christian McBride. Her original composition “Hortense” was featured in the Netflix concert documentary Beyoncé: Homecoming, and in 2019, Brandee was selected to perform her original music as a featured performer for Quincy Jones and Steve McQueens’ “Soundtrack of America.” Brandee is often noted for standing on the shoulders of the women who ushered in the harp as a clear and distinct voice in jazz & popular styles – particularly Detroit natives Dorothy Ashby & Alice Coltrane. Her new album, Brand New Life, builds on her rich oeuvre and cements the harp’s place in pop culture. As the album title suggests, Brand New Life is about forging new artistic, personal, political, and spiritual paths. Younger’s music is imbued with a sense of purpose and respect for legacy, creating a larger platform for the harp to reach newer and wider audiences than ever before. In addition to performing and recording, Brandee Younger is on the faculty at New York University, Steinhardt School, and The New School College of Performing Arts.
Follow: @harpista
Courtland Pickens is a local singer-songwriter with a powerful presence in the local community. In 2017, he released his gospel EP entitled “The Manifest Promise,” and he was a top audition finalist on NBC’s “The Voice” in 2016.
He is the founder and director of KNOWN, an audition-based Twin Cities community youth choir. The choral ensemble was established in the latter part of 2019 as an extension of Voicez, Inc., a 501C, non-profit music organization striving to train and develop the next generation of singers and composers throughout the Twin Cities Area. They utilize performance-based music education to galvanize youth between the ages of 12-25 as agents of change by promoting self-esteem, leadership skills, cultural awareness, discipline, and a commitment to excellence