RECESS Odean Pope & Immanuel Wilkins, with Jennifer Kidwell
RECESS is a new immersive performance created by composer-performers Odean Pope and Immanuel Wilkins.
Join us as we transform a North Philadelphia warehouse into a sculptural playground for sound. RECESS invites audiences inside a living model of improvisation, in an installation that is part bandstand, part score, part jungle gym—designed by Immanuel Wilkins and Rachael Elliott. Performance artist Jennifer Kidwell acts as guide and facilitator in this experience of “radical play.”
Odean Pope and Immanuel Wilkins are two points in the Philadelphia music continuum, connected by tradition and innovation. Odean was Immanuel’s teacher—he first heard him play at 9 years old. While Odean remained anchored in Philadelphia—an undisputed jazz elder in the city, leading jazz education while touring for decades with Max Roach and forming the groundbreaking Saxophone Choir—Immanuel went on to Juilliard and then a stellar career as a world-class musician and composer. Now the two have collaborated as colleagues on a new commission that evokes that continuum, drawing on the past, reveling in the present, and projecting into the future. They are joined by Wilkins’ quartet: Micah Thomas, Ryoma Takenaga, and Kweku Sumbry.
- Odean Pope— tenor saxophone
- Immanuel Wilkins — alto saxophone
- Micah Thomas — piano
- Ryoma Takenaga — bass
- Kweku Sumbry — drums
- with Jennifer Kidwell*
*This performance will be preceded by a PROCESSIONAL/HISTORY TOUR that will start at 1:30pm at N. 8th St & Cecil B. Moore, led by Jennifer Kidwell.