Simmons College Hosts the Afro-Semitic Experience, 2/13/08
April 1, 2008 (TAGS: Campus News )
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Students, faculty and staff were engaged by a performance of the Afro-Semitic Experience on Wednesday, February 13, 2008 in the Linda K. Paresky Conference Center at Simmons College. The audience enjoyed an hour and a half energetic performance which was followed by a question and answer session and reception. As part of the Afro-Semitic Experience’s performance the audience joined together and danced the hora.
“It was fantastic to see such a diverse crowd so energized by the Afro-Semitic Experience’s performance,” said Hillel President Leah Maroni-Wagner, ’08. “To see people dancing the hora as part of this multicultural program was just amazing!”
The Afro-Semitic Experience is an ensemble dedicated to preserving, promoting and expanding the rich cultural and musical heritage of the Jewish and African diaspora. They are a band that understands and can present interpretations of music from traditions as rich as Gospel, Klezmer, Nigunim, Spirituals, and Swing and you have the Afro-Semitic Experience. This is a group that is as comfortable playing a freylakh as they are swinging a blues, that knows how to playing either a bulgar or some funk. Multi-cultural soul.
The Afro-Semitic Experience began performing in late 1999 as an off-shoot of the creative work of African-American pianist Warren Byrd and Jewish-American bassist David Chevan. In 1999 they were asked if they had a band that could perform their brand of Jewish and African-American music. As much as they liked the idea of expanding the duo to perform large ensemble versions of pieces of sacred music, Chevan and Byrd were also interested in finding a musical setting where they might be able to explore not only the sacred sounds of Jewish and African-American music, but the secular as well. At the time they both belonged to the New Haven based jazz group, Bassology. It was not before they began adding new material to the Bassology set lists. Soon the group was jamming on Klezmer and Yiddish songs along with their usual assortment of jazz and world music pieces. As word got out they found themselves playing the occasional wedding and Bar Mitzvah. People in the New Haven area were thrilled to hear a group that could encompass such a wide range of musical styles and languages.
"The Afro-Semitic Experience’s performance was an amazing opportunity to reach a wide range of members of the Simmons community. It was so fantastic to see such a diverse audience experiencing music that reflects the Jewish experience and the African-American experience," said Simmons Vice President Juliana Ross, ’10.
The Afro-Semitic Experience performance at Simmons College was sponsored by: Simmons Hillel, Multicultural Affairs, Office of the Dean for Student Life, Office of Spiritual Life, Office of Student Leadership and Activities, Africana Studies Department, Department of Communications, Modern Languages Department, Multicultural Core Course (MCC), Political Science Department, the Scott/Ross Center for Community Service, Simmons Institute for Leadership and Change, The Simmons College Black Administrators Faculty and Staff Council (BAFAS), Simmons School of Social Work, the Campus Activities Board (CAB), the Black Students Organization (BSO), and Hillel Council of New England.
"It was so exciting to bring together a wide-array of student organizations, academic and administrative departments for this energetic campus wide Black History Month program. The energy in the room during the performance was electric. So many people shared how exciting it was to have a group like this come to campus," said Ailene Gerhardt, Simmons Hillel Director and Director of Small Campus Advancement at Hillel Council of New England.
To view photos of the group’s performance at Simmons on 2/13/08, visit our web album at http://picasaweb.google.com/simmonshillel/AfroSemiticExperience21308.
To get more information about the Afro-Semitic Experience visit them online: http://www.chevan.addr.com/ase.html. For more information about this program at Simmons and other information about Jewish life at Simmons, visit Simmons College Hillel online: www.simmons.edu/~hillel or contact Hillel: hillel@simmons.edu or (617) 521-2137.