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Artist: Carlos Simon
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Carlos Simon:

Together

GRAMMY-nominated composer Carlos Simon will release his new album Together on September 8 globally via Decca Classics. The 10-track project collates and celebrates the multifaceted layers of Simon’s personality, upbringing, and musical understanding, with a creative process that strikes the balance of original compositions, improvisations, and carefully crafted arrangements. In addition to performing on a number of tracks, Simon has enlisted violinist and fellow Decca recording artist Randall Goosby, 2 x GRAMMY Award-winning mezzo J’Nai Bridges (“the ‘Beyoncé of opera” - BET), acclaimed GRAMMY Award-winning baritone Will Liverman and GRAMMY-nominated rising star cellist Seth Parker Woods. The album also features contributions from the Carlos Simon Collective, a group that Simon founded and conducted. Made up of Chicago’s best freelance artists, the collective is headed up by fellow GRAMMY-nominated, acclaimed composer, violinist, educator and friend Jessie Montgomery.

Carlos Simon:

Requiem for the Enslaved

Decca is proud to announce the signing of US composer Carlos Simon and the release of his new album Requiem for the Enslaved. The title work sees Simon infuse the traditional Catholic requiem with music from African American spirituals to create a haunting piece for chamber ensemble and spoken word.

The album’s central piece, Requiem for the Enslaved, with text by Marco Pavé, was commissioned by Georgetown University, where Simon is currently Assistant Professor of Composition, following a decision by its student body in 2020. A majority voted to establish a reparations fund to be paid to descendants of 272 enslaved people who were sold for $115,000 by the Maryland Jesuits, the founders of Georgetown, in 1838 to rescue the university from bankruptcy. This work honors the passing of those people purchased and sold by the founders. Upon receiving the commission, Simon visited the Louisiana cotton plantation that purchased the enslaved people and delved through the Georgetown archives for historical research as he began work on the piece. The album’s cover is inspired by this location.