Darius Jones: For The People at Roulette

For The People is a collection of compositions by Darius Jones, in collaboration with The Wet Ink Large Ensemble, that expresses the many reasons why American citizens should vote in this year’s November Congressional election. As artists, we have the power to inform, inspire, and empower our community to action.
Inspired by the idea of America as an experiment, Jones needed a compositional strategy that would be flexible, and due to of the experimentalism, improvisation, ensemble interaction, and theatricality inherent to the structure, writing game pieces was a natural choice. He created a scenario where participants must follow the rules of the piece while simultaneously giving their unique perspective: an important aspect that reflects American culture as a culmination of multiple opposing perspectives. There is never only one viewpoint. There is no dictator. We all have a voice....

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For The People is a collection of compositions by Darius Jones, in collaboration with The Wet Ink Large Ensemble, that expresses the many reasons why American citizens should vote in this year’s November Congressional election. As artists, we have the power to inform, inspire, and empower our community to action.
Inspired by the idea of America as an experiment, Jones needed a compositional strategy that would be flexible, and due to of the experimentalism, improvisation, ensemble interaction, and theatricality inherent to the structure, writing game pieces was a natural choice. He created a scenario where participants must follow the rules of the piece while simultaneously giving their unique perspective: an important aspect that reflects American culture as a culmination of multiple opposing perspectives. There is never only one viewpoint. There is no dictator. We all have a voice.

The evening includes the world premiere of A Child Caged in Ice, followed by the second performance ever of America The Joke. Jones closes the evening with the return of LawNOrder (pronounced “law no order”), a 45-minute game piece dealing with social justice and American history. Each player represents a separate character (unknown to the other players) and is handed a law to follow at the beginning of the piece.

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