ART IS…

Art Is: Dameun Strange
Dameun Strange is a sound artist, multi-instrumentalist, and award winning composer whose conceptual chamber works, choral pieces and operas are focused on stories of the African diaspora, often exploring afro surrealist and afrofuturist themes.
TRANSCRIPT
(cheerful music)
- I think of myself as a storyteller
because I always thought that
that's what I wanted to do with my music.
As my journey as an artist continued,
I wanted to tell stories that aren't often heard
or are quieted and in particular,
stories about people of African descent,
uh, from the African diaspora.
(bouncy music)
My name is Dameun Strange
and I'm a Sound Artist and Composer and Musician.
(suspenseful music)
As a musician, I've played everything
from classical music to jazz, to hip hop, gospel,
experimental, ambient electronic work too
then I've also written a couple of operas.
(melancholic music)
My mom was an inspiration to me artistically
and she is the first person that really taught me
how to write a song.
And she died at a fairly young age.
I feel like I had a decade of like trying to like
figure out who I was,
after my mom passed away.
And then I've had a decade of recovery as well,
where I found, found my journey back to composing
and being the artists that I,
that I thought I would be.
We are in my little lab,
um, and it's kind of where I like to map out projects
and do some fine tuning on, on things that I've recorded.
I think for a long time,
I had these ideas and I wanted to write for orchestras
but now I've decided that, that I don't need that.
That that's not the standard of excellence
and really feeling connected to my own traditions
as an African American
and then connected to my ancestors from Africa.
That's one of the reasons why I decided I wanted to learn,
learn the Banjo because that's an instrument
that I can directly tie
and, and find its roots uh, in Africa.
(lighthearted music)
Today I'm collaborating with Kahlil Brewington,
who has been a musical partner of mine
for almost two decades
and also with Ananya Chatterjea.
And she is the leader of Ananya Dance Theater.
So I, I've always been a fan of collaborating
with other artists outside of the musical genre.
I'm contributing what I do
which is sound and they're contributing movement.
And when it comes together
it's just a beautiful magic that, that happens.
(lighthearted banjo music)
I told him so that the meter
that I was going to play in
and Ananya asked me,
do you have like a mood or theme that I should think about?
And since I'm really working on pieces about water,
I just said, just water.
(lighthearted banjo music)
This piece that I was thinking of doing
was actually telling a positive water story,
because so often, um, for African Americans,
our stories about water are negative, whether it's about
the Middle Passage and Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade
or about segregation from um, beaches and pools.
So my way of dealing with it
and healing uh, this phobia that I have
was to think of a positive story
but I want to go further
and really connect it to our ancestral roots.
So this past January, I was able to travel to Senegal
in West Africa.
And since Senegal is uh, very much a country in Africa
that is connected to the ocean,
it was just fascinating to be there
and to feel so familiar with the place,
looking into people's eyes, the Senegalese eyes,
I was like, I feel like we're very much connected.
(lighthearted banjo music)
What I want people to get out of my work
is to feel a deeper understanding
of the full spectrum of blackness
and then all the beauty that exists in that spectrum
to be inspired to learn more.
So for other African Americans in particular
or black folks, uh, to, to feel that they're heard
and that they're being celebrated.
And sometimes there's a, uh, an aspect of healing
that, that is a part of that too.
(lighthearted banjo music)