The Kimmel Center is the venue for the world premiere of a monumental symphonic gospel work. Several amassed choirs bring to life an evening-length work by Hannibal Lokumbe, the stubbornly unclassifiable jazz trumpeter and composer.
The new piece is titled, Can You Hear God Crying, the composer's tribute to his great-great grandfather who was born in the Sahara desert, kidnapped in Liberia, sold into slavery in Charleston S.C., but escaped and made his way as a free man to Texas, where Lokumbe was born and still lives.
The Philadelphia Inquirer's David Patrick Stearns reports that the music this story inspired is anything but simple.